大象传媒

It was the 27th April 1942, I was 11 years old and living at 46 Southwell Road in Norwich with my parents George and Winfred Tibbitts and my younger brother John, 4. At that time, my father who was in the RAF was stationed at Foulsham in Norfolk. He had been home with us on leave but went back to base on that day. We had experienced air raids on the city in recent times and obviously, the fear of being hit was never far from our family鈥檚 minds. We didn鈥檛 have a shelter in our garden but my nanny, who lived on Goldwell Road; close to our house did, so we tended to spend a fair amount of time at hers when my father was away, probably because my mother felt happier there with us children. However, on this occasion my father specifically asked my mother not to go over to nannies as he thought our house would be stronger and safer. My mother agreed and Dad returned. I will never know why, but despite mum agreeing not to, she decided during the evening to take us to Nan鈥檚 house. My brother and I went to bed in the usual way. We had been to sleep when the dreaded sound of the air raid siren rose from the still of the night. My mother and Nan came upstairs for us and we got under the bed, Nan went under the table. Suddenly there was an enormous bang, the house shook and the lights all went out. Soot came cascading down the chimney and the windows at the back of the house blew in. A bomb had hit very close by, my Nan cried out as the table had gone up in the air and came back down on her back. We immediately crawled out and tried to make a dash for the shelter but the back exit was cut off, so we left through the front door and walked round to Ashby Street in order to reach the back gardens. As I looked across the gardens towards our house, I will never forget the horror when all that was there was a massive hole, the whole block of 6 houses had vanished, destroyed by the bombings.

The moon and stars twinkled brightly in the dark night sky and my mother gasped in horror at the sight and the thought that the only possessions we had, were those we were stood there in. My mother had no shoes on and winced at the pain of the broken glass on her feet. My brother and I were in our nightclothes. Fortunately, some near neighbours grabbed us and directed us down to their shelter and there we stayed for the rest of the night, huddled up with about 30 people in a shelter designed for 4. The next day we were taken to my school on City Road, which was being used as a refuge. There we were washed and scrubbed up with carbolic soap to get all the soot out of our hair. My mother had to go to hospital to have the glass removed from her feet. Then we were taken to the Womens Voluntary Service, where we were allowed to pick I pair of shoes, I skirt, I blouse, I coat and I set of under wear, from new supplies that had been sent from Canada. All of our ration books and ID Cards had been lost in the house.

My father was given compassionate leave, arrangements were then made for us to go to Ely in Cambridgeshire to stay with my grandparents, and that is where I then went to school for the next 3 years and where I made several new friends and first went out to work.

I have often thought about all our poor neighbours in the block, although I didn鈥檛 know them very well, I knew Mrs Jolly who was a dressmaker and lived next door to us. She rented a room in our house where she did her dressmaking. Although losing our home was the most awful experience, at least we still had our lives and went on to have our own families to enjoy.

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