大象传媒

My name is Eric SHINER. I lived at Burnham-on-Crouch in Essex during the war. This is the third chapter of my war memories, No 1 was entitled 'BEFORE THE BEGINNING', and No. 2, 'OUT OF THE FRYING PAN INTO THE FIRE - AND BACK'

Burnham-on-Crouch is situated is five miles inland from the coast, nine miles north of the Thames estuary with the River Blackwater as far again to the north. After the daylight air battles of the summer of 1940 there followed the night raids - The Blitz. These raids continued for months and few months went by without and air raid warning. At first we would watch from outdoors and look for the searchlights which was the first indication that enemy aircraft were about. Then we would hear the distant sounds of gunfire followed by the never to be forgotten unsynchronised drone of the enemy bombers on their way to London. That was the signal for mother to hurry us indoors to the cupboard under the stairs in the hall next to the gas meter! We didn't have an air raid shelter. Mother would watch from the open front door.

I remember well the noises and the sounds - the sound of the aircraft - the distinctive crack of the A.A. guns - the pom-pom-pom of the Bofors guns - the clatter of shrapnel on the road and on the roof tops - and the hail-like shower as dozens of incendiary bombs fell. I soon learned to separate the sound of bombs crumping in the distance from other reports, but we were always waiting for the big bang - the bomb that would drop too close. Then one Friday evening it came. A tremendous explosion shook the house. A land mine had exploded in the gardens of houses in Princes Road next to the railway line. My friend, Colin HUMPHRIES, lived in one of the houses that was destroyed. He had been in the bath at the time and he had escaped injury when the bath tub turned completely over and left him underneath.

Lan mines came in twos. The other one had landed near the marsh Road railway bridge and the parachute had caught up in a tree suspending the sinister grey cylinder in mid-air. The soldiers guarding the site wouldn't allow anyone too close and it was later blown up by the Army. Most of my school friends sported a piece of ragged khaki parachute or a piece of cord - souvenirs from the parachutes the mines floated to earth on.

Then there were the sights that accompanied the sounds - the flash of shells busting - the searchlights weaving across the sky - and the flares lighting everywhere outdoors and in with an intense white light. Mother would call us to the door to see something spectacular - a flare hanging in the air lighting the clouds or an aircraft shining silver coned in the searchlight beams. And I also remember the red glow low in the western sky that we were told was London burning, 50 miles away. In the daylight there was a towering pall of black smoke where the oil refinery at Thames Haven had been hit.

Our night fighters were roving the skies in search of the raiders but we didn't know it at the time. One night were in our usual place under the stairs during a raid when I could hear an enemy plane. Suddenly the sound changed and got louder until it became a wailing screech, followed by a dull thud, and silence. The plane had crashed in a field near Twizzlefoot Bridge on Marsh Road, about 2 miles away. The following morning my brother and Icycled to the crash site. There was an oily smell in the air. I climbed up the rim of the crater and looked in. An oily greenish liquid filled the bottom. ARP wardens, servicemen and P.C.Lomax, the local policeman, were busy with buckets of formaldehyde looking for human remains. I found a hand, small and white, among the wreckage. We stuffed our saddle bags with as many peices of the wreckage as we could as souvenirs. Many years later I learned that this plane had been shot down by one of our night fighters.

A few weeks later a similar event occured when another enemy aircraft crashed at Dammerwick Farm on the marshes, but I was at school the next day and I couldn't get to see it until the weekend when all that remained was the crater, again with the oily liquid and the distinctive smell.

As well as bombing, enemy aircraft were laying mines in the waters of the estuaries. One tragedy occured at Burnham when Jimmy DEAN and Bill BOURN had taken a motor boat from Petticrow's yard to go up river and had been blown up by a mine off Cliff Reach.

Mornings after a raid, if we wern't at school we would search for shrapnel, empty bullet cases and any incendiary bombs that had failed to ignite. We knew which ones were booby-trapped with a charge in the fins bu those that weren't were a source of thermite mixture which we extracted by taking off the fins and unscrewing the top. Ideal for making home-made fireworks!

When Hitler invaded Russia the worst of the night raids ceased. The sound of aircraft still filled the night skies, but now there was no air raid warning and the sound was the regular beat of the Merlins and Hercules - the engines of our bombers on their way to the enemy.

In those days it was the sweet sound of revenge.

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