Sept 3rd 1939 - The date war nearly started.

I was just over two years old when war was declared, on 3rd September, 1939. Soon after that I was evacuated, together with my mother and sister, to Hitchen in Hertfordshire. We stayed there until my mother realized that the war proper had not yet started - this was known as the phony war - we then returned to London.

The British Expeditionary Force (BEF) was in France until they were chased out via Dunkirk in May/June 1940. That's when the phony war ended and the proper war started.

Hitler decided to invade England, but to do that he had to have control of the skies over Britain. He gave this job to Field Marshal Goering. This was the Battle of Britain, fought mainly over the southern counties of England. As we all know, he failed and on 15th September 1940 he gave one last throw of the dice and failed again. From that time on, Hitler gave up the idea of invading Britain. Instead he decided to bomb us into submission and so, in 1940, the Blitz started. I was just three years old and we spent nights sleeping in our Anderson shelter, then we tried a purpose built street shelter, then the underground station at Essex Road. We finally settled for a purpose-built shelter in our street, which was built under a children's playground in Morton Road, until 1943 when I was coming up for my sixth birthday.

That's when I was evacuated on my own, with my label in my lapel and my gas mask in its box. My sister couldn't go as she was fourteen and able to start work. I was sent to Blackpool. I was moved from there as my mum wasn't happy about the way I was looked after. I was moved to Manchester and stayed there until 1944 when the Blitz was virtually over.

I came home just in time for the V1s (Doodlebugs)to start, shortly followed by the V2s - the first ground to ground ballistic missile. That was until their launch site was overrun by the allies after Noamandy.

The V2 was far more deadly than the Doodlebugs because you couldn't hear it coming. Although I do remember a time when the three of us, Mum, my sister Joan and I were huddled together in the back room listening to the unforgettable drone of the V1 traveling overhead, hearing the engine cut out and the explosion as it ploughed into my old school in Rotherfield Street. We watched in horror as the whole back window, including the sash box, flexed in then went back to its rightful position without breaking a pain of glass. Shortly after that, the war ended and life could get back to a semblance of normality.

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