大象传媒

This story was submitted to the the People's War site by Stoke-on-Trent Libraries on behalf of Frederick Holland and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

I come from Endon. We were on the route for the Blackshaw Moor camp. That was an American base and we used to get gum from them.

At Endon there was about five anti-aircraft guns between the Black Horse pub at Endon and the left turn for Rudyard, right in the flight path for bombers heading from Germany to Manchester. They used to send a radio signal from Germany right up a corridor up the country to Manchester unimterrupted. If they strayed off course it beeped at them. They didn't need to navigate! Blithfiled reservoir, Stanley Pool, Rudyard Lake and Bosley Lake are all in a line along this route and the runs were along this route. I remember seeing them firing at night.

Some bombs were dropped on Manchester by parachute. If they were caught by the wind they were blown back the 30 miles to round here where they exploded. There are some craters near Rudyard even now.

Stanley Pool had barrels on it linked together by steel chains to stop enemy aircraft landing on it. There were dummy machine gun posts along the banks too.

Derby Street in Leek was machine gunned by an aircraft one day and some bombs were dropped killing about five people.

In 1941 a barrage balloon broke free from somewhere and was finally caught and anchored at Biddulph. A bit like that story in Dad's Army!

A Thunderbolt plane crashed on Stockton Brook golf course. The pilot bailed out and landed at Biddulph but broke his back and died from his injuries.

On another occasion two German planes were chased by Spitfires and crashed into the Roaches killing all crew. They were buried in Leek cemetery but their bodied were taken back to Germany in the late 1950s. I'm told there are over 40 crash sites up near the Roaches.

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