When war was declared I was 10 years old and recovering from illness at Broadstairs in Kent, having been discharged hurriedly from hospital in London to make room for possible air raid casualties.
From there I went to Ashtead, Surrey, where my school (Dulwich Hamlet) had been evacuated. After a year there I returned to London and was a pupil at Dulwich College for the rest of the war.
The nearest bomb missed me by about 20 yards, killing a girl slightly older than me. It left our home still habitable but uncomfortable, so we moved up the road (Dalkeith Road in Dulwich) to a house rented from someone who had moved out of London.
We shared it with my grandmother, whose home and business had been destroyed by a firebomb.
My father travelled daily, using whatever transport was uninterrupted that day, to his office in the city where he was responsible for arranging the supplies maintenance and repairs for a fleet of cargo ships crossing the Atlantic in defiance of the U-boats. At night he did duty as an Air Raid Warden.
We stayed there through the V1 and V2 attacks, having some scary moments but emerging unscathed.
I am now a retired Clergymmn and Civil Servant living in the Forest of Dean,wondering what the world has in store for my grandchildren.
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