大象传媒

I was one of the brash, cocky little children who thought being evacuated was a great adventure. Of course, this attitude was bolstered by the fact that my parents were, in a way, evacuated with me.

My father was a teacher in Margate, on the Kent coast. He was also over age, so there was no chance of him being called up. I remember seeing ships going down in the North Sea, and I also recall seeing the troops coming back from France after Dunkirk, bandaged. Shortly afterwards, our furniture went into storage and off we went.

My mother came along as a helper, so it was all very cosy. As our train chugged slowly northwards, other trains, equally slow, chugged beside us, full of returned troops. I remember that they threw cakes and sweets in through our open window. It was terribly hot, and we had to wear our coats. Also, of course, we had to wear our gas mask boxes slung over our shoulders, and our name tags. I was eight years old, but some of the other children were only five. It must have been hard for them, but I don't remember feeling any sympathy!

We arrived in Lichfield, and we were taken to a large hall to be allocated. Along with another girl who shared my name, I was taken in by an elderly lady. 'I'll have the two little Brendas,' I remember her saying.

My parents were the last in the room and the local squire, no less, took them back to his seemingly palatial home. They even had servants and a car! My envy knew no bounds! Being a rather manipulative child, I made up my mind that I, too, would live the high life. Consequently, I began to 'miss' my parents, even going so far as to cry for them! What a little toad! Anyway, things worked out as I had hoped and, for a while at least, I enjoyed living at 'the big house'.

For the next two or three years we moved from billet to billet, but I stayed with my parents. Then the time came for me to move on to high school. I took the Kent Scholarship examination and this enabled me to move to Clarendon House School, then evacuated to Stafford. So I had to leave my parents (sob sob!) and set off on another adventure.

I was billeted with Mr and Mrs Tucker, who took me to their hearts. They had one son, Trevor, and they had always wanted a daughter, so I think they were prepared to love me whatever I was like. They were strict with me, but I always felt wanted. Mr Tucker had taught himself to play the piano, and every night after I was tucked up in bed I would knock on the wall, which was a sign for him, downstairs, to play 'Sheep May Safely Graze'. That is one of my fondest memories.

After some years my father became headmaster of the village school in Alton, Staffordshire, and so I had to transfer away from Stafford and Clarendon House. I remained in contact with Mr and Mrs Tucker (I never called them anything else) until Mr Tucker died well in his nineties. I have since met up with Trevor, the 14-year-old boy who has, by some sleight of hand, become a man of seventy! I visited him in Stafford only recently. It was at his house that I met his son, Nick, and through him, his grandson, Andrew, who is now in his early twenties. Who knows, next time I travel to England from Australia I may meet HIS son!

The thread really does seem to be never-ending.

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