Snippets

I was evacuated at the end of the war — my mother tells me I was about 3 — to Swindon. We used to live in Woolwich, London. My mum used to work in Woolwich Arsenal — but that would have been after the war. I remember them testing the shells on Plumstead and Erith Marshes when I was at school. Some of them were loud — and they were just testing them!

It was distant relatives of my father`s we were evacuated to and they had a pub down there. I think mum came with me. Dad came home on leave - I think he was in the Navy - and he said get yourselves down to Swindon. The relative was a top-of-the-range speedway driver; I think his surname was Moore. I don`t remember this myself but my mum told me.

Another thing I was told is that during the war when the doodlebugs came over and I was at my grandmother`s, I heard them before she did. I was only two. We used to make a tent with the heavy curtaining or blankets over this big oak table in case there was glass after the blast. When the sound of the engine cut out, you knew it was on the way down.

I know she had an Anderson shelter, dug out in the garden with corrugated iron over the top and covered with earth. Most gardens had one.

My uncle George was married to a German woman, Clara. I think she was from Dresden; I know they took a real pasting during the war…

(Vic is our caretaker. He told me his story for this website and, as a result, is going to contact his cousin, who was George and Clara`s daughter, to see what memories she has of what it was like for her and her family during the war.)

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