'We forgot about you!'

One day I was taken ill in 1943 on a Number 36 bus in London in the middle of all the bombings. They got me to the Middlesex Hospital and saved my life.

I was there for quite a long time when the bombing was on, but one night they forgot me. I was on the top floor sleeping out there when a sister came running up and said “We forgot you were out here and they’re dropping the bombs! Hark at them!” The doodlebugs were flying right over.

After I left Middlesex Hospital they got me to Stoke Mandeville in a green line coach which had been converted into an ambulance, and I was there for a few weeks. I was poorly for some time after that; and I had my 32nd operation 12 months ago!

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Becky Barugh of the BBC Radio Shropshire CSV Action Desk on behalf of Joan Higgins and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

See more of Joan's stories:

• I was the first female postie in the war years in Bridgnorth
• We didn’t really have to take any evacuees…
• ’The Cheapest Holiday We Could Find’
• My chance was gone
• Evacuee Remembrances — Hello and Goodbye (And Hello again)
• A Victory Memory
• Lest We Forget

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