FREE ISSUE
APRIL, 2017
A R T S 50 Alive Magazine
Let Me Stay At Home Mom Stories From World War II
An Inter-generational Project Funded By Heritage Lottery
M E M O R I E S
I N T E R V I E W S
W R I T I N G
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LET ME STAY
A HERITAGE LOTTERY FUNDED PROJECT BY ARTS 50 ALIVE Arts 50 Alive has been working with schools, young people, community groups and senior citizens throughout Birmingham to gather unique stories and artefacts about World War II. During the project, Arts 50 Alive organised a range of inter-generational activities and events where the stories could be told, collected and artistically interpreted. This included interviews, creative writing and arts workshops, drama performances as well as a range of heritage site field trips. In this magazine you’ll find a wonderful selection of stories, creative writing and art. Head to www.arts50alive.org to discover a comprehensive collection of all the digital recordings, interviews, photographs and videos documenting the project.
Special thanks to: Ash Grove Seniors, Hawkesley Seniors Art Group, Shenley Seniors, The Other Side Of The Door, Kings Norton Seniors, Holloway Hall Seniors, Carry On Caring Northfield, National Citizen Service, Bournville College Students, Bartley Green Secondary Students, Fairway Primary Students, King Edwards Five Ways Students, NAF Home Education Culture Club, Northfield Arts Forum, Oliver Armstrong, Fran Littlehales, Guy Hirst, Jess Doherty, Lauren Jansen-Parkes, Lynsey Smitherman, Helen Mansfield, Northfield Community Partnership and to all the interviewees and participants - we couldn’t have done it without you!
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AT HOME MOM
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TRUE STORIES PAT ADAM
I’m here today. My father stayed in touch
though was still very basic. I remember
MY DAD’S GREAT ESCAPE
with the Italian family after the war and I
we had a lot of jam and bread. During
HAWKESLEY SENIORS
actually take my middle name, Angela,
WW2 my husband’s grandad had a farm,
after their daughter Angelina.
Holly Farm, which had a German P.O.W
My dad was in the Cameron Highlanders
working there - he used to do carving and
and was captured at Torbruk [Libya] and
ANNE JAMES
things like that. It’s interesting because
was taken to a P.O.W camp. My father
AN AIRPLANE ENCOUNTER
they all said he was a lovely bloke. You
and a few of the others escaped, most of
HAWKESLEY SENIORS
began to accept that a lot of the enemy
them were caught but only my dad, a
were the same as us, but were just
little wiry scotsman, and another guy
I was eight when I was evacuated and
following orders to fight - it’s so sad. One
remained free. Dad fled into the Italian
luckily I was able to go to my
of the horses at the farm also had to go to
mountains and there was a family down
grandmother who lived in Worcester. I
war, but thankfully it came back but with
in the village that used to look after him,
was coming home one day walking along
half an ear missing from being shot at!
they’d walk up the mountains and give
as you do, there people in front of me
him food. He lived mostly in a cattle
and people behind. I heard this airplane
JENNI MCLAREN
shed because although it smelled it was
overhead, it was a German plane and all
MY AUNTY AT BLETCHLEY PARK
warm. Occasionally the families would
of a sudden it swooped low and started
HAWKESLEY SENIORS
let him know it was safe to come down
machine gunning at us. There wasn’t any
into the village to wash, eat and to
tactical target, he must have been on his
Before I moved to Bournville about a
recover.
way back from Birmingham. I threw
year ago I went to meet with the
myself into a hedge and honestly I
Townswomen’s Guild. They had a
During one of his visits a child raised the
thought “This is it [I’m going to die].” It
alarm that the Nazis were coming. In the
was a harrowing experience, something
family house above the stone staircase
I’ll always remember, and it was a
was a small dark ledge over the front
miracle nobody was hurt.
door. They heaved my dad up and he hid himself. The Nazis came in, went up the
JO MOSELEY
stairs and checked all the rooms. My dad
FARM LIFE & THE COUNTRY
swore that one soldier actually clocked
HAWKESLEY SENIORS
onto him and their eyes had met.
veteran from Bletchley Park give a talk, a 92-year-old lady called Betty Webb who worked at Bletchley Park as a linguist and ended up at the Pentagon in America because she spoke Japanese. This reminded me that my Aunty, Joyce Crouch, who worked at Bletchley Park for six weeks. She came from the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. She dealt
Whether he was spared because of that
I grew up in the aftermath of WW2.
