大象传媒

THE BOMBING OF THE HARBOUR 28th June 1940

After the evacuation, life carried on much as normal, playing with friends, going swimming, packing tomatoes, until my parents said someone was going to give a speech in town and I鈥檇 have to go.

We took the bus to town, got off at Pier Steps, walked up them to the Smith St./ High St junction by Lloyds Bank. The place was packed, it was solid with people, and the speech was going to be from 鈥� I think it was Mr Sherwill. He gave a speech about whether one should evacuate or not. Anyway, being parked amongst these people I couldn鈥檛 see anything at all, only legs, not being very tall, so my Dad stood me up on the windowsills of Lloyds Bank.

Any rate this rather went on for a bit, from 6 to about 6.30 and being as we were some of the last to arrive, we were near the beginning of the rush to get out of the town to go down to the bus. We went down the steps and along the harbour front looking for the Baubigny bus, which was there. We were waiting to get on with lots of our neighbours, people were talking - and suddenly we heard this throbbing of aircraft! I looked up, and coming up from the south were specks of silver in the sky and they got closer and closer. Dad said, 鈥淟ook, there they are!鈥� and I could see them! We could see by then that they were fairly large aircraft, as far as I was concerned anyway, and they were in a formation. We were just getting on the bus, and I said to Dad, (Mum had got on the bus), 鈥淲hy are they putting ladders down from the aircraft?鈥�
He looked up and said 鈥淥h my Gawd!鈥�, and he called to my Mum,
鈥淨uick, get off the bus, we鈥檝e got to go!鈥�

The ladders weren鈥檛 ladders, they were the vertical descent of the bombs shining in the sun! This was an air raid!

Anyway, Dad said that he had spotted that the building which is the Ladies and Gents toilets by the bus station had been sandbagged. So he said, 鈥淩ight, we鈥檝e got to get over there and shelter in there!鈥�
鈥淨uick, run!鈥� Well we were running fairly fast until we got up by the Albert Memorial - then the first bomb landed! I think we took off then and we got there rather quicker, and so did a lot of other people. We pushed our way in as it was packed, and several clutches of bombs came quite close, and there were some very loud bangs. I鈥檇 gone off air raids by then. The raid went on for about half an hour. Some people said,鈥� It鈥檚 all right, the Isle of Sark is in the harbour and she鈥檚 got a Lewis Machine gun.鈥� I thought that was going to see them off, but it didn鈥檛.

Eventually the 鈥楢ll Clear鈥� sounded and we went out. Well one of the bombs we heard must have been very close because just across where the Albany is now, just across from the toilets, 20 yards it is, it had blown the tobacco factory there to bits and it was all on fire, so that must have been the close one. And of course everything else was smoking, and fire, and we went to look for the bus, but there wasn鈥檛 a bus in sight, everyone had gone. I don鈥檛 know what had happened, I suppose the drivers had gone as far away as they could.

So how were going to get back as we lived at L鈥橧slet, quite a long way? Dad said we would have to walk.
鈥� Can鈥檛 you get a taxi?鈥� 鈥淗uh, a taxi?鈥�
We couldn鈥檛 have afforded it anyway. Everyone was milling around wondering how they were going to get home. However, suddenly along the quay came a lorry which used to deliver the tomatoes and it was our neighbour, our contractor, Mr Sid Vaudin. He had been delivering tomatoes on the White Rock and when he鈥檇 finished, he鈥檇 gone off, and got as far as St George鈥檚 Hall when he heard this fearful racket. He stopped, and saw planes coming up around, and realized there was something on, so he parked his lorry and waited until it was over. Then he turned round and came back because he knew that a lot of his clients for tomatoes in our road, and around L鈥橧slet, had sent tomatoes and were going into town for the speech. So he turned round and came back with his lorry and picked up as many as he could. But he couldn鈥檛 go very far because he was running out of petrol. Petrol was rationed in those days. We got into the lorry, went as far as St Georges Hall and stopped there and got some benches from the hall and put them in the lorry and were able to sit down, and he took us home that evening.
MALCOLM WOODLAND

Mr Vaudin was extremely fortunate. A number of tomato lorries were destroyed on the White Rock; the Germans had mistaken them for ammunition lorries.

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