大象传媒

Anne Mead's war time experiences

I was four when the Second World War began.

Workmen came to build an air raid shelter at the house next door. My brother John was ten years old. We were both watching the builders at our neighbours house when the first ever siren went off. John jumped over the wall into our garden. This was an amazing feat as the wall was very tall. We marvelled at this for years as he was unable ever to repeat the jump. Like the little sister I was, had to run round from one garden to the next. I was upset to be just too old for a Mickey Mouse gas mask. The grownups ones were smelly and we kept them in a cardboard box with a string round our neck.

My parents did not want an air raid shelter as it would block out the light to the kitchen window. Instead the coal cellar was strengthened and we had beds in it and kept food there. We went down to the cellar to sleep at the beginning of the war when the siren went. My father was a Baptist Minister, he was an air raid warden and went round the neighbourhood with a torch saying, "Put that light out!" Our house was a large three storey and my brother slept on the third floor. When the novelty of the air raids wore off, we were unable to wake my brother from his sleep and so we all gave up sleeping down in the cellar. My mother said that if John was going to be blown up we might as well all be.

We had a stirrup pump in the yard. This was a very good plaything. The windows of the house had criss cross sticky paper stuck on so that if a bomb dropped the glass would not shatter. We had blackout curtain so no chink of light could by seen by the enemy planes. To go out after dark you had to feel your way along the walls. It was easy to get lost especially when it was foggy.

Food and sweets were rationed, lots of things you couldn't get. My mother always seemed to have tea to spare and would give it wrapped as presents. I thought this strange, maybe because I didn't drink tea. At the beginning of the week my mother gave us our own ration of jam and butter and sugar in our own little pots, I kept mine until everyone had eaten theirs. Sweets were hard to find but we used to suck on some horrible twig like thing called Spanish root. I don't remember every going hungry. Every Saturday we had fish and chips and my mother made pancakes, not a very healthy diet.

Growing up in wartime seemed perfectly natural and I don't think it worried me at all.

Soon after the war we moved to Northamptonshire. I went to a new school. Clothes were still rationed and I was allowed to wear my uniform from the Manning Grammar School, Nottingham. It was very short, grey with pleats. At Kettering the uniform was a longish navy shapeless tunic. At school occasions such as the annual carol service the teachers were so ashamed of me they hid me in the back row. I loved that.

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