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SCHOOLBOYS’ MEMORIES OF WORLD WAR II — PART SIX

ANTHONY HOGG

When we returned to school in September 1940, life was punctuated by many air raids, with several ‘dog fights’ occurring early in the mornings whilst we cycled from Cheam to Wimbledon. My journeys often involved diversions because of bomb damage from the previous night's raids. At school we spent quite some time in the basement ‘shelters’, where it was difficult for the masters to conduct their classes efficiently. The school calendar was changed to five full days, no games on Wednesday afternoon and no school on Saturday. We did have some games on Saturday morning for I remember playing rugby in the morning and playing soccer for a Sutton United reserve side in the afternoon.

Inevitably, the disruption as a result of the air raids during the day and at night caused one's studies to suffer.

Discussions often took place regarding which Service to join, and having considered them all, I opted to apply for a six-month University Short Course for Army potential officers. In July '42 I attended a War Office Selection Board (WOSB) in London, had an interview, when I agreed to attend a Royal Signals Course, a medical examination, an intelligence test, filled in some forms, was sworn into the Army and received 5/- (25p.) for a day's pay. Months later, I heard I was to attend Exeter College (University College of S.W. England) in October '43. At about the same time, Bren Taggart (who also cycled to school from Cheam) joined the R.A.F.V.R. and later became a pilot.

With all the visits to cinemas and youth clubs etc., I was pleased to earn pocket money fire-watching at my father's office. Although we still suffered night bombing raids, they were far less frequent than in 1940 and '41, so one was able to have a reasonable night and even do some studying.

BRIAN HORSMAN

Our long summer holiday was in Mudeford, and of course one recalls only sunshine and blue skies. War was declared while we were there, and we returned in September to enter Figures, with new dark blue blazers, regulation cap and tie. One could cope with the size of boys who were a few years ahead, but the seniors seemed to be of a different species. There were strange beings who wore velvet caps and were well over six feet in height, who turned out to be prefects. Some seemed to disappear overnight, to return shortly in khaki uniforms. We had only gasmasks in cardboard boxes and identity cards. The greatest kudos was to obtain an army gasmask case, which caused great envy, and was a most valuable asset for swaps.

It was in this first year of the war when France fell that we had an influx of refugee boys. I remember the names of Maeckelberghe who became head boy and a great sportsman, and Grosjean. I see other faces, but not the names. Some appeared with strange looking foreign bicycles. Thrown in at the deep end it must have been a daunting prospect for them to receive lessons in another language. Mr. Ward often seemed to come to the rescue with fluent French. Why did I remember Grosjean? Because of a cold day, the ferula, and blood on his hand. I do not know what the offence was.

In the winter of 1940/41 we were settled into the school routine. Nights of air raids do not terrify small boys. There is too much of interest in where bombs have fallen, where fires are burning, whether the out of sync engine note of a bomber was a JU88 or Dornier. Mornings brought searches for shrapnel, nose cones, or bits of aircraft for the very fortunate. We had no air raid shelter at home, and in the beginning we squeezed into the understairs cupboard. This proved to be too uncomfortable, and soon we returned to our beds. On the night that St.Paul's survived the onslaught I recall seeing the sky over London bright as a sunset from the fires burning below. The bomb nearest to us fell in Worple Road. Fortunately it did not demolish houses but cut some main services and upset the trolley bus system. Apart from broken windows we got off very lightly.

CYRIL ELKINGTON

As the war progressed the Germans unleashed a new terror in the form of the V-One Flying Bomb or ‘Doodlebug’ as it became commonly known. Their unpredictable arrival made Fr. Sinnott see the need for some form of warning system, from the nature of the case likely to be late rather than early. One Prefect was stationed in the College grounds to listen for the tell-tale sound of the V-One’s engine. When he heard it, he blew a whistle to attract the attention of the Prefect positioned at a top floor window. He in turn communicated with a third Prefect whose duty was, by ringing the Angelus Bell, to sound the general alarm and warning for the Staff to get the boys under cover, if only under their desks. Alas, all went badly wrong on the first occasion when a car revving noisily to get up Edge Hill was mistaken by the first Prefect for a Flying Bomb. The communication of information went according to plan but I watched from the College field in dismay as the Angelus Bell started to swing violently in a thoroughly unliturgical manner, finally making a complete somersault and losing its clapper in the process. I think that henceforward we relied more on God’s Providence than any alarm system...