soldier or whether he was just
There were still ration books. I was in the
with the Bombe Machine - a very tall
extraordinarily lucky we’ll never know.
country so we didn’t have any bombing
device that Turing and his associates
Perhaps that soldiers mercy is the reason
or go away like other children. The food
created. My Aunty Joyce would rotate
4
WORLD WAR II dials according to a menu in attempt to decode messages. She said it was very dim and exhausting work, and actually declined to have her name on the roll of honour. It was just her duty to do what she did.
CHRIS LA FONTAINE BLACK OUT TRAIN JOURNEYS HAWKESLEY SENIORS
I was born just before war broke out. My
Bombe Machine
father was in the Territorial Army so he’d been called up so it was just my mother
I also remember in this little mining
anything sugary was a treat. I tried it
and I. We lived in
valley in South Wales a butcher named
with my kids and they all just went
London but she would
Danny. She was also the farmer and
“Bleurgh!” I don’t think they’d be very
take me down to
every single Sunday she’d
Wales every so often to
sell legs of lamb.
my grandmother. One of my
If you were in
clearest memories is travelling
London, where I
from St Pancras station to
grew up, you’d never
Wales in the pitch black but I was used to it. My mother
popular now!
see a leg of lamb. I RJ - Bournville College
think she didn’t
I was born in London and I remember being taken out by my mother one night after the bombs had come down. The one clear memory I have is
once told me we were doing
declare all of her stock. She made sure
looking up the sky, it
this journey when I was a baby and I had
all of her customers got what they
was illuminated
been crying. There was a soldier in the
wanted. But other than that, rationing
with red and
carriage and he said to my mother “Have
was normal and we didn’t really know
yellow sparks. I
you got any other children?” she said
anything else. We used to eat date
remember
“No,” he replied “well give her to me
sandwiches because you could always
thinking,
I’ve got five,” and I shut up all the way
get big blocks of dates, which was a
and saying,
to Wales [laughs].
sugary treat on a sunday morning. When
how pretty it
you weren’t getting many sweets
looked.
Kieran Blake Bournville College
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BRENDA HARMAN
liver, hearts and chicklings which were
BOMBINGS AND RATIONING
the guts! We ate everything, the only
SHENLEY SENIORS
thing you wouldn’t eat was the whistle [laughs]. We never went hungry, we even
The very first memory I can recall is
had a cockerel at Christmas!
being under the table in my mother’s arms because Mom wouldn’t go in any of
DAVID BUCK
the air raid shelters. She felt it was safer
BOMBED IN KINGS HEATH
under the table and this was pretty
SHENLEY SENIORS
common back then. They were very thick tables, often reinforced, but there was a shelter at the infant and junior school. I always say we were poor and my sister always disagrees because Mom was such a manager and she used to make everything for us. There was one boy and two girls and I was the youngest baby. We used to hear the planes overhead but it was like a big game to us. We were short of pencils and chalk and sweets were rationed. Cough sweets used to appear in the sweet shop and everyone would adopt a fake cough just to get them. You used to have to carry a ration book and babies could have a banana, one banana to the family. Rations were wholesome food, everything was homemade and from scratch. Mom did bottling with Kilner jars. You’d take
My father died in 1933 leaving my mom with five little ones, the youngest being six months old, so Mom didn’t allow us to be evacuated. We had bombing all around us. One day a bomb came and brought twenty-two houses down with it just around the corner from us. You could feel the explosions lift you up in the shelter. One time my eldest sister didn’t get out of bed to get into the Anderson, so my brother had to drag her out! She wouldn’t get up, even for the Nazis [laughs]. At the beginning of the war, during the bombings, we’d go under the stairs but then it got so bad we had to go in our own shelter. Then it intensified so we’d go into the big communal shelters. This was all in Kings Heath on Florence Road.
