School Days

Hi
My name is Dennis Grange I was Six years old at the start of ww2 I lived in Leytonstone East London near the Temple Mills shunting Yards at Stratford we were bombed every night and in the morning went to school climbing over the ruins of the houses from the night before I was never evacuated so spent all the war in East London there are many stories I could tell but the one that still makes me laugh is:-
The school is Downsell Road in Stratford which I must say is still standing. Most of our time at school was spent in underground shelters built under the school play ground on this particular day we were all in the shelter and our head master ask For two volunteers to go with him to the top of the school to get some books so that the younger ones could read them My friend and I volunteered Now this is the funny bit My friend and I loaded with books up to our chins coming down the stirs with our head master just behind us with his arms full of book also when though the window my friend and I saw a doodle bug flying and at that moment the engine stopped and the doodle bug was heading straight for our school
Well we both flung the books up in the air and run down the stairs not stopping until we reached the shelters it was a little later that we were told that the head master didn’t see what we did and fell head over heels down the stairs on the books we left we also learnt later that the doodle bugs engine had started up again enough to divert it away from the school and crash somewhere else if it hadn’t I would not be writing this story now

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