大象传媒

This story was submitted to the peoples war website by Simon Gulliford from St Georges school Broadstairs and has been added on behalf of 鈥淓lizabeth鈥�
with her permission who understands the conditions about her contribution

I was seven when the war started, unlike some children I was not evacuated because my father鈥檚 words were 鈥淚f we鈥檙e going we鈥檒l all go together.
Of course I remember things like the menacing sound of the German planes the swoosh of the bombs falling nearby and, the air raid siren and the blessed calm sound of the all clear. My story is about shelter and food.
We lived in flats that were too high and the garden to small to have a shelter built. We stayed at home at night until a landmine fell at the back of us and blew in my bedroom door. My father then decided to we鈥檇 be safer in a shelter. The first one was a few minutes walk away in what used to be a car showroom. The walls and ceilings had been re enforced with concrete blocks. The owner used to charge us a small amount to sleep there. It smelled of Jeyes Fluid and that smell stills stays with me today. We did not stay long.
After this we went to an underground tube station. Regents park. We slept on the platform along with hundreds of others. There were three tier bunks. Much to my disgust we had to sleep on the bottom bunk. It would have been much more exciting on the top bunk, but my dad slept there with mum on the middle. I always looked forward to the ladies coming along the platform with boxes like those carried by ice cream sellers at the cinema. They were larger and contained sandwiches and lyons pies. My favourite was bread pudding. Ladies pushed trollies with drinks on them. They had tea but their hot chocolate was best. When we slept at regents park tube station my parents paid for storing our bedding in a large room behind a pub in swiss cottage. This saved my father from carrying the bedding to and from home.
Our last sleeping place was when we were allocated places in a deep shelter at Belsize park. This was deeper than any tube in London, even Hampstead heath. There was a lift to get you down there. I don鈥檛 think anyone could have walked down there. Thank goodness the lift was never out of order. The lights were really bright down there again there were three tier bunks and it was nice that there were other children down there too. The older people usually played cards. Food was rationed with small pieces of everything, little cones of sugar and tea. There was meat but in small amounts. My mother got rissoles from the butcher which were less coupons than proper meat. Also, we had corned beef which my mother made a lovely hash with onions. I enjoyed our numerous sleeping places people were very nice to us and each other.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.