food that was out of season and seal it up with salt. Everyone put food in the garden and we lived on carrots and parsnips and vegetables. Meat was very short but my brother was fifteen years older than me so he used to get it more than us, we’d get very jealous. But my mom could make meat rations last by making stews, cottage pies and things like that. Things like offal too: brains, 6
Balsall Heath Carlton Cinema
RON HEELEY U-BOAT CREW IN LIVERPOOL SHENLEY SENIORS
I lived in Liverpool and was never evacuated. One day a Destroyer ship came in and prisoners came off. It turns out a Destroyer had captured a U-Boat and that the Nazi crew were being marched up towards the train station. So word went around Liverpool that there was U-boat crew walking through
Captured Uboat U-534 Crew, Liverpool 1945
town. We ran to see them and when we got there people had started throwing rocks, bricks and anything they could grab. I remember one British fellow that was there, a retired navy seaman, he told me that he never been so scared for his life until he was in Liverpool among the angry mob accosting the Nazi crew.
Another clear memory of mine is an ammunition ship blowing up. I remember going to bed that night when the sirens went. We ran upstairs and my grandad said “God, look!” and there was no ceiling or roof, and on the bed there was
Birmingham New Street, 1941
a huge piece of shrapnel that had been blown four miles to our house from the docks.
Another time I woke one morning and there was the smell of beef all over Liverpool. We found out that the nazis had bombed the cold storage place and bomb-roasted beef had been rained down all over the place!
Queen’s Road Birmingham, 1940
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JOHN WAKEMAN
we used to trade them. It’s ridiculous to
One vivid memory I have is playing
SCHOOL & THE AUSTIN FACTORY
think of that now.
football against German prisoners for
SHENLEY SENIORS
their amusement. There was a P.O.W We were vulnerable because we lived
camp at Cofton Park. The following
When war was declared I was nine years
close to the Austin factory that made
week it was reported that the Nazis had
old. I was one of the many who were
parts for Spitfires and Lancaster planes.
taken British P.O.Ws into some woods
deprived of an education because I spent
But during the beginning of the war
and shot them. And that was the
a lot of time in air raid shelters. In junior
thousands of children were evacuated to
difference between them and us. In fact,
school I was allocated to look after the
Birmingham because it was considered a
Italian prisoners were largely trusted
scrap metal room and moved motorbikes
safer place than London, which is ironic.
here. They worked on farms and had to
and things like that. In senior school we
The only place they didn’t manage to
wear boiler suits to identify them.
were part of Dig For Victory.
bomb was the Austin factory. The factory had a unique camouflage, it was painted
Many a time I was called out of class,
like an estate so it looked like houses
given a spade and a garden fork and we
from an aerial point of view. They even
went to the local nursery to dig. Most of
painted the airfield to look like a pond.
the parks were plowed up for growing
The Nazis never managed to bomb it, but
potatoes. I remember being out of school
towards the end of the war the Italians
for two weeks to help the Land Army
bombed the railway it was connected to
girls pick potatoes in Cofton Park in
by following the tracks.
Longbridge. The girls weren’t strong enough to lift the bags of potatoes we
Behind our house were searchlights and
picked so I had to do it. You just did
a barrage balloon - a sort of balloon on a
what you were told, or asked to do.
cable to catch the planes. There were also
School children contributed greatly to the
decoy sentries, huts and fake anti-aircraft
war effort and it’s something that’s rarely
guns near Frankley Beeches which were
talked about.
bombed and I remember those bombings a lot. After the air raids, the skies would
One funny story I remember from school
completely light up. The night they
is that there were these pictures of pigs
bombed Coventry with the incendiaries
going around. Kids would ask you
and burned it completely down my father
“Who’s the biggest pig of them all?” and
told me to look at the sky. So we got out
you’d guess and it would be the wrong
of our shelter and even though we live
pig. But then they’d fold the picture
twenty miles away from Coventry the
cards up and they’d form a picture of
sky was red and bright like daylight. You
Hitler and say “He’s the biggest pig of
could see the searchlights and hear the
them all!” [Laughs]. We also used to
bangs. That’s what happens most nights
collect pieces of shrapnel from the
for quite some time.
bombings, those were our treasures and 8
FRAN LITTLEHALES GRANDMA’S PARACHUTE UNDERWEAR
My grandmother was a seamstress and could literally make anything out of anything. She could make two blouses out of an old pair of pyjamas! Late at night there would be a knock on the door and someone would give my grandmother a large brown paper parcel. Later on she would go out with a bag of small parcels or ladies would come to the doors and take a small parcel away. My mother didn’t know what was happening. Years later the subject cropped up. It transpired that the parcels were German parachutes and my grandmother made underwear out of them! The german parachutes were 100% white silk, whereas the British ones were a mucky brown colour. I pity any German airmen dropping down in Merseyside and having a bunch of Scouse kids mobbing them for their parachute.
