大象传媒

This story has been written onto the 大象传媒 People鈥檚 War site by Cornwall CSV Storygatherer, Martine Knight, on behalf of Matilda Jeffry. Her story was given to the Trebah WW2 Video Archive, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund in 2004. The Trebah Garden Trust understands the terms and conditions of the site.

Being the RAF I worked, during the blitz, on barrage balloons in Coventry. During one air raid I was hit by shrapnel and only saved by my tin helmet.

After Coventry I was posted to Predannack on The Lizard. I was, by then, an electrician and worked on the flight trainer simulator. Pilots had to do 2 hours training each month to be able to use the radar.

It was good for me to be posted near home, as my father was a PoW in Poland, having been captured at Dunkirk.
He was fifty when war broke out and lied about his age to enlist as he hadn鈥檛 fought in WW1, due to being in a reserved occupation.
He was in the Royal Engineers and they were used to keep the enemy tanks back whilst troops escaped from the Dunkirk beaches. Of course, they themselves were then overrun and were marched all the way from the Belgian border into the heart of Poland.
He was listed as killed in action and it was two years before my mother heard from the Red Cross that he was alive.
Before the war he was a tailor with Simpsons of Penzance and, whilst in the PoW camp, made fake uniforms to help escapers. They were made from blankets and all sorts.
Some who escaped visited him at home after the war, but not all survived the attempt.

Video details CWS040604 14:55:56 to 15:08:16

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