大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a London CSV volunteer on behalf of Audrey Demer and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

In the summer we would go into the fields and help the prisoners of war make the haystacks 鈥� it was fun. The Italian prisoners had more freedom and were very friendly to us, but the German prisoners were guarded as they worked by a soldier with a rifle. They also had 鈥榮hoot patches鈥� on them in case they tried to escape.

Williamina and her friends came to see us as often as possible, as did Mildred and her friends. When they asked us if we were okay we always answered 鈥榶es鈥�. I still don鈥檛 know why we didn鈥檛 tell them the truth. I suppose we realised we had no choice but to stay where we were.

Although we would never answer back I think I got the worse treatment, as I would give the 鈥楲ook鈥� 鈥� a habit passed down from my maternal grandmother and mother. Edna would lower her eyes but even so young I knew these people should not be beating us and I stared them out with the 鈥楲ook鈥�. I suppose it was bordering on insolence but I knew these people were doing wrong as our parents had never hit us or even raised their voices to us. A 鈥楲ook鈥� sufficed. It was not all bad with Mrs Harris as in the evening we would all read a chapter of a book, my favourite being 鈥楲ittle Women鈥� and we often went for long walks with her. She also gave me a patch of ground to make my own garden.

We woke up one morning to see the field outside crowded with soldiers. They were Canadians on manoeuvres and they gave us all sorts of goodies that we quickly gobbled up. We were often hungry and used to steal bread, so we were disappointed when these soldiers moved on.

At the side of the road to the village was an enormous tree trunk, this was attached to something and was to be pushed across as a barricade in case of invasion. One day, whilst playing in the woods we heard marching feet and, thinking it was the Germans, tried our hardest to move this tree trunk across the road. We of course couldn鈥檛 even budge it so we ran and hid in a ditch. Panic over 鈥� it was the Home Guard out on a practise.

When we saw our planes overhead going out to war we would count them and then again when they returned, holding our breath if one was missing and giving a sigh of relief when that one came straggling in behind the others.

We had many adventures, too numerous to tell, but one backfired on me badly. Mrs Harris was beating us periodically and we came up with a plan that I should hide and make out to run away for a few hours, and when she found me she would be so relieved she would never hit us again. I hid for hours behind these bushes watching Mrs Harris, Christine and Edna looking for me. Edna waved her hand behind her back occasionally, and when it was getting dark I let myself be found.

When we got back to the house Mrs Harris hit the backs of my legs with the copper stick so hard that Edna had to help me walk to school on the following Monday. We were long grey socks and mine kept falling down and the teacher was shocked when she saw the welts on my legs. I told her I had fallen over. She called the other teacher over (there were only two in the school) and a lot of whispering went on but that was it. I was wrong to hide, but felt so ashamed for Mrs Harris.

Edna decided to take me to the Billeting Officer and told me to tell him. It took me a while to pluck up the courage to knock on his door as he had a big dog. He looked perturbed when he saw my bruises but just said: 鈥淕o back to where you are living and be a good girl.鈥� So Edna held my hand and we went back to Mrs Harris. There was no time to be worrying about evacuees as men in their thousands were being killed at war.

Chapter 4: www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/a5706137
Chapter 6: www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/a5706227

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