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This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Dorothy MacKenzie for Three Counties Action on behalf of Edward Awkin and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

In 1943, I was 13years old and had come back to London from being evacuated to Atworth Wiltshire for 5 years. Dad looked after a workers club in Kensington, London and we lived above the club. The club had four stories and a basement. When bombs fell during air raids, Dad used to rush out to start digging to rescue those who were buried and because of this he got to know the local police and firemen very well. A tiff arose between the club members and Dad and we all moved out of the club flat to live in a nearby flat, which had lots of mirrors — I called it the house of mirrors.

After one week the club members told Dad that the falling-out was merely a misunderstanding and we moved back into the flat above the club. That night there was an air raid and the house of mirrors took a direct hit. Dad was out from the club like a shot and I went with him where the police and the firemen were already digging. Dad said to the policeman ‘Who are you digging for?’ When the policeman saw who Dad was he exclaimed, ‘We are digging for you and your family!’

Another experience I remember is that the houses where we lived were around a central garden area and when the siren sounded, we took rolled—up mattresses to a communal shelter in the garden. In the shelter there were three tier-beds and I was always on the top bed. After a while the shelter kept flooding and they re-enforced the basement of the house where the club was to make it usable as a shelter. My mother had fire-watching duties and she was supplied with a fire-helmet, a bucket and pump and a bucket of sand. The only problem was that every time she saw planes coming near, she rushed to the basement to hide. My father had to do her fire duties instead.

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