FRAN LITTLEHALES FISH HEAD STEW
My mother was taken by my grandmother to a Women’s Institute meeting on how to create recipes and meals on rations. The woman who was giving the talk was very posh and had one of those BBC accents. The women attending were mostly dockers wives or the wives of the shipbuilders at Cammell Lairds ship yard. The woman was describing how to make a meal out of fish heads, and asked if there were any questions. My mother said that a large Irish lady stood up, folded her arms and said in a loud voice “What I want to know is, what happened to the rest of the fish?!” The meeting collapsed into a riot of shouting and clapping and the woman who was giving the talk disappeared off the stage. My grandmother grabbed my mother’s hand and scuttled out of the room, saying how rough the W.I had become nowadays. FRAN LITTLEHALES SAD SONGS OF THE POLISH AIRMEN
The bombing of Merseyside got so bad that the Anderson shelters were not safe enough to sleep in during a raid. The Germans were dropping huge bombs that could destroy a shelter and kill everyone in it, so new instructions were given by the Air Raid Wardens that there would be an early warning siren to give people enough time to get to the Mersey Tunnel and sleep down there. My mother was afraid and she hated going down in the tunnel, she said that some people were hysterical, that there was a lot of noise and some people had been robbed while they tried to sleep. Some soldiers/airmen who were wounded were sent down in the tunnel to try and keep order. But one particular instance there was some Polish airmen who were singing songs with an accordion down in the shelter and everyone began to calm. My mother said she’d always remember the sound of the airmen singing ‘sad’ Polish songs.
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ALMA HEELEY - AN AIRMAN IN THE GARDEN - SHENLEY SENIORS
My clearest memory from the war was when a plane was shot down over Northfield and the pilot landed in our garden. I remember there was an argument because my mom thought he was German but we brought him in. I remember trying his boots on and him being very lovely. He was Lieutenant Anderson of the RAF. He wrote a letter to my parents thanking them for their hospitality. The letter reads...
Dear Mr & Mrs Durose, A short note to thank you for the very kind way you looked after me when I turned up so unexpectedly in the garden. I must apologise for not having written before, but I’ve only just returned to work. I’m glad to say I don’t seem to have suffered any permanent ill-effects from the crash on the head. Thanks a great deal for the very excellent first aid and the tea. Now I must say goodbye once more, may I say very many thanks. Your sincerely - Roy Anderson - Flight Lieutenant.
ARTHUR GEORGE
were lovely, honest to God, it was the
we’d go into the Anderson shelter and
ASH GROVE SENIORS
regime that was bad.
slept there, we took it as it came. We were never short of food really, we had a
I was 12 when the war started and when the it finished I joined the army in 1945. I was stationed in Warwick, and then to Chester, and then to Yovel to the camp, from there I went across to Italy and Germany. I loved army life, I hadn’t even seen the sea until I joined. When we got to Dover and we saw a big garden with the massive big sea, it was a shock for me. But from there I went across to France, then got the train to Austria. We went into Palestine, and finished in Egypt. We were ambulance drivers transporting prisoners. The Germans 10
I grew up in Selly Oak with a brother
ration book, we always seemed to work
and a sister. I started life down in Small
out ok.
Heath in 1927. My mother came up to Small Heath when she was pregnant, but
Through the war I was working at the
with a man she wasn’t married to, so I
Austin car factory, I was in the service
had six years without a mother. I thought
department repairing cars before I went
my auntie was my mother. At fourteen I
into army. Women were working there
went to work. I was just an ordinary kid.
too, they were wonderful, they did
You made your own fun [laughs] we
welding, everything! And you can never
were probably rogues. The first air raid
say a woman’s a bad driver, honest to
that sounded, you’d expect bombs to be
God, I’ve seen some of the best in the
falling so you’d run across to the pub and
world. They had a harder job than the
into the cellar. It was alright there was
men from the beginning.
water in there. At six o’clock at night
GLADYS BOWEN - BOYFRIENDS AND BOMBINGS - ASH GROVE SENIORS
I had seven American boyfriends during the war. I was 12 years old when the war started and 19 when it ended. I grew up on Silver Street in Kings Heath. Kids used to play in the road, we had a big skipping rope that stretched across the sreet because there wasn’t any traffic. When the war was declared on the radio my dad said “You’ve got to come in and listen to this,” and so I did, and when it was over I went back to playing in the street, it didn’t mean a thing.
