大象传媒

My mother-in-law Ethel is a bit of law unto herself and I think it stems from having parents who were stalwarts of their community.

It appears that she married at the tender age of 20 on her birthday.(Sadly, her husband Jim died prematurely around 1957 of a heart attack while playing football).

As with most wartime weddings, austerity was the order of the day but the presents from the guests were forthcoming and were neatly wrapped and stacked around the piano in the front room.

Unfortunately, the wedding reception being held at her parents home was interupted by gate-crashers from "Dicke" Hermann's Luftwaffe causing a mass evacuation into their own and various neighbour's air raid shelters.

There was a fair bit of bombing locally and it must have been quite terrifying, particularly not knowing if your relations, friends and house would still exist when the all-clear sounded.

Eventually the strident note of the siren announced that they could come out of cover and much to their blessed relief the house appeared safe, if a little blast damaged.

As the relatives returned from their different places of safety, Ethels father, Bill Squire (see the story "I am Going to Help Stan!" to find out what happened to his son Billy)later to receive a medal for gallant work he performed during the great East Coast Flood in the early 1950's, decided to check all was well in the house before resuming the wedding celebrations.

He entered the hall and all appeared normal, no visible bomb holes etc. Then, as he approached the front room, he distinctly heard a strangely out of place ticking sound. ARP training took over and he left the house to stop other family and guests from entering.

As can be imagined, looking for a good time in a period of such pain and sadness as WWII the wedding guests were most disappointed when her father announced there was an unexploded and ticking bomb in their frontroom.

Having evacuated people from all around, Ethel's father and a couple of others decided to check the bomb out while awaiting official assistance.

Soon they reappeared and a question was floated amongst the guests, "Who bought Ethel and Jim a bloody clock?" The vibrations of the bombs had started it going.

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