I was born in Penge in South London and I was 4 years old when the War started. I lived with my Mum, Dad, and older brother in a 3rd Floor flat above Lennards the shoe shop, which was on the corner of Maple Road/High Street, Penge. My father was not fit enough to join the Armed Forces so he was commissioned to work in an ammunitions factory in Streatham, South West London.
At the back of the flats on the ground floor we had a small back yard, where my father used to keep rabbits, which were used to substitute meat for us to live on. There was a small door in the yard, behind which was a tunnel which you had to crawl through on your hands and knees to get to the cellar where they used to, at one time, keep stock. When in the cellar you could not stand up fully but had to bend over to walk around.
At Christmas, so as not to be interrupted by the Air Raids, our family used to stay down in this cellar all night. There was my Mum, Dad, brother and myself, my grandparents, and my aunts and cousins. They used to take all our Christmas food down there and Christmas presents, and they put paper chains and balloons up to make it more of a Christmas for the children. We could hear the aircraft and the bombs being dropped and wondered what we would find when the Air Raid was over and we emerged from the cellar.
After one air raid, my father, who was a member of the ARP, left the cellar to walk up Maple Road to see what damage had been done. One of my aunts lived in a flat halfway up Maple Road with my baby cousin and the Pub opposite had been bombed. My father found my aunt's wardrobe lying across the bed and all the windows were blown out. Fortunately my aunt and cousin were with us in the cellar and were safe.
But one of my vivid memories as a child was about 1943 when I must have been 7 or 8 years old. I was on my way home from school at lunch time and the Air Raid Siren went off. I started to run to get home quickly and suddenly heard an aircraft above. I looked up and the aircraft was so low you could see the pilot and the fact that it was a German aircraft. I was terrified and frantically looked for somewhere to hide. I was passing a Home and Colonial food store in Maple Road, Penge and rushed into the doorway to see if I could get in but they had locked the door. I banged and banged on the door for someone to let me in. An assistant came and opened the door and took me in and down to the cellar where all the stock and provisions were kept. The other assistants were already down there. They comforted me, sat me on a barrel and gave me a biscuit and a piece of cheese and asked me where I lived. After the All Clear Siren went off they took me upstairs and let me out and I ran home to my Mum, who was very worried.
Afterwards we found out that the German pilot that had flown over had machined gunned a playground in a school in Lewisham and had killed lots of children, obviously before the siren had gone off, otherwise they would have been in a shelter. This made National Press at the time. The pilot was eventually shot down.
Written by Julie Allen
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