大象传媒

鈥淭his story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Mike Yeoman from CSV Media 鈥� Brighton, and has been added to the web-site on behalf of Amy Grimes with her permission and fully understand the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.鈥�

The doodlebugs or buzzbombs 鈥� the V1 rockets that buzzed loudly as they flew 鈥� were truelly terrifying to hear. The terrific sound they made, flying through the air like a grotesque giant beetle, and then the silence as they dropped straight down. Unlike the planes they would come day and night. Sometimes you could see them. The noise would stop and the dark conical shape high in the sky would stay still for a second and then start to fall straight down. Ten seconds later would be the noise of the explosion and flames and smoke. Sometimes the buzzbombs would veer off slightly and I would be terrified that they were going to hit us. I still had nightmares about it 30 years later.

One day my infant school was hit and partly destroyed. We had to go to people鈥檚 houses for a week to learn our lessons. Needless to say I didn鈥檛 learn much and half the time I skived off - preferring to lead my gang of eight year olds, with our home made swords and guns, hiding amongst the bushes and the trees in the park. We used to taunt the old man who was the park keeper at the time to try and catch us. He never did.

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