These war-time dangers caused Fr. Sinnott to realise that those sitting the School and Higher School Certificate exams in the summer of 1944 needed to do so in more peaceful surroundings. He accordingly arranged for all of us to take up residence in Mount St Mary’s College, the Jesuit boarding-school at Spinkhill, not far from Sheffield, and to sit our exams there. He accompanied us and helped us to settle down but this enforced experience of boarding-school life was not the happiest, for some much less so than for others.

PETER WILKIE

On the way to school, a group of us always walked from Wimbledon station, to save the bus fare and look for shrapnel which had fallen on the pavement from the anti-aircraft guns firing from the night before, and we always called in to the Sacred Heart Church on the Hill for a quick prayer. This was an accepted custom for College boys. The best way to the station in the evening was by the cinder path which ran along the railway line - I often walked with Davis and Sullivan and the keen train spotters. One day we found that a shot-down German fighter plane had been put on show near the town, and as we passed by it was possible to pull bits off when the man in charge wasn’t looking. The young Bloomfield was a great collector of the relics of war of all kinds. His speciality seemed to be bullets and cartridge cases, nose cones of shells and the fins of incendiary bombs. These were eagerly sought-after, and an almost daily swop-shop was held.

For a while, a daily ration of milk was available. It was laid out in the hall, and those who got there first at morning break time used to take the top cream off the bottles and leave the very weakened milk for the late comers. If our parents could afford it, we paid a shilling for a proper lunch - always a good meal and the spotted dick was favourite. A group of us always took sandwiches and sat in a special corner. Nobody was made to feel different because of it. When the air raid warning went off, we retired to some basement somewhere. That practice did not last long, and later when the ‘banshee’ sounded it was generally ignored. But when the anti-aircraft guns did begin to fire we took refuge down below, always making sure we had with us our gas masks and our iron rations.

TONY KELLEHER

The onset of war brought the inevitable descent to the cellars at the first sound of the sirens, but apart from the Dunkirk episode, it was fairly quiet on the home front during that first year. When the dog fights commenced over the south east in the summer of 1940, it became a time of great excitement for 13 year olds. So the collecting of shrapnel and bits of aircraft was a popular hobby.

The war had suspended most sport and the majority of activities outside school. So no interscholastic games, unless the conditions suited. Pitches were at first scrutinised for shrapnel, before play commenced. Most games were between the three houses, so they became very competitive

Through the war years, drama had taken a back seat in the curriculum, but as we got used to the wartime conditions and we were getting the better of Mr. Hitler, so bolder we became and expanded our stage techniques. Fr. Sinnott was particularly keen, and in 1944 produced and directed a little sung item involving some of the prefects called ‘My Novelette’. It was a hilarious success.

TONY WOELLWARTH

My main recollection of the College during the war was when, on arriving, we were instructed by the prefects to go to assemble in the Hall, instead of going to our classrooms as usual. Father Sinnott mounted the stage, and in sombre words, reported the death of Esmonde, an old boy, who had been awarded a VC posthumously for his bravery in attacking the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau with his squadron of Swordfish torpedo aircraft in the Channel. He then declared a whole holiday, and we were all sent home.

As a young schoolboy, and not realising the significance of a VC, I remember being unimpressed with Father Sinnott's address - until he mentioned the holiday.

On arriving home, I had difficulty persuading my mother that I had not been expelled from school, and that a holiday had indeed been awarded in honour of an OW who had received the accolade of a Victoria Cross.

BILL HOWARD

As a pupil attending Wimbledon College during the war years, not having experienced peacetime conditions for a significant period, I did not at the time sense that my experiences were anything other than run of the mill. Of course there were periods of excitement when classes were disrupted due to air raids but over time even these incidents became part of normal school life.

One incident however remains with me today which others may recall. It was one of those summer afternoons towards the end of the war when we were playing cricket on the college ground. Picture a scene of some tranquillity. Fr. (‘Daddy’) Dowling was umpiring, busily hardening a cricket bat with a spiked ball. I was midway through an over, bowling inaccurate leg breaks when the silence was disturbed by a very loud ‘Whoosh’ overhead. Instinctively everyone ducked but there was nothing to be seen and the match continued as if nothing had happened. That evening we learned that a V2 rocket had hit Smithfield Market causing enormous damage with considerable loss of life. I don't know why I still visualize that cricket scene but to me it does seem to illustrate how precarious life was at that time. Fortunately my youthfulness blinded me to the daily hazards.

