"Ping Ping"

One day my Mum went in to the shelter with my Dad, and my sister and her baby. I was working at the welding place at the time, and I wanted to go and see them as I wasn’t far. They said “Oh, they won’t like you going”, but I said “I’m going” and I walked out, and as I went along I could hear ‘ping’ ping’ all around me, of course it was shrapnel, but I didn’t realise it. My Mother said it’s a good job I didn’t know what it was because you’d have been frightened - if that goes through you it would kill you.”

I said “I’ve come to see you, there’s my sister sitting there all forlorn with a baby, there’s my Father sitting there, and you, and I’ve come to check you’re ok; so as long as you’re all alright…” then I returned to work.

Again they didn’t really mind — I mean they didn’t really want you to go because they want to know that you’re there, because if anything dropped there, then they’d need to account for you — so that’s fair really.

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

See more of Dot's stories:

• Doing a man’s job
• Red skies for miles
• I must have looked nuts!
• I had to collect my own flowers!
• ”Boom!”
• They went to work in slippers
• You had to have a laugh

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