大象传媒

Ann Clarke was interviewed by her daughter, Sally Ann Clarke. This story was submitted by Sally Ann Clarke with Ann's permission. Ann fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

鈥淚 was 3 when the war broke out, 10 when it ended.
Air raids were going on all the time. I was terrified of the air raid siren; the pitch of the wine was terrible.
We used to get woken up at night and taken down to the air raid shelter which was made of galvanized metal. We鈥檇 first go to the kitchen where our gas masks would be laid out and put them on and walk down to the shelter. It was right at the bottom of the garden, which seemed a long way for us to walk. We had some books and toys left down there in the shelter and we had candles and a torch. It was spooky. That was one of the worst things really. Most of the time I was in my nighty, it was very cold. There were two little makeshift beds for Jill, my sister and I, we鈥檇 lie down but we couldn鈥檛 sleep. As it was galvanized metal you could hear through it, it was terrifying. Very loud bangs, the shelter rattled.
I didn鈥檛 like being enclosed in a really small space, with lots of spiders and moths. I had a great dislike for spiders and moths after that. Bombs were always going off.

I did know a whole family who lived opposite us that died from the bombs, I remember that bombing raid.

I remember being in our front lounge window, all the glass from that window was blown in, the bomb that killed the people opposite. There was a cot in there and we were underneath the cot. We didn鈥檛 go down to the air raid shelter because there wasn鈥檛 any warning. I don鈥檛 remember the year that was. I remember a smell of gas during the bombing; I had to wear a gas mask.

I was upset that the house opposite was blown up and very frightened that our windows were blown in. I remember being frightened of loud noises and I guess that was bombs going off. We were lucky that only the windows were blown in at our house.

I remember going to Primary school and Mum was working for Lucas factory first of all in South Yardly and then in Sheldon near where we lived. We used to have to walk up from our Primary School to the factory. We had to sit on the grass and wait for Mum to come out of the factory. It was a Walls Ice Cream factory but it was converted. She was doing her bit for the war, particularly widows did then. It was a long walk home.

I remember sitting in the garden when all these sheets of tin foil came falling down from the planes. They came down quite low and I used to collect them and leave them in the shed.

I remember being happy in Beechmore Road mainly because we had lots of friends around us and I didn鈥檛 understand what was really going on.鈥�

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