DAVID RICHARDSON

Classes during the War were not usually large. In my second year (1940-41) the school was very diminished in size because so many boys had been evacuated. I seem to remember there were only 170-180 altogether. When by 1945-46 there were 400 boys the place seemed crowded. However the school was always small enough for us to know the names of all the boys. Of course this was only the surname, the form used by even close friends. When friends came home one awkwardly moved to Christian names, only to revert to proper usage back at school. I remember my first visit to Henry Wardale’s home (Stanton Road) and shifting diffidently to ‘Henry’. In the sixth one started moving over to Christian names.

School uniform was compulsory, the main constituents being blazer, tie and cap, supplied by the school outfitters Hope Brothers of Ludgate Hill. A navy blue serge suit was also required which I recall wearing in Rudiments when my parents realised that I would soon grow out of it. Wartime clothes rationing restricted compulsory items to cap and tie. Cricket and rugby also imposed their requirements: white flannels which somehow survived rationing and rugger jerseys, plum red and white and blue horizontal stripes.

DAVID MORRELL

My main memories of these years are of cold in the winter due to fuel shortages, a monotonous diet due largely to war time restrictions, some happy summer days spent swimming in the river Kennett and holidays in Wimbledon where I must admit that I found the bombs and later the doodlebugs rather exciting.

MICHAEL GREENSLADE

War broke out in September 1939, but those of us still in London graduated to the College and Figures. The following summer former Donhead boys were invited back to meet Fr. Barber, now an army chaplain just returned from the horrors of Dunkirk. We sat round him under a tree while he told us of his experiences. The war became vivid in this gaunt and red-eyed priest in military uniform who only a year before had been showing us how to swing a cricket bat.

PEDR DAVIS

I recall watching the doodlebugs that swept over London during a last-ditch Nazi attempt to hurt the British nation during the dying days of World War Two. We boys would watch the pilot-less monsters fly overhead and wait for the jet engine to cut out — a signal that the doodlebug was about to dive to earth, crash and explode.

MICHAEL QUINLAN

The years at Donhead were shaped in considerable degree by wartime constraints. A good many boys left at or soon after the beginning of the war as their families moved away to places seen as safer than London; several of these leavers came back to the College in 1945 or 1946. By late 1940 Donhead’s pupil strength was down to about forty, with a teaching staff comprising just a Jesuit head — Father Francis Moran — with three admirable women (one especial stalwart, Miss Mary Manning, continuing to run the Cubs) and occasional help from Sergeant Jackson for PT classes.

One of the features of the war years was the presence of a significant number of boys (at least a dozen, I fancy) who had been evacuated from the Continent when German forces overran the Low Countries and France. Belgians predominated, but there was also Dutch and French representation. Most returned home soon after the war ended, but stayers-on included Willy Maeckelberghe, whose exceptional gifts as a fly-half made him a special figure in the school, and a Frenchman (Raymond Romeo) who became one of seven from Rhetoric Arts 1947 to go up to Oxford later — a striking figure from a class which cannot have numbered more than about twenty.

Games were, for a time, hard hit by wartime limitations. Rugby picked up gradually in 1942/43. Cricket took a good deal longer to recover.

During the war years high-profile events had to be curtailed. Annual Sports Days continued (though there were no external athletics fixtures) and were regarded as big occasions. Academies (the annual prize-giving evenings) were however foregone, as indeed was the award of prizes.

We were of course conscious of the wider war, but I suspect that at least in my and younger age-groups all but the most imaginative followed events in rather the same spirit as peace-time cricket scores. I recall one or two of the older boys appearing occasionally in their Home Guard uniforms. Harsher reality occasionally broke in, with word of the loss of OWs whom some could remember as senior boys, and there was much attention given to the award of a posthumous Victoria Cross to Lieutenant-Commander Eugene Esmonde, who had been fairly briefly at the College in the 1920s; he lost his life in 1942 leading a forlorn attack by Swordfish biplanes upon the battle-cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau as they broke out of Brest in bad weather to run through the Channel to German ports. Looking back, I am mildly surprised that there was not more fuss made of the award of the George Medal to Derek Baynham, still in Syntax, for his part in a brave attempt to rescue a Polish pilot whose aircraft had come down off the South Coast.

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