大象传媒

This story was told to Judith Brewer at Birchington library and Mr Nichols understands the copyright implications.

My Father bought a bungalow in Newington rd just before the War. When war broke out and the schools got evacuated I didn't go with them. When the raids started I viewed the first one from our garden. You could see a lot of planes dropping bombs and there were shells exploding amongst the planes. My father had no job at that time so he joined Wilsons bakery and drove an electric bakers van around Ramsgate. About mid-morning one day in a very bad raid, my Father was driving the van down South Eastern Rd and the bombing was so bad that he stopped the van and a woman in a 4-storey house across the road called him towards her. As he ran towards her there was a direct hit on the van which blew him into her arms and they fell into the passageway of the house which simultaneously got hit by another bomb, bringing the house down on top of them. My Mum and I were expecting him home about 12 but he didn't arrive home till about 1.45 covered in plaster dust which was a bit traumatic for us all.
I was just a boy but I do recall that Chuchill visited the area and the morale which had been very low was raised dramatically as a result.
One day when all the schools had been closed for some time I was near Dame Janet School under the 'dog-fights' and we went to the playground's underground shelter. As I was about to descend the steps I saw a Spitfire hurtling down to Earth and the noise was a very loud whine. Next day I cycled up to where it had crashed and there was terrific hole about 50 yards into the field almost exactly where the traffic lights at Rovex are today.The memory has stayed with me, thinking that perhaps I was the only one to see the pilot's final moments.

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