大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Alison Tebbutt of the Derby CSV Action Desk on behalf of Doris Webb and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

From 1940 to 1948, I worked as a bus conductor in Derby. I didn't want to go into a factory. I had to walk three miles to and from the bus station. Sometimes I did this walk twice, if I was on a split shift. I had to carry my gas mask on one arm, and a tin hat on the other. I also had to carry a big box of tickets and a ticket rack. There were no lights on the buses and no signposts.
Sometimes the driver had to take American soldiers back to Western on Trent. One night, some girls got on the bus with them. 'I can't bring you back again' the bus driver declared 'I'll lose my job.' So he left them there!
I was often terrified as I started the long walk home from work. My dad worked on the railways so my mother was often home alone. If the siren went, I had to run all the way back, because my mother didn't want to go into the shelter on her own.
One night, my dad declared he wasn't going into the shelter. 'If I'm going to die, I'll do so in my own bed,' he declared. As soon as the bombs started to drop he was soon running down the stairs in his pajamas!
I was only married for seven weeks when my husband, Frank, got called up. I used to wait for the postman everyday. He just kept shaking his head. One day my mother came to the bus station with a telegram, Frank was missing. I wrote to everyone trying to find him. Someone sent me a packet of needles, as proof he had been lost. Frank never came home. I was a widow at twenty-six.
About four years after Frank died, I started to notice I always had the same driver on my bus. His name was Sid, he was from the Lake District. 'Why are you always on this bus?' I asked. 'Because of you' he replied.
Sid and I got married. Frank and Sid were like chalk and cheese. Frank was a true gentleman. Sid was rough and ready, but loved to dance!

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