大象传媒

MY RETURN TO JERSEY BY BILLIE BROOKS NEE ROUS

I spent four and a half years in the army. Passed first class cook and also serg. Course. Married 1943 to Warrant Officer Class One. His name was J. Rous. 1945 they liberated France and left the Channel Islands until last. I had a message from the war office, a plane was waiting at Exeter to fly me to Jersey to help to get the food going in the green houses as there was no food and they were starving. I got to Exeter and a biplane was waiting for me. I did not think about it at the time, there was only the pilot, another man and myself. We took off, we flew just above the waves to Jersey. I have been asked since if I was frightened. I was too excited at going home. Also I had been stationed at the airborne Division at Bulford where I got used to planes. On arrival home rats were as big as cats. The girls who fraternized with the Germans were having their heads shaved and put them on the boat to the mainland. Running a farm with Jersey cattle and bulls saved my sister and brother in law. Hitler had sent a message that Jersey stock was not to be destroyed. My mother didn鈥檛 expect to see my sister again. My mother never went to our old house again or near it.

My mother and father returned to Jersey some months later where my father died. My mother came back to mainland and died in Southampton where she was buried.

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