大象传媒

My Family in WWII

My great-great granddad Edward was in the First World War and Second World War. He started off as a Private and ended up as a Sergeant Major in the Scots guards. He moved to the Isle of Man down from Scotland and met my great-great grandma Ellen-Jane. They got married and moved to Liverpool. They owned a bakery and shop in Liverpool. When the war broke out it effected the bakery as a lot of the workers were called up to the war. My great-great grandma kept it going until rationing made her shut down. They re-opened after the war.

My great granddad Ralph worked for shell mex in Liverpool. He lived in the Wirral with my great nanna Grace. Shell wouldn鈥檛 let my great granddad go to war even though he wanted to join the air force with his brother great-great uncle Sid. So great granddad Ralph was trained to disarm bombs. He had to go up and down the jetty looking for bombs. There would be two people on the boat they would take the bombs in the boat to a warehouse at the far end of the docks to disarm the bombs. This was done because the oil tanks were coming into the docks for shell mex to unload the oil.
This effected my great-nana Grace because she wouldn鈥檛 know when or if Ralph would come home. It could be days or weeks before she saw him. Then when he did come home she said 鈥渉e would have a green tint to his face.鈥� Great granddad never talked about the war or anything
he did not to my nan or her brothers or sisters. My great nanna grace wanted to join the land army and signed up with out telling my great granddad. When the papers arrived for my great granddad to sign the paper he refused and said 鈥渘o wife of mine is going to work on the land army鈥� and ripped the papers up.
In May 1945 at the end of the war my great nanna grace was travelling over to Liverpool as she had done every day since she was living in the Wirral even when the war was on. She would travel by train and public transport first by train to central station (from Leasowe). Then by public transport to place where great great grandma Ellen-Jane lived. This time the train stopped at St.James street station one stop down the line because the line was blocked. The busses out of town had been stopped from running because of bombing. My great nanna was also told that my great-great grandma鈥檚 street had been bombed. She was expecting my nanna Dawn and her twin, great nanna Grace was seven months pregnant. So she ran for quite a while not stopping for anything. When she got there she found out that it wasn鈥檛 my great-great grandma鈥檚 street it was the street next to it. This street had been flattened, glass everywhere and buildings around there were effected. Great nanna grace went into labour not long after. A few hours later nanna was born at 3lb. Her twin David wasn鈥檛 so lucky. My great nanna Grace also had twins during the war my great auntie Helen and my great uncle Ralph. Auntie Helen was weighed at 2lb and Uncle Ralph at 2陆 lb. The doctor said, 鈥淭hey won鈥榯 live鈥� but there here today. They were born at home on the 21-12-42. They were kept warm with water bottles.
My Nan remembers the ration books that were a product of war. Everything was rationed, but my Nan had hens, apples, pears and other fruit trees and bushes. My Nan says they were the lucky ones. She did share with the other family, friends neibours. She also remembers the air raid shelter in the back garden. Everybody would come to their shelter. There were gas masks on the wall and ones for the babies. There was a pump in the garden going into the shelter to get water out.
My great-great granddad Rushforth was a dealer at the black market. He used to bring the hard to get foods in coffins or a Hurst.
My great granddad Rushforth was in the navy and travelled all over the world.

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