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Margaret Dunn, aged 83

My brother used to work at a local cycle shop, and was very keen on making crystal radio sets known as ‘Cats Whiskers’ at the time of 1944. The Germans had made the ownership of such crystal sets illegal, but people were making them so they could hear the war news from British sources, rather than German propaganda. Anyway, he had sold one of these crystal sets to a local gentleman who lived close to where he worked. Whilst he was working at the cycle shop two days after selling this crystal set, two German Officers came in, and placed the very same crystal set down on the counter. Suffice to say he was scared out of his wits. However the Germans must have just confiscated the set, and had not been told where the gentleman got it from. Once the Germans had left the shop, my brother’s employer told him to go home immediately and get rid of the set(s) he had, which he very quickly did.
Well, we had previously been given permission to chop down two trees in our garden, so as soon as he got home, he took all his crystal sets, and he hid them under the piles of leaves, branches, etc, that had been made by the cutting down of these trees. We were all very scared, but as time went by we heard nothing from the Germans about making these crystal sets, and our nerves settled again.
We found out afterwards that the gentleman had his earphones on, listening to his crystal set, close to a window when a German passed by and saw him. He never did give my brothers name to the Germans, for which we were very grateful.

Margaret Dunn

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