When you're young...

During the war we were playing in the corn fields. Of course, when you are children, you don’t think of the danger and that.

We were playing away and my friend’s mother came down, her husband had warned her, because she was deaf. She came running out saying “Come! — the air-raids” and she picked me up and she carried me home and I’d left my shoes in the cornfield so I had to go and look for them.

It turned out that we were safe anyway as the pilot was that German from Oakengates and he didn’t want to drop bombs on us because he knew us, so he went over and dropped them on the Lodge Wood and then he gave himself up.

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

See more of Lilian and Gottfried's stories:

• Charlie, Have you got a cauliflower?
• Always the last one
• Seen from both sides
• Some mothers lads

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