大象传媒

When war broke out my father bought a revolver - he intended to kill at least one German if we were invaded before he died. He also purchased a photograph of Winston Churchill which he would salute every morning.

He employed a local 'chippie' to reinforce the hall of our house and barricaded the front door with sandbags! He also built a shelter in our pantry with some railway sleepers and when the air raid siren sounded we all trooped down the steps into the pantry and tried to sleep in our home made sleeping bags. The pantry also became a place of refuge for my aunt, gran and two-week old cousin from Long Eaton when they moved in with us. After a few false alarms we only descended into the shelter when we heard bangs as well. Eventually public shelters were built in the street but we tried to avoid these as they tended to smell very strongly of urine!

Soon everyone got used to 'being at war' - it became quite commonplace for people to carry their gas masks in their cardboard carriers around with them.

"This story was submitted to the People's War Site by Keith Ruffles of the CSV Action Desk on behalf of Ms Bowers and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions."

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