大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Nona Dougherty of the GMR Action Desk on behalf of John David Lappin and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

On the large croft in the middle of our estate was a hugh open-topped metal tank about 8 foot high which was an emergency water supply should the normal supply of water failed. These were situated all over and on surrounding walls painted in yellow was a large sign L.W.S. and an arrow pointing out which direction it could be found.

It was on this croft early in the war that the local A.R.P. gave demonstrations to residents on how to deal with incendiary bombs using the stirrup pumps which were disributed to various houses on the estate. You would think that recycling and saving was a recent phenomenon by all the publicity it is being given by the media. We, in the 1940's were all past masters of recycling. The local farmer had bins stationed around the estate and any food scraps, peeling stalks that anybody had left over, this is where you put them. The end use was food for his pigs!

At school one year, we had a fortnight of collecting glass jam jars and the school fund received a small amount of money for every dozen collected and the pupil who collected th most, won a small prize. Naturally, there was not an empty jam jar anywhere in the local area.

Another year, it was books and magazines for the troops and depending on the weight of paper you took to school, resulted in you being given a rank, i.e. Corporal, Captain, Major!

Regarding saving, every Monday we were encouraged to invest in National Savings and when you had saved, I think it was 15/-, you received a saving certificate and after a stipulated length of time, you could cash it in together with the interest accrued. One week in the year the town had a s[ecial savings week and in the market place a tableau was erected. Once it depicted an allied submarine and an axis battleship and depending how much had been saved each day resulted in a torpedo moving towards its target. If the saving target was reached, the battleship was sunk!

During the war children, especially boys, collected many items, usually by swapping. I still have about 10 military cap badges. unfortunately all my shrapnel has gone and the silver foil called "chaff" which was dropped to confuse enemy radar and littered the streets on many mornings together with pieces of barrage balloon material from the "Belstaff", a Middleton firm which made rubberised fabric, are buried in a box somewhere in the garden - my buried treasure - ready for some future generation to find.

It is now hard to believe and will no doubt horrify many, but I had in my possession, as a 6/7 year old, through the swapping system, about 6 rounds of rifle ammunition [.303 mm]unknown to my Mother! I was not alone, many other lads had them and after watching them placing them between two bricks and using a nail and hammer, trying to fire them! - tried it myself in the garden! Luckily for me on the day I was experimenting, an uncle on leave called to see my Mam, saw what I had and took them off me! He disarmed them by twisting off the end and took out the strips of cordite. He then placed the strips on the garden path in patterns and spelt out my name. He then lit one end and the flame quickly burnt along the strips, just like we saw in Westerns with gun powder. It left an imprint on the flags and were still there years after the war ended, and was more fun than trying to fire the bullets.

This takes me to more gun experiences.
The first was regarding my Uncle Bert who was stationed for part of the war on Glasgow Docks as a guard. He was armed with a revolver and part of his duty was to stop looters and gangs trying to steal the emergency food rations stored in the ship's lifeboats - they all contained chocolate which was highly prized. I persuaded him to let me see his revolver which he used to say was just like a cowboy's, so on one leave he brought it home for me to play with - I was in school boy heaven! Then disaster struck! - he forgot to take it back when his leave was over! you can imagine the panic when he arrived back in Glasow! My aunty had somehow to get the gun to him because he would have been court martialed if the army found out he had no gun. He managed to bluff his way through by borrowing revolvers off his mates, whilst my aunty sent his through the post, well wrapped in knitwear!
The second was during the summer of 1942 and my Dad was stationed at Leigh-on-Sea awaiting to be sent to the Middle East, although he did not know that at the time! He was in an Ack Ack Gun Unit of the Royal Marines on a 3.7 inch anti aircraft gun on coastal and port defences. Instead of him coming home on leave, he managed to arrange for my Mother and I to go and stay near where he was billeted. He was friendly with his Major who also had his family on holiday and I used to play with his son who was about my age. Near the end of the holiday they received orders that they were to be sent abroad and to pack up their gear.

