大象传媒

This story has been written onto the 大象传媒 People's war site by CSV Storygatherer Jane Chanter on behalf of Mrs P.M Drew. The story has been added to the site with her permission and Mrs Drew fully understands the terms and conditions of the site.

My name is Pat Drew, nee Webb. I started school at Geasons, Ridgeway, Plympton shortly after war broke out and my memories of the war years are still very vivid. I lived with my parents, Tom and Sybil Webb and my brother John, at the top of Lucas Lane, Plympton, Plymouth. We were bombed out at our home in June 1941 by a Germen plane which intermingled with British planes returning to England, so no siren gave us warning. We were under the stairs, due mainly to my father suspecting there was an enemy plane overhead. Our front door was blown upstairs, we had no windows left and our lathe walls all collapsed. For weeks afterwards we had blankets between the rooms as our walls and we survived with no windows until the War Damage people arrived to repair.

I only once saw my father cry in my life, which I will never forget. An air raid came upon us before he had time to come home from work at Devonport Dockyard. My mother, brother and I were desperately worried about him and when he eventualy arrived home hours later in the dark, having walked at least six miles, he slumped into the settee, put his hands to his face and sobbed his heart out. My mother pleaded him to tell us what had happened and he said he had had to walk over dead women and children in the streets of Devonport. It is a moment I shall never forget.

Once a German plane came down in a field at the top of Plymbridge Road. As children my brother and I were excited and went up to see it and collected some small pieces of shrapnel.

At one time there were a lot of American soldiers based on the playing fields of Plympton Grammar School and one of them, Don became a family friend. Sadly we heard later that their ship had sunk in the Channel. Some American soldiers used to drive through Plympton, throwing out chewing gum to we children on our way to school. One Christmas the Americans gave some of the children at our school a wonderful turkey dinner, a real treat, at I think Stag Lodge near Plympton.

At weekends homeless people used to walk out to Plympton and wander past our house. At one time our schol was closed in order to take some of the homeless in. During the war my father and his friend, Ivor Dewdney used to organise dances for the Servicemen at the Market Hall in Market Road, Plympton. They were very popular - I was only eight years old then and used to ask the men to dance with me !!

We grew all our own vegetables in those days and as eggs were rationed we had our own chickens. Neighbours gave us their scraps in return for eggs. Luscombes Bakery at Colebrook cooked dinners in their ovens for families once when there was power. There was real friendship between neighbours in those days. We all helped one another in times of need.

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