大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War Site by a volunteer from London Volunteers on behalf of Winifred Bynorth and has been added to the site with her permission. Winifred Bynorth understands the site's terms and conditions.

As a child I lived near a railway line which, it was commonly believed, the Luftwaffe thought was a possible RAF airstrip.

This particular night in question the warning air raid siren came too late and we became aware the Luftwaffe were roaring down the street, and the bombs started to drop with a screaming whistle. Our parents rushed into our bedroom and grabbed my sister and I and quickly ordered my sister and I to get into our siren suits immediately. (A siren suit is an all in one trouser-garment which zips up the front.)

We hadn't time to get to the shelter and my father threw us under the sink in the kitchen as more bombs were raining down. After this raid subsided, we were then able to get into the air raid shelter at the end of Thorntree Drive. This was a communal shelter with bunk beds and many of our neighbours were either in there or rushing to get in there. Another wave of bombers came down the street and this was the worst wave. We heard the bombs screaming down and there was total silence in the shelter as we all held our breaths and prayed that we wouldn't get hit. There was a terrible noise and a whistling of a bomb as it crashed 100 yards or so from the shelter. The whole shelter shook and bricks became dislodged and dust was everywhere.

After two or three minutes, we realised we had been in a very near miss and were safe. Everyone started to laugh in a reaction to the situation we had been perilously through. When the all clear sounded eventually we came out into a beautiful moonlit night where the stars seemed very close to the earth. It seemed as if there were no problems anywhere at all. People called goodnight to each other and went to their homes.

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