My Dad's other job was in the stores so he was able to borrow items [I was the only boy in our neighbourhood with a real leather football, cricket bat [much too big for me] and a real cricket ball - was I popular with the older boys! One day, to keep me and the major's son occupied, he borrowed two revolvers for us to play cowboys with! In the meantime, all the marines were piling their full kit bags in the street where they were billeted in what were boarding houses pre war. We were playing hiding behind these piles when huge lorries came down the street and the vibrations sent all the kit bags flying and we were trapped under hundres of kit bags! The marines who saw what had happened feared the worst for us but as luck would have it, we were in the gutter and in a pocket caused because the high kerb kept the kit bags off us, a lucky escape!
The third was in the early summer of 1944 at the end of June e4arly July and Dad was back from his tour of the Middle East, Palestine, North Africa and Sicily and was stationed at Warsash on Southampton Water. His gun unit was one of the many there to protect the impending invasion fleet. Again he had arranged for us to go down to stay with him on holiday near his unit. Unfortunately, before our holiday at the end of June was "D Day" and an exclusion zone was in operation along the South Coast. This did not deter my Dad who went ahead with his plans for us to stay at a house in Hamble belonging to a relative of his Major. They were going to stay on a nearby farm so did not need ration books and we would use theirs for rations. He told us which train to catch from London, which was a stopping train to Southampton and which station to get off before Southampton. When we arrived at London Road Station, Manchester [now Piccadilly], my Mother showed her travel warrant to the ticket inspector who, when he saw Soouthampton, promptly sent us to the Station Master. He pointed out that we could not go to Southampton. My Mother pleased with him saying I might never see him again, so he said OK and wished us good luck!

We broke the journey in London and stayed overnight with an aunt and uncle who lived there, and no problem with the train to Southampton. From then on everything went as planned and when we reached the designated station, we waited in the waiting room until the ticket collector crossed to the other platform, then promptly left by a side gate where we were met and taken to the house in Hamble. The house was a semi and from my bedroom window I could see the daily hospital ship going up to Southampton with the wounded from France.

The first time we went to find my Dad was an adventure in itself. We had a map to follow which took us down a lane, which we later found out was on the perimeter of an airfield and many times I had the thrill of fighters taking off and passing over our heads at zero feet as they cleared the high hedge. The lane brought us out at the River Edge where the American Army Engineers were building a jetty for the hospital ships to dock at as it was nearer to Netley Hospital than Southampton. I became very friendly with the G.I's - so no shortage of chocolate and gum! Next was a trip across the river on a rowing boat ferry then a walk down a long road lined with what looked like boarding houses. We just started walking down the road when we were challenged by a sentry who said it was military only. This is where Dad had slipped up, being in unifort he had no problem using this route. Mam showed him the letter and route my Dad had given her and told him we had come down from Manchester. He kept us waiting until he had checked us out, then gave us a special pass for future visits.
At the end of the road, we turned left past a field full of military ambulances and walked along a coast pathway and after a short walk we came to my Dad's camp at Warsash. directly opposite Calshot Tower, a base for Sunderland flying boats.
This holiday was probably the best I have ever had, the weather was very hot and we spent many days on the beach near the gun site and when they could, my Dad and his mates came down for a swim. A few times the alarm went and they had to run to their guns and start firing at what were to become known as "Doodle Bugs" or "V.1's". We thought they were very fast German planes at the time.
I spent many hours searching along the safe stretch of beach looking for objects amongst all the debris wheich might have come from the invasion beaches and watching the flying boats across the water. As I could not swim I was given a cylindrical rubberised fabric life belt to wear, which was tied on with tapes and blown up by vlowing down an attached tube. I was allowed to keep this and had it for many years.
One day I was allowed to have a close up visit to my Dad's anti-aircraft gun and even sit on his seat and turn the handle to elevate the barrel.
Floating on Southampton Water were huge objects which looked like cotton reels and nobody knew what they were. Some thought they had something to do with repairing or garaging landing craft - they were actually the reels of oil pip for "PLUTO" [pipe line under the ocean].
One day, near the end of the holiday, there was a military atheltic meeting held near Southampton and as my Dad used to run for Salford Harriers, he was running for his unit. We went with him and all his mates in the back of an army truck to the event.
We came home via London where we stayed overnight with the uncle and aunty, then caught an early train to Manchester. The adventure did not stop there because, just out of Euston, the train stopped due to an air-raid. You could see the V 1's flying over, then falling down and hearing the explosions!
A few weeks after the holiday, my Dad's unit was sent to be part of the anti-aircraft defences of Antwerp which also became a target for V 1's, and the German counter attack, known as "The Battle of the Bulge".
Continues with Part 3.

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