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3rd September 1939 — The Day War was declared

This story was submitted to the People’ War website by Irene. McGivern and added to the site by Anne Wareing of the Lancashire Home Guard…

The term being at war was on the lips and minds of everybody, for me though being only 8 years old it meant nothing. The only noticeable change for me was that my parents, adult relatives and neighbours were very sad and worried that our world had come to this.

Realization that changes were happening only occurred to me as a child, when there were plans to evacuate all children under 14 years of age living in vunerable areas, close to major cities and ports/docks to the countryside. At this time my family was living in North Kent but I was at a private boarding school for girls in London and therefore got evacuated along with all my fellow pupils.

We were evacuated to Hertfordshire and I was living with my family on a farm in a quaint village called Little Gaddesdon. I was the only evacuee to be placed at this farm but the owners had a son called Geoffrey who was about my age. In the village there were some of my friends and classmates housed with other families.

We all attended a school in Hemel Hempstead, which was about five miles away. I had to cycle to school and back every day. I was lucky though because I was able to go home for school holidays and see my family. Some of the other children could not because their families lived in Liverpool itself.

As I could get home at the holidays I still managed to see the developments that occurred as a result of the war, these included; the arrival of the Anderson Shelter at my home. My father had to dig up part of his precious garden; he dug a hole about 6 feet deep and the same long and wide. Over this was placed the Shelter and then on top was covered with the soil he had dug out. He later planted this soil with vegetables and I can clearly remember seeing cabbages growing out of the roof.

My parents fitted out the shelter as best they could which made time spent in there as comfortable as possible. We had a Tilly lamp in there, which would give off light and heat. There were bottles of water, which my mother would change daily and some sort of dry biscuits that my friends and I kept nibbling on, hopefully without mum noticing. This made a great playhouse for us children.

I did spend some time in the shelter during air raids but fortunately, having been evacuated and away from home I did not have to be in there too often. North Kent did not get badly bombed in the early days of the war; it suffered most though later on with the introduction of the V1 and V2 rockets.

Another event that occurred during my childhood happened whilst I was visiting my Aunts in Greenwich during the school holiday. This was the bombing of the London Docks. They lived very close to the River Thames opposite the dockyards. The warnings had gone off and we were in the Anderson Shelter, bombs had been falling on London and then they hit the docks. The sky was lit a most vivid red and the ground was shuddering with explosions. The sound of it all was deafening and the fires spread across the entire length of the dockyard. Alarms, sirens and warning bells were ringing adding to the noise; smoke billowed out of the remains of buildings. On our side of the river all the windows glowed red with the reflection and it was as light as day outside. The water in the river was a fantastic ribbon of red, flowing on past the scene of destruction.

The next day whilst the dockyards continued to burn and smoke filled the sky, my father managed to get through to us and we all went home.

The Battle of Britain happened again whilst I was at home during the summer holiday and took place predominantly above North Kent. Being just a child I though how exciting this was not appreciating the gravity of it all.

The final event that registered vividly in my mind was on the 6th of January 1945, the day my home with me and my family in it got hit by a V2 rocket. There was no warning as was usually the case with a rocket attack and we were going about life as normal. It was eight o’clock at night and my brother Donald, who was only three, was in bed asleep. Father was about to switch the wireless on and mother was in the kitchen with me.

Everything went black and there was the most ghastly smell that to this day I cannot describe. It was quiet and I was bitterly cold. The gas from the cooker then ignited and gave us some light to see by. That is when I realized that I could see the sky and it was snowing, our house was destroyed and I was so cold because the coldwater tank had burst above me.

Next there were a lot of voices and people all trying to help. I got carried out of the wreckage and into an ambulance I didn’t know what had happened to the rest of my family at this stage and was confused by it all. I had injuries to my head, a broken arm and finger and cuts all down the right side of my body. I remained conscious throughout even when I arrived at hospital where they then sedated me.

I was in this state for weeks until I had recovered sufficiently, my father was visiting me in hospital, but it was not until 6 — 8 weeks later that I was told that my mother and brother had died in the attack. Donald was found in his cot without any injuries, but the severity of the blast had burst his lungs. My mother had died from multiple injuries, but my father had walked out without a scratch on him.

The rocket had impacted at the end of our garden and destroyed about dozen homes in total. The only other fatality was a sailor who was at home on leave and the blast killed him too.

After this happened I moved straight from hospital to stay with my uncle and aunt in Scotland where I remained until well after the war finished.

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