I found the war deadly dull, it sounds awful [laughs]. The only excitement I think we had was at All Saints Church on Vicarage Road. I watched one of our fighter planes chase a German plane around the steeple of that church. I went into work the next morning and a friend called Wynford told me a story...
She was standing, looking out of her bedroom window because it was a beautiful night when she saw this German plane coming towards her house, she saw the swastikas on its wing, and it crashed in Earlswood and there were no survivors which was very sad, but at the time I couldn’t care less because it had probably had bombed the life out of us. Birmingham was the most bombed city after Manchester and Liverpool. We were making aeroplanes here but I didn’t know it. I was making fluorescent lights in the factories and everything was very hush hush.
I lived quite a normal life or what I thought was normal at the time, I went out with a lot of fellas in uniform. The first one I went with was American. We were on what we called the monkey run where girls and boys walk up and down the mainstreet, and decided whether they wanted to go out with each other. What I didn’t do was sleep about. I could see all these girls having babies and thought “Not me!” My mother worried, but I didn’t take no nonsense, I put many a fella on his back. I met a lot of nice people and once they went away I didn’t see them again. I just prayed that they’d get home safe. You can’t do anything in a war except hope that your family and loved ones are safe.
We had a bomb shelter, but while the aeroplanes were overhead I used to stand outside and watch them. I had no fear. It sounds strange, I was only young, I never thought we’d get killed and I never thought that they would win. We had this terrible faith that nobody would beat us. Being young we felt indestructible. The Americans were billeted down Queensbridge Road, that’s where I used to do my flirting. We were very sad when they went. I didn’t go out with them for the chewing gum. But when I met a fella I warned him “Keep ya hands to yourself.” Charlie Rankin - Bournville College 11
12
Megan Green - Bournville College
Partick Forde - Bournville College
Vishaka Chavda - Bournville College 13
MARIAN EVANS
a spare bedroom you had to give it up,
I lived near a P.O.W camp. I was in
A CHILDHOOD IN WALES
you weren’t allowed to say no. I had
Sunday school one afternoon and the
three siblings and we had our own
local policeman came and said a lot of
I lived very near Swansea, which was
rooms. All but two of the children were
prisoners had escaped and were circling
badly bombed in the war because it was
chosen in the school, no one would have
our village. So we ran home and even
a harbour. In the night when the sirens
them because they looked so unkempt.
saw one of the prisoners on the way!
went we all had to dive down into a
Although my mother wasn’t supposed to
Eventually they were all captured, but
shelter to avoid the bombs. Food was
take any children, she couldn’t help but
some of them got very far. So I suppose
very limited, you couldn’t get many
take them in. There was Rosie who was
that was quite an adventure seeing these
sweets so when we used to go the the
seven and Jimmy who was five. I had to
escaped prisoners. I was fortunate
cinema, we would bring carrots to eat.
share my bed and clothes with Rosie and
because I had a rather large garden and
We couldn’t get toothpaste either, and if
my brother did the same with Jimmy.
my father always grew food. My granny always kept pigs and chickens so we had
you had a bath in the house, there was a line on the bath - and you couldn’t have
Rosie and Jimmy had been living at our
meat too. She also had an orchard with
the water go above the line to save water.
house for six months when one day we
lots of fruit. Others weren’t so lucky.
