大象传媒

By Alan Butcher
In 1940 I was three and lived in Lancing road in Sheffield near the Sheffield United football ground and one night the Germans decided that they were going to remove us by bombing us. I don't remember anything about the actual bombing as my mother had moved us into the cellar. When we came out the next morning all the outside was very very clear and there wasn't any debris about at all just the shell of the house and the next door house was just the same.

We wandered about and walked down the road and the local school was on fire so everyone was dancing around that and a little bit later they cleared the street and a just down the road there was an huge explosion louder than any noise you hear on November 5th and that was an exploded bomb which they were getting rid of. From that time onwards I ended up living on the Frechville estate with an Auntie and my Grandparents. I remember the 1940 -1941 winter was very bad and I remember building igloos out of ice blocks up there.

Later they found an unexploded German bomb just 300 yards from our house, if it had gone off I think it would have been the end of us. It took us about a year and a half to get the whole family back together living in the same house after the bombing. My brother was nine at the time and my mother told me later that he turned green during the bombing as he was so terrified but I was so young that I can't remember being frightened I think my mother cuddled me so tight during the bombing.

By Alan Butcher- Sheffield

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