- Contributed by听
- 大象传媒 bus in Lincolnshire
- People in story:听
- Clare Simpson
- Location of story:听
- London
- Article ID:听
- A1955496
- Contributed on:听
- 03 November 2003
We used to work on a Sunday evening above platform 15, they used to do coffe, tea,eggs for the troops, we had a continuous stream of people queing all evening long. In the two years I was there I never saw the end of the que! It was run by a well to do lady, who supervised it. The washing up bowl was large and made of wood.
When the red light was overhead with meant a bombing raid was on the military police used to come and collect all the tea urns and take them under the station. This was in 1942. I've never been able to find the doors we went through to get underneath the station.
On Waterloo Station one night myself and several relative - the military police came up and asked my brother where he was stationed - he said the Tower of London - he was in the Scots Guards - they didn't believe him. The carted him off and in about 20 mins he was brought back and said they had made a mistake.
We were transferred to Plymouth as I worked for Shell as they thought it would be safer. We'd been there 18 months - the polish ships in the River Tamar they used to fire there guns before the siren went - so you got shrapnel coming down onto the paths before you were aware that the siren had gone. The planes came in with their engines off - or so we were told.
Back in London - a bomb fell at Ballham High Street and unfortunatly it went down an air shaft near the underground station. It broke the water mains as it went through and the platforms were ingulfed in water. There was a red London Bus passing at the time - the bus went down the hole. It was sticking out the hole - it was some days before it could be hauled out.
A V2 fell on Smithfield Market in High Holborn - I was in Leadenhall Street in the centre of London - it was about 2 miles from where the V2 fell. Our dresses lifted up with the force of the blast.
It was evening time when I was walking up Putney Hill and there was suddenly a roar like a train going through a station and I crouched down by the side of a fence as I knew it was something pretty big - it fell in Richmond Park - i was only about a mile and a half away from it. No one was injured.
I went to the West End of London one afternoon in December - we sat in the dress circle and half way through the film we were asked to come downstairs as there was a red alert over London - eventually the film was suspended and the audience left. There were so many fires burning in the East End of London that I remember being able to read the front of a paper without a light. I'm not sure how I got home but I got back to Putney and you could still walk about without any trouble - because of the fires light.
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