大象传媒

I was 12 years old when I was evacuated with Sydenham County Secondary Girls School to Dorking in Surrey. My little brother came with me. The school eventually shared accommodation with Dorking High School, but my classroom was based in the additional building used, Pixham Mill House. My war years were mainly happy as a teenager learning to grow up. I joined a Guide Company which met in St. Martin's Parish Hall and this widened my horizon's immensely, leading to a trip to Lake Annecy in France in 1947.
As a schoolgirl, a Guide and, later, a Ranger, I helped the war effort where I could. We knitted balaclavas, socks and mittens for soldiers at the front. We helped at a local nursery washing plant pots and planting seeds. We washed floors at the local hospital and I spent long Sunday afternoons in the Warden Post under Deepdene waiting for the phone to ring in case I had to set of the air-raid siren. Before the war ended I had started work at the London County Council in County Hall. We used to duck under our desks in an air-raid if we thought the doodle-bug might be heading for us. I went up to London to join the celebrations when the war came to an end and returned to Dorking that evening in time to dance in the main street.