大象传媒

It was early evening on VE day in Grove Hill Road, the part between Swinemoor Lane and the River. Everybody was out on the street and enjoying the bonfire we had built in the field next to the Latimer school room, affectionately known as the Tin Tabernacle. Mr Wright, who ran the local shop, had saved a large box of fireworks from before the war and was about to let them off. I was 11 years old and had very vague memories of fireworks 6 or 7 years ago. We lived at number 333, on the corner of West Street.

My Dad, Les Walker, was called up by the army in early 1940 and joined the East Yorkshire Regiment at Victoria Barracks. He soon went on to the Royal Armoured Corps and learnt to drive tanks at Bovingdon in Dorset, and soon after was sent to India and then Burma. He spent practically all of his working life at Wright and Hoggards in Swinemoor Lane as a printer.

My Mother, Irene, had spent the war working in the shipyard canteen before returning to Broadgates Hospital as a nurse. I can remember, in the canteen, slicing bread on a bacon machine and making chips during my school holidays. My school was St Mary鈥檚 in Mill Lane, before the fire.

As the fire was blazing away, somebody said to me 鈥淢ike, your Dad is coming down the road鈥�. There was this soldier, in uniform, carrying a kit bag, striding towards us.
Suddenly my Dad was the Hero of the Day, as he was the only person in uniform, and he was persuaded to stand on the doorstep and make a speech. He was rather embarrassed, I remember. He had injured his legs in Burma while driving a tank, and spent some time in Indian Hospitals where, he told us, he shook the hand of Louis Mountbatten. He would never tell us the nasty happenings of the war, but only the frivolous things like catching butterflies in the jungle, finding snakes in his bed and taking photos of tigers.

Obviously, my Mother and I were delighted to see my father again after so many years away. I recall unpacking his kitbag and finding many sweets rolled up in towels and shirts. And that was the end of my perfect VE Day.

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