大象传媒

I was born and brought up in Bristol and I spent the War years working long hours in the telegraph service. We hated the dark nights seeing our way home with the inadequate light of a hooded torch. But we dreaded the moonlight which brought the bombers.
After a bad raid there was often someone in the office with a story to tell. There was the lady who watched her house burn down while the fireman stood by, helpless with no water for their hosepipes. There was the girl who arrived late after spending the night sheltering in the crypt of a church, which was burning above her. Then it was my turn.

When everyone was offered an Anderson Shelter my father wouldn鈥檛 have one. The bombers would never get us as far as Bristol. With the fall of France he realised his mistake and paid for a brick construction in the back garden. My sister hated it right from the start. She said it was like getting into a grave. She was very nearly right. The electricity alone could have proved fatal. From a 15 amp point in the kitchen a thin wire led into the shelter. Connected to it were two bedside lamps and a 1,000 volt fire.

When the sirens went, we waited in vain for the bombers to pass over. The radio was very heavy, and we were getting ready to go to the shelter when the power station was hit and we ere plunged into darkness. My sister flatly refused to go into a cold dark shelter, so we retreated to the cupboard under the stairs.

The fire needed stoking; the scuttle was empty so Dad decided to go out to the coal house. There was an almighty bang, and the latch was blown of the back door. Dad dropped the shovel and flew back to the cupboard, where my mother, who was a very religious woman, was praying 鈥減lease god make it stop.鈥�

A few minutes later there wad a hammering at the door and a very worried looking Air Raid Warden was asking if anyone was in the shelter. It had received a dead hit and had been blown to smithereens. The next morning when I looked at a crater large enough to hold a double Decker bus, I felt sick.

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