大象传媒

During the war my father was an anti-aircraft gunner in the Royal Artillery stationed in various parts of Britain. He often talked about his wartime experiences over a pint with his mates in the pub, many of whom had also been servicemen, and I liked nothing better than to listen in.
He always maintained that his basic training had a remarkable effect in instilling a great sense of confidence in him that civilian life had not.''When I went away I was afraid of everything; when I came back I was afraid of nothing.'' he said. He never served abroad and always resisted volunteering for an overseas posting because his best mate, a cockney, had done so and been killed within a few days of going overseas. ''Orders are orders'' he would say, ''but never volunteer for anything!''Before his mate was killed he visited his home in East London and was surprised by the poverty and deprivation that he found.Coming from a small Pennine hill village to the west of Huddersfield, his own family circumstances were far from affluent, but he maintained that they lived better during the war than many and benefitted especially from a constant supply of fresh vegetables grown in a small family allotment.
In 1944 my father found himself manning an ack-ack battery on the outskirts of Tunbridge Wells in Kent at the height of the V1 flying bomb raids on London.For weeks they blazed away at V1's passing overhead on their way to the capital and whilst the noise was considerable, they hardly succeeded in hitting anything. Then a new form of American ammunition was delivered and suddenly they began to bring down some of the V1's over the town.Considerable damage ensued when they fell relatively untouched with their warheads intact. When it became known what was the cause of this new devastation, my father's unit became so unpopular that they were refused service in their local pubs in the town!
Nevertheless I am very proud of my father's wartime service and I always secretly admired him greatly for choosing to fight rather than opt for an exempted occupation as he told me some had. As a result of his service and that of many thousands of others, I now have the freedom and affluence to be able to travel frequently overseas and when I do I always carry with me one of his wartime ''dog-tags.'' They were lucky for him and I hope they'll continue to be lucky for me!

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