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During the war years I was in the War Workers Club. I worked at the post office and my colleagues said to me "One of these days we’ll go to London". The War Workers Club was very handy. We met a lot of service boys up there.

My friend and I decided to go to London to write a story (We both used to write a lot of stories then) — this one was to be ‘The Cheapest Holiday We Could Find’. We didn’t tell our parents, but w set out on the Sunday morning and we were going to hitchhike to London, and we did.

We had two or three good lifts, and just before we got to Worcester there were some U.S troops in jeeps and they stopped. It was any port in a storm so away we went with the soldiers in the jeep and they were just mad! They were up in the hedge — we were clinging on for dear life! They put us down at Worcester. Then we had a lift from Pickfords furniture deliveries who took us to Oxford — then we had to call it a day so took the rest of the journey by train.

When we arrived at Paddington we discovered that the hostel that we were going to be staying in had closed, so we spent the night huddled up together on a seat. We were alright though — we just clung together with our handbags. We rang the hostel the next day and they let us in.

We stayed there a few days, and all we did was go to Trafalgar Square with a loaf of bread, a pat of butter and cheese and lived on cheese sandwiches. At night we went up in the God’s at the theatres for two shillings, and we had a very cheap holiday.

We came back on the train and we were alright, and of course we wrote a story about it for the War Workers Club and that was that. It was very exciting.

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Becky Barugh of the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio Shropshire CSV Action Desk on behalf of Joan Higgins and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

See more of Joan's stories:

• I was the first female postie in the war years in Bridgnorth
• We didn’t really have to take any evacuees…
• ’We forgot about you!’
• My chance was gone
• Evacuee Remembrances — Hello and Goodbye (And Hello again)
• A Victory Memory
• Lest We Forget

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