大象传媒

This is a short account of some of my childhood memories of WW2

I was eight when the war started and lived in Sevenoaks through most of the war, our family had no one in the services so to a lad of my age it was quite an adventure. I suppose my mates and I could be classed as war profiteers as we cashed in on the shortages. We received a penny fo six pounds of newspapers and the same amount for twelve pounds of scrap paper. We could get threepence for a barrow load logs; and with Knole Park so near we had a good source of supply.

Our schooling suffered a bit but Mr Wallace and Mr Taylor carried on with lessons as best they could. When we had to retire to the shelters we listened to classical music, learnt poems and speeches from Shakespear. We never got round to learning algebra but I think what we learned during the raids were far more benificial, as elementary pupils very seldom knew about those subjects.

We watched history being made in the sky above us and on Septenber 15 1940 we were on a family picnic so I was able to watch air battles and I still have the pictures of the con trails in my mind.

I only exprienced two months of the V1 raids as I was evacuated to Devon, but I was at home long enough to remember the sheer terror of the twenty second pause between the engine stopping and the explosion. The V2s were did more damage but there was no anticipation of death with them and most folk will say that the smaller missiles were the real torror weapons.