Getting Grandma Under the Stairs!

During an air raid near the beginning of the war, before all the proper shelters had been built, we had to shelter under the stairs when the sirens sounded.

My father was at work on a long goods train. My mother had to run to the Bedfont lane Wardens Post as soon as she heard the siren. She was a warden and a fire watcher. So my sisters, Rose aged 15, and Betty aged 10, my Invalid Grandma and I (aged 12) were left at home.We had to get to shelter as quickly as possible while the siren was sounding.

The cupboard under the stairs had been emptied so that we could all shelter there during air raids. The whole process was fairly new to us all. Rose was in charge and we all knew that we had to get Grandma into the cupboard first and get the cat in with us only if we could catch her.

We almost got Grandma to the cupboard then Rose panicked because she thought she had heard some bombs (at this early stage in the war no one knew what bombs sounded like as none had dropped yet).

Because Rose was panicking she started to prod 10 year old Betty to hurry her up. Betty knew that Grandma was supposed to go under the stairs first, Mum had made us rehearse it like that. Betty started to cry and shout leave me alone and ran into the hall, which had cold red quarry tiles on the floor. Betty lay on her tummy on the floor and whent stiff as a board, she shook and screamed and went puce with anger. Rose kept prodding Betty to get her to stop and get into the cupboard but of course this only made Betty worse. This made Rose panic even more and so she prodded Betty more insistantly. it was a vicious circle.

Poor Grandma didn't know what to do for the best. If she had got into the cupboard as she was suposed to it would probably have calmed Betty and Rose down but the situation was as new to Grandma as it was to us and she wasn't very steady on her feet any way.

I took charge in the hall while Rose ran the half mile to the Wardens Post to get my mother. Rose left the house still yelling "stop it Betty" (all this while the siren was sounding),Rose didn't even have a tin hat! How she found Mum I will never know.

By the time Rose came back with my Mother Betty had begun to calm down . Probably because Rose wasn't there prodding her and shouting.Betty was beginning to look a bit sheepish at her own behaviour. Mum calmed everyone down and got us all in the shelter,even the cat Binky. She then had to go all the way back to her post.

Its just as well that so few bombs were dropped at the start of the war and we had time to practice getting to shelter.

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