大象传媒

WAR TIME MEMORIES IN NORTH WALES

I lived at a village called Tan-y-fron near Wrexham in North Wales. I was nearly 4 when war broke out on Sunday September 3rd 1939. My friend Shirley was 4 that day and I was at her birthday party. I remember the grown-ups going very quiet when it was announced on the radio that World War 2 had started.

AIR RAIDS
The war lasted for six years 1939-1945. During that time there were many air raids mainly on the big cities like London, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Bristol, Southampton, Coventry, Hull, Liverpool, and Glasgow. The nearest of these to my home was Liverpool. The air raid siren for our village would be heard whining away. This meant that the German bombers were heading for Liverpool. Although we were 30 miles away, we were vulnerable because our village was next to a steel works which made steel for tanks and other things to help fight the war.
At the first sound of the siren my mother would awaken my sister and I 鈥� most raids were at night. We would put our coats on over our nightdresses and go along the road to a neighbours鈥� cellar, joined by other people from nearby; when we were all together we didn鈥檛 feel so afraid. We鈥檇 hear the planes go over and one night a big hill nearby was bombed , the Germans thought it was the steel works. This hill burnt for several weeks because of the dryness of the heather and was therefore a danger to the local area because it lit up the sky. We all had gas masks with boxes to carry them and had to take them everywhere with us; even babies had special ones. Sometimes if the air raid was very bad we wouldn鈥檛 leave the house, my mam would put a mattress in our pantry under the stairs and we would sleep (or try to) there. When the all- clear sounded everyone was very relieved. I remember shivering with fear whilst the raid was on.
Barrage balloons filled with hydrogen were placed over important industries to stop planes flying low. Searchlights were used to light up the sky so that the anti aircraft guns ( called Ack Ack )could find and shoot down the enemy planes.
One evening we were visiting an aunt for a party. My father was patrolling the village as an ARP warden and came to tell us there was to be a very bad raid and that we were not to try going home.There were about 20 people in my aunt and uncle鈥檚 house, a small house, when the siren sounded; the children were put under the table hoping that would be protection. It was a long raid and an even longer night until the all-clear sounded and we went to bed, four to a bed! I was late for school that day.

RATION BOOKS
Ration books were issued at the beginning of the war. Food was very scarce, living on an island- the British Isles 鈥� food supplies couldn鈥檛 be imported and so we had to grow as much as we could in Britain.
Each person was allowed a few ounces each week- 2oz butter, 2oz meat, 2oz margarine, sugar, cheese, etc. It was a struggle for most people to make a decent meal, many substitutes were used, and housewives became good at making up recipes that would be filling for their families; everyone with a garden or spare piece of ground grew vegetables and gave any surplus to neighbours who had nothing.
We did not drink a lot of tea in our house so my mother would swop our tea with a friend for sugar. She was then able to make cakes and biscuits and treacle toffee, because one friend was a farmer鈥檚 wife who had molasses as a treacle substitute!
Our village was lent a field by the local farmer for each villager to plant a row of potatoes. When ready it was wonderful to have plenty of fresh new potatoes to eat. We had potato fritters, potato dipped in egg and fried. Mother would make nourishing stews with plenty of vegetables and little meat, which was rationed. My father needed good food as work was hard and strenuous at the steel works.
With strict rationing sweets were a great luxury. I never saw a banana until I was 9 years old. It was exciting when ships could get to Britain from the West Indies with sugar, bananas, and other fruit. Sometimes tins of peaches would come to the local CO-OP and I would be sent to queue for them, first come first served, one tin per family. Peaches with evaporated milk for tea was a real treat, particularly with a rare tin of salmon to start with!

THE WAR EFFORT
My mother was a Red Cross worker and belonged to the Comforts Committee, a group of ladies who met in the church hall each week.The government provided huge packs of wool, sometimes it would be coloured khaki with which the ladies would knit socks, scarves,and gloves for the Army. When navy blue the garments would be for the Royal navy, and a lighter blue for the Royal Air Force. There were groups of ladies all over Britain knitting away to keep the armed forces supplied with warm clothing. Children were asked to collect silver paper, also wild rose hips from the hedgerows to make rose hip jelly.
When the war ended all the church bells rang. We had street parties with long tables down the centre of the village; we made bunting to hang across the streets with any red, white, and blue material we could find.
Because the production of steel was so important to make armaments,etc. people were ordered to give up their iron railings and gates from the front of their houses; these ended up at Brymbo steel works where my father and four uncles worked. Sometimes they worked sixteen hour shifts and if this was at weekends my mother would put a hot dinner into a bowl and my sister and I would deliver it to the edge of the steel works- no canteens in those days.
Whilst walking to the steel works we would often pick up strips of silver paper which we took home and made Christmas decorations.My father told me that the silver strips were something to do with the Radar system. Recently, ie.sixty years after the war I was talking to a friend who had been a navigator in Bomber Command when I mentioned that at the age of 7/8 I had picked up this silver 鈥減aper鈥� and wondered what it was really for. He was able to tell me that it was called 鈥淐haff鈥� , a British invention, used to confuse Radar, and that he had flown in a bomber raid over Hamburg on the first occasion it had been tried to confuse the German Radar system, with him sitting on the floor of the plane and manually pushing out these packets of 鈥淐haff鈥� . It was judged a success by the fewer number of British planes that were 鈥榣ost鈥� that night compared to previous missions. Of course what I and my friends had picked up during the bombing raids on our area was German 鈥淐haff鈥� which they had used on raids over Britain.
Several of our village boys died in the war; one I remember was a neighbours鈥� son Randolph Prince who died at the hands of the Japanese. I shall never forget the wracking sobs of his father when he heard the news.

My lasting memory of the war years was helping each other and making do with very little. MAKE DO AND MEND BEING PUT INTO PRACTICE.

EUNICE ROLLAND
August 2005

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