大象传媒

WORLD WAR 11 MEMORIES

I was born in 1935 on the Isle Of Wight.

In 1939 we lived on the outskirts of a small village called Whitwell. We being my father mother sister and cousin, our house was a thatched lodge leading to two farms, and also to the fields leading to Stembury Downs. During the war high points around the south coast of the Island were key radar posts Niton and St. Boniface Downs and there were R.A.F camps all around these areas. One such camp was on Stembury Down and all service men had to pass by our Lodge to gain access to the camp. My memories of the war revolve around what I remember of the boys stationed there. My father was a farmer and milked every day so we were never short of milk, he was also a very good gardener so we had plenty of fresh vegetables, he kept ferrets so caught rabbits for food and mother kept hens for eggs and cockerels for the pot.
How it started I do not know but mother started feeding these R.A.F. boys about six at a time would descend on us at a time and have a really good dinner, rabbit stew with dumplings and lovely new veggies followed by apple tart or rhubarb crumble. In exchange the boys would bring down some of their rations sugar, tea, chocolate and sometimes even stockings for mother or my eldest sister. It was always a happy meal and I loved them coming.
We did not have an air raid shelter but Mum and us girls went under the stairs when the siren went, we had a big mattress in there and pillows and blankets, a bottle of water and a chamber pot for emergencies only. There were also spiders and little silver fish which fascinated me. Dad and our cousin Harold would not come into the under the stairs; they always stayed out in the porch on guard for incendiary bombs, as being a thatched roof they were on the look out for fire. One night Dad called us all to come out as Southampton had been bombed and we could see it burning a huge reddish yellow light in the sky.
The school that my sister and I attended was in the village two miles away, we mostly walked to school except when the postman gave us a lift in his van. We always had to carry our gas masks with us and most mornings had gas mask drill. They were horrible things with a piggy like snout with holes in and a rubber hood to stretch over your face and secured at the back with a thick rubber strap, the gas mask smelt awful of rubber and hot sweaty breath, I really did hate having to put it on.
The first time I saw a banana was at school. Somebody (I cannot remember who it was)brought a box of bananas in to school one for each pupil. We were also given a bar of chocolate, what a day that was.
Our village celebrations for the ending of the war in the village were wonderful. My father and the carter from the farm brought out the hay wagon and the shire horses and dressed them in great splendour with gleaming brasses and the little tinkling bells and magnificent head dresses and we village school children were lifted up onto the wagon and we rode around the village finally ending up a the village hall where we had a splendid tea party. Where our mothers got the food from I never knew but it was all lovely.

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