My earliest memory ever was that I
saw two strangers walking up our road
wanted to go to school very badly. On
with a baby in their arms, we all rushed
Our village was between two train
my third birthday, when my birthday
to the window to watch them. They
stations and there was an arsenal factory
cards came - I escaped from the house,
walked into our driveway and knocked
near by too, and what the Germans had
ran to the school and sat on the step until
on the door. It was Rosie and Jimmy’s
realised is that their planes could follow
someone came and fetched me.
mum and dad. They had been bombed
the flames coming up through the
out of their home and our address was
chimney of the steam train to find the
I lived in a small mining village and we
the only one they knew, they had
arsenal, except they didn’t find the
had a lot of evacuees come. My mother
nowhere else to go. Rosie and Jimmy
arsenal - they found our village. We had
was one of the local councillors and had
had been separated from their parents for
one bomb drop in our village, it
to go to the school to receive all these
so long that they didn’t know who they
demolished a bungalow but nobody was
children. The children were marched
were. But my mum took them in, baby
hurt fortunately.
from their trains to the school. If you had
and all.
JENNIFER EDWARDS - BUTTERY TREATS - THE OTHER SIDE OF THE DOOR SENIORS
Squares of cold toast with thick butter that showed my teeth marks, made for me by my Aunty Alice, she was my Godmother Alicia Patricia Ermintrude Longford Griffiths. These toast treats were given to me when I was about four or younger, just towards the end of the war when butter rations were very sparse. The love of butter never left me. They were eaten in her tiny kitchen which was four doors down from our house – a new house built just before the outbreak of war. Alicia Patricia Ermintrude Longford Griffiths, better known as Alice, loved her Woodbine cigarettes, everyone smoked forty a day. Now she’s dead and gone, but I remember, seventy years on, her toast and butter.
14
RENNEE MOORE
windows. I walked in, turned the light on
stopped once, my friends had theirs but I
THE BLACK OUT
and a nearby policeman fined my dad ten
hadn’t. I had to report to the police, and
shillings because the light shone out of
the policeman knew me, but I still did
the window.
twenty-four hours in the station and I was
Mostly I remember the air raids. You could tell by the sound of the plane
only fourteen.
whether or not they had already dropped
I remember we were coming back from
their bombs. It was a heavier sound if
the cinema one night, I was fifteen at the
CYNTHIA HAMMOND
they were still carrying. I was fourteen
time and with three friends, and then the
FROM JAMAICA TO ENGLAND
when the war started and I went to work
air raids started. Down the road near the
in a factory. We had these huge machines
church yard they’d dropped flares, they
On arriving in England in June 1956
that made chains that were for tanks, but
were huge, they lit everything up like
from Jamaica I saw the aftermath of
we didn’t know what they were for. We
daylight. The Air Raid Warden saw us
World War II. My parents lived in North
had to test them on a machine, it was
and made us go into the church yard and
London and at the bottom of our garden
very boring. Blackouts were one of the
lie down between a stone wall and the
in Islington was an Anderson shelter. We
worst things, no lights anywhere. Prior to
graves. He told us “It isn’t down there
were told it was used as protection
that we had to tape up all the windows,
with the graves you have to be afraid of,
against the many bombings during the
plug up the vents in the walls with
it’s up there in the sky, the planes.”
height of warfare. Every November along with Guy Fawkes night we were taught
newspaper in case they dropped gas, it all seems ridiculous now. The blackouts
One of the most terrifying experiences is
to remember the fallen and to quote Sir
were the worst, because you didn’t know
when the bombers were coming over
Winston Churchill ‘At the rising of the
where you were going. You used to wear
Birmingham. You could see the red glow
sun and the sunset, we will remember
little luminous badges sometimes, if you
in the sky. Bombing affected the gas,
them.’ We would then wear our poppies
could get one. In the first week of the war
electric, water all those everyday things
with pride but not knowing the full
I was coming back from the hairdressers
in life. I did get nervous once. You
penalty that those fine young men paid -
in the evening and my dad hadn’t yet
always had to carry a blue ID card in case
for a free Britain.
finished blacking out the kitchen
a policeman stopped you. We were
15
Gloria Jones
GLORIA JONES - STORY OF AN EVACUEE - KINGS NORTON SENIORS Dad was a little late coming home from work one night, so after giving me a hug, he changed out of his overalls and was about to eat his tea when those dreadful sirens went off. Dad quickly put on his coat and picked me up along with my red siren suit. Mom slipped her coat on and picked up her handbag and Dad’s dinner, and we all hurried out of the back door and into that horrible dark cold air raid shelter at the bottom of the garden. I could hear the sound of people hurrying down the road to the big shelter. We were lucky we had our own. Mom had tried to make it comfortable with blankets and pillows but it was dark and smelly. Then it started – the sound of the guns pop popping and the drone of the aeroplanes and the woosh of the bombs falling. There was one very loud bang that night and Dad said ‘Oh God, that’s near’ and then the noise on the shelter sounded as bricks and wood fell against it. Someone was screaming and someone was running and their was noise of glass breaking and the windows falling out.
