´óÏó´«Ã½

This story has been submitted to the People’s War website by Anne Wareing of the Lancashire Home Guard on behalf of Muriel Askew and has been added to the site with her permission…

As the war began I was living with my mum, dad sisters and brother next to the park in Oldham. My brother taught me to row on the lake in the park and every Sunday a band would come and play in the park, it didn’t cost much to go and listen to it and we enjoyed doing that. Also we would go to the Grand Theatre is someone well known was appearing, or we would go to the cinema where all the films used to be in black and white.

I was a confectioner by trade and I remember getting the bread out of the ovens on a large spade. It was an early 6am start and I used to get a lift on the back of a motorbike with a young man I knew. My sisters worked in the jewellery trade .

Things were in short supply and we hated the rationing. None of our neighbours had a wireless and mum used to invite them in to come and listen to ours if there was something special on.

I can remember the trams in Oldham and the blackout and when the bombers used to go over on their way to bomb Manchester, we used to sit on the doorstep and watch them.

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