大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War website by Sandra Beckett on behalf of Stanley Hurrell, the author, and has been added to the site with his/her permission. The author fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and condition.

Christine and I first met after we left school at Totnes. Our first date was on 24th August, 1938. We remember it well; in my case helped by the fact that a young man named Hutton scored 364 runs in the timeless test match against Australia at the Oval cricket ground that day.
We knew that war was not far away; we were born just after the end of WW1 and had read so much about the Western Front. We had also seen the beggars with an arm or leg missing or blind or racked with cough from the mustard gas attacks they had endured. We had no illusions. But soon we were both wearing uniform; Christine that of the ATS, where she served in REME, mostly at Catterick Camp. I spent two y ears as a wireless operator in the RAF before re-mustering to Flying duties where I eventually became a Bomb Aimer on 78 Squadron at Linton on Ouse. We flew the lesser know Halifax bomber whose sturdy construction saved six of us from sudden death.
There were so many strange things happening to us. We grumbled about all the restrictions but in one sense life was easy. A serviceman or woman had little direct responsibility; we had no choice; we just did as we were told. We survived WW2 by the Grace of God and at the end I came home from PoW camp in Germany and Christine from Catterick Camp and we were married on 16th June, 1945 at Totnes. Life never went back to the old pre-war ways but we did our best to fit into the new Order of things.
There was so much to remember of the war years; the places we had never seen before, the scores of friendships we made, the kindly feeling that existed between people everywhere, the tolerance and forbearance that was always shown, the help to those in trouble and most of all the total determination to see it through. In the latter sense, we owed all to Sir Winston Churchill; he truly was a man apart.
In September 1939 our teenage thoughts ran to whether our generation could face up to troubles as our parents had done before and we could only hope. In the summer of 1945 we used an expression common in those days 鈥� 鈥淲ell, fair enough鈥�. I can only think how lucky Christine and I were to survive and if I think back it is of the lovely fellows who gave their all.
Christine and I hope to celebrate our Diamond Wedding anniversary on 16th June, 2005.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.