We had been down in that horrible shelter for hours and the bangs were louder than ever. Mom had cried and was shaking. Dad held us both so tight he had hurt my arms, but I couldn’t tell him - I was so frightened. It seemed to go on for hours but I must have fallen asleep in the end and all was quiet when I woke up. Dad said “Come on love let’s go.” He looked round as he stepped out into the garden and said “I hope they were down in the big shelter.” It was quiet now except for the sound of someone crying. The air was full of dust. Dad was in a hurry and Mom was cold and looked so worried. A man shouted “Stop. who goes there!” as we passed the next entry. Dad told him it was Harry and his wife and daughter and we were OK. 16
They just wouldn’t listen to me as I tried to tell them I had no shoes and socks on, and I tried to miss all the broken glass and bricks. The ground was covered in bricks and wood and dust. It was only when we turned the corner out of Palace Road and passed a shop where an old couple were standing just outside, that they listened.
The lady said “Come on in I have got some shoes and socks that’ll fit your little girl.” Dad grabbed me in his arms and carried me in crying. “I’m so sorry darling,” he said, “I know you were trying to tell us something. oh my baby!,” he cried as he hugged me to him. The lady sat me on the wooden counter and then gave me a little kiss. Mom and Dad thanked them and Mom said “We are going to see if Mom’s okay and then see if we can stay with a cousin away from the worse of it – we just can’t take it anymore.” The lady said “Good luck and I hope you find her okay, it was a bad one tonight, several houses down here have been hit.” She hugged Mom as we walked away, Dad carrying me in his arms…
We went round to my Gran’s and had a cup of tea. She was so frightened too, then Dad said “We’re going to see Ethel, I can’t take anymore. As soon as we can we will fetch you and my Dad.” I can’t remember how we got to Rowney Green but I was so glad we did. It was a little country village with one shop and a Post Office, a small school for just five children which included me, two cousins and the teacher’s daughter. There were three farms in the village too.
We stayed with Ethel for a couple of weeks, she was kind enough to let us have a bedroom with a single bed and they put two dining chairs together for me to sleep. It wasn’t as comfortable as my own little bed had been, but a lot better than sleeping in the air raid shelter. It was quiet except for the cock that crowed in the morning and the cows and the sheep in the fields.
It was heaven at Rowney Green, it was the start of a new beginning. They all laughed at me in the shop when I heard an aeroplane go over ahead, I instictually pulled Mom down on to the floor waited for the bangs. They didn’t know what is was like to be so frightened. They only had one bomb drop in the village and one befallen plane. They used to stand at the top of the hill and watch as the bombs dropped over Birmingham where fires started. It took me a long time before I could stop being so scared of aeroplanes. For me, it was heaven living in the country away from all the ammunition factories that were main targets for the bombers. The sound of the animals in the fields were wonderful and it was even more wonderful when my Nan and my Grandad were able to come and live with us in a little cottage we had been able to rent from a farmer, with pink roses growing up the front and around the bedroom window. It was so nice to smell them when we opened the windows, no dust in the air there, no air raid shelter, no broken buildings and no people crying when we went out in the morning.
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KATHERYN STEVENTON - DAD’S ARMY - THE OTHER SIDE OF THE DOOR SENIORS My mother didn’t like my father being in the Home Guard – there was no glory in that. My father being a bit mature for the services and having a protected occupation, was very much a member of Dad’s Army. His daytime work was in London, deciding whether or not to keep Regency wrought iron railings or whether they would be sent off to the furnaces for the war effort. He hated doing this, for him all railings were worth keeping.
His train journeys were often in the dark because of the Luftwaffe, and many a time he missed or nearly missed his station. When he got home he rushed off to the Home Guard, with maybe just enough time for a hasty meal. He’d spend his nights in dugouts armed with only a wooden replica rifle, waiting for the German planes to pass overhead on their way to London and he’d report this to headquarters.
