大象传媒

Age 2 - 8 in Tottenham 1939-45

I was born in London in May 1937, just before World War 2. My dear parents were Victorian in their outlook as was everybody then it seemed. My father was a long distance lorry driver and his parents both died by the time he was three years old. He was therefore brought up in an orphanage. He was the youngest of four children, a sister and two elder brothers. My mother was the youngest of five children. They married quite late in life at about 32 years old. Because my father was an orphan, he left me with the impression that I was dearly loved by both him and my mother. I now consider that I was very lucky.

Because of the fast approaching War in 1937, I now understand that my birth was somewhat frowned upon at the time by my mother鈥檚 family of elder brothers and sisters. The attitude was 鈥� fancy bringing children into a World like this鈥�. Even more so was the birth of my younger sister who was born in February 1943. I clearly remember the outbreak of War, the bombing of London in 1940, evacuation to Lancashire, Doodlebug bombs, V2 rockets, bomb sites and the devastation in London, the blackout, the peasouper smogs, Churchill鈥檚 speeches and the hushed silence of all the adults listening, in need of his evocative tones. Although I was only an infant during these times, when I look back and remember, it seems to me that one could 鈥榝eel鈥� the atmosphere of the time, the will to win, the national oneness. A clear example of this was the sheer joy when the American daylight bombing raids on Germany took place, when about 1,000 4 engine flying fortress bombers skimmed the London rooftops in formation en-route to Germany, when their thundering engines shook the houses with their roar, when all the residents rushed into the streets cheering and shouting them on, willing them to do the maximum damage to the German towns, in open revenge for their own suffering.

Life was cheap then! It鈥檚 the only time in my life that I remember this attitude prevailed. That 鈥減ublic opinion鈥� thought so too. Life was cheap! Especially if you were the national enemy. Especially if you were a neighbour who had died in his house from a bombing. One had to think that, for to put too high a value on one鈥檚 neighbour鈥檚 loss of his life, took it鈥檚 toll on emotion for you. One had to forget it, and get on with it. This was the atmosphere. This was what war was. At last a relief from years and years of putting a very high value on life. At last open bloodlust, war.

How silly it is that this should be. Would it not be better to lower the value put on life in peacetime by bringing in strong laws such as capital punishment against murder and violence, than to gradually increase the value put on life until laws get weaker and weaker until eventually open bloodlust breaks out, riots take place, and finally open war between all nations. Life is precious, we all know that, but public opinion must be listened to. I say this with an eye to 1997, when there is no capital punishment, prisons are overflowing, public opinion is said to be overwhelmingly in favour of capital punishment but the leaders keep the cork in the bottle. I do hope that it doesn鈥檛 go pop one day. It seems to me that this 鈥渃ombined spirit of the people鈥� was so tangible when I was small, that it has been around all my life and it is a spirit or sense that we all have access to and that we can 鈥榝eel鈥� it because it is, in fact, a sum total of everybody鈥檚 emotional feelings.

From the foregoing you will gather that the war had a very great affect on me. I did not realise this until later life when I was over 50 years old. Because I was so young, I learned to live easily from day to day, from hour to hour even. I was so insecure that until the war was finished and I experienced the spirit of relief and elation of VE day, on Victoria embankment with thousands and thousands of others, there was no future, no past to want to remember, and I knew fear. The most frightening thing was the pinging of the shrapnel on the pavement during a sudden air raid. The fear feeling when the siren went, and the wonderful relief with the all-clear siren.

After the War came the austerity. This era seemed endless to me, endless to the point of deprivation. I was totally amazed at the election result in 1945. Obviously I knew nothing of politics but I did know and genuinely loved Churchill. To me he had an effect on all the adults around me. They stopped, they listened, and they seemed to relax. I therefore thought that he was a great leader. Then when the war had ended and the coalition government called the first post-war election, the voters threw him out. The adults around me, parents, aunts and uncles all seemed shocked as well. Listenening to the election results on the radio was as exciting as watching the cup final. The newspapers published all the seats and candidates with a space to fill in the votes cast. The radio announcer gave the results and you filled out the result on the form. Fascinating, like a parlour game. All the adults got together and 鈥榟ad a drink鈥� and it was like a big family party night. There were in fact many party get-togethers during those days. Especially when the servicemen came home.

When the new government came in everybody was to my senses, eager to get on with their lives. I was eight so I was then old enough to understand more and soon realised that the country was broke and that we were all in for a time of austerity. My father talked of the goodtimes before the war, told me about the lights in Piccadilly and theatreland. All I knew was the blackout, for all my life so far. I could not imagine what it was like, the city he described to me. I was told that steam engines where coloured before the war, blue, red, green. Amazing, unimaginable to me. Now they were all black under a nationalised British Railways Board, who even painted all the brass and copper pipes black. I was told that this was because the workers were now in government and that the brasses were a difficult job to keep clean so that they arranged to paint them black so that they didn鈥檛 have to do it anymore. This seemed totally logical to me at the time and it summed up the mood of the country as a whole over the next 5 years of socialist government. Coal was short. I was told that the miners job was a very hard one and that they were taking it easy now that their party was in charge. The austerity was terrible. Far worse to me than the war. Everything was short and rationed. The whole public attitude seemed to decline so that if you didn鈥檛 feel like doing a job you didn鈥檛 have to do it any more. You just downed tools and went on strike. I grew to hate that post war government. A feeling that I have not lost until today.

In building this picture of the experience of infancy during war from 2 to 8 years of age, I have tried to think of what I did for leisure! What did I enjoy doing? So far I have found it difficult to say. My memories of the period 1939 to 1945 are mainly as described so far. There must have been other things worth remembering. Holidays - none at all although we did go for day trips to Brighton or mainly Southend-on-Sea, etc. My main memory is survival and living for "now". No yesterday, no tomorrow, just "now".

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