Mother got fed up with this night after night, and one evening locked him in the bedroom while he was changing into his uniform. This didn’t stop my father who scaled down the front drain pipe of the house, and of course, there was an awful row in the morning when he came off duty.
My father said his platoon had many plans if the Germans ever managed to invade Britain, one of these was putting dinner plates upside down on bridges and covering them with earth. The point being that the German tanks would stop, thinking the plates might be landmines, and when the Germans started sweeping for them the Home Guard would sneak around the tanks and put sugar in the fuel tanks to make them inactive. This has all been told to me but one thing is for sure, while I was growing up there was always a magazine of rifle bullets in one of the draws in the dining room side board.
ALEXANDRA VISCE - BARTLEY GREEN SCHOOL STUDENT - CREATIVE WRITING Bang. Eyes Open. My heart fluttered faster than my waking lids, as I woke with alarm and gasped for breath. For a moment everything seemed sullen; quiet until I took note of the mixture of frosty air and sweltering heat from the opening in my bedroom wall, alight with fire and flames. I scattered from my sheets just having time to hurriedly throw on some clothes from the previous day. I burst open my door and slid down the stairs, my feet strimming the steps as my mind paced forward, questions thrown aloft as my single priority arose: get out! I reached the bottom and surged for the door, though as my hand reached for the handle and grasped it firmly, I came to my senses as alarm preceded me, and stiffened. My parents could still be up there.
A whistling from above interrupted my sudden breakthrough of emotion, and I scrambled to turn the doorknob and scurry out as I heard the whistle grow deafeningly close. I didn’t even hear the whole explosion as I was knocked forward, my head slamming against a pavement scattered with debris and something screeched through my ears. A fading sight of embers and commotion, a rush of people - and the vague feeling of motion around me as my eyes involuntarily closed. Waking - confused, yet safe. A static radio snaps to life. “Another Great War has just begun.”
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CONNOR STERLEY - NAF HOME ED CULTURE CLUB - CREATIVE WRITING A five year old Martha stirred in her deep slumber, she was dreaming about a chair, covered in roses and dandelions. All of the guests there were under stereotypical black umbrellas and were wearing black suits and dresses. She did not know what the chair meant nor did she want to understand why she could not see her father again. All was quiet and the rich morning sunlight stopped at the blackout blinds, that had recently been nailed to the inside of the window, meaning that the only light came from the hallway and from an oil lamp that was rarely lit. There was a sudden earth-shattering scream that rung up the staircase, Martha rolled over, opened her eyes and blinking blindly she lifted a leg over the edge of her bed and planted it heavily on the wooden floor. She swung her other leg over so she was sitting on the edge of the bed. Another sound rung from the staircase but this time it had a deeper undertone.“Martha, dear? Come downstairs it’s breakfast time.” It was Daniel Rathbone but she called him Pops anyway, he was calling for her to come downstairs for breakfast. She stood up and stumped, still half asleep towards the door. She lifted a tired hand to the copper door knob. She turned it and heard the mechanisms inside click and the door swung forwards. She stepped forwards onto the gnarled wooden landing and started gliding down the dusty staircase. She walked into a bright kitchen from the stairs, the door leading to the garden was open and the family were sitting at the table eating bread and drinking water. “Good morning dear!” her mom, Mrs Rathbone said, she was wearing a white apron with yellow dots and her hair was tied up in a neat bun. Irish olleg
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seat at the table. Martha sat at the window, long after breakfast. The sun was setting
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Martha. How did you sleep?” “I slept well, but had funny dreams” Martha said, taking a
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Daniel was reading a newspaper at the table when he looked up and smiled kindly. “Hello
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and the men were returning from the work. Martha unstuck herself from the windowsill and went to the kitchen. Martha was sitting at the table when there was a commotion outside the house and a deafening sound blared through the walls.“No time to waste! Martha turn all of the lights off!” Daniel said sharply. Martha ran towards a fuse box and flicked a switch, the house was instantly pitch black apart from the faint glow of the moon outside, seeping through the open window. “Everyone back into the kitchen!” Daniel said in a hurried voice. Martha ran back down the hall and into the dark kitchen. A sudden hum on large engines was upon them, flying low over the town. The pilot had not seen any lights and assumed that he had not reached his quarry yet. 19
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