Life for a child in WW2

The image attached to this story cannot be viewed for moderation or technical reasons

I lived in Poplar, just 10 minutes from all the big docks. In 1939 Dad had an Anderson air raid shelter built in our back yard, but as nothing yet had happened everyone thought it was funny. I was 4 years old, my brother was 7. My father was drafted into the Forces, and joined the RAF, so he wasn't at home with us when the first big air raid in London happened. It was a lovely sunny day in 1940, and my brother was asked if he would like to earn threepence by holding open the necks of sacks which were being filled with sand to lay on top of an air raid shelter. Whilst they were doing this the air-raid warning siren went, but no one took any notice as there had been many such alarms, all which proved false. However, my brother says that quite suddenly everything stopped and you couldn't hear a sound. There came a drone that got louder and louder. Out of the clear blue sky came a formation of black aeroplanes in V formation, with small planes all around them. They were German bombers, the small ones fighter escorts to protect them. As my brother and all the people watched he recalls the planes falling away and down, dropping bombs. Instantly everyone was shouting and running. My brother was told to run home quick, which he did. He says he never got his threepence!
My memory of this time was that I found it quite fun being in the shelter, lying on a bunk, and eating chocolate. However, when the air raid was over, my mother had to get help to carry me out, I was screaming my head of at the sight of our house -it had been bombed and was in flames. I was very frightened. We clambered over fences and through our neighbours house to get out. My school was also on fire, which was just opposite, and both were burnt out.
Next we were on the back of a lorry, going to the Hop-picking farms in Kent. We had gone to live with my Gran, and we were all being evacuated from London. With nowhere else to go we were put on a farm, with several other families. It was dark when we got there, and we had to stumble our way into huts, without any lights because of the blackouts: we were on the route enemy planes took to London. The smell of the hay still reminds me of that time, as that was my bed.
We spent a month on that farm. There were young children, women and a few old men - the adults picked the hops for the farmer. Sometimes the returning German planes would off load their bombs if they had any left, and once I recall my mother picking me up and diving into a ditch as a plane dive-bombed us, raiding us with bullets. We weren't hit but the pigs weren't so lucky.
I also recall the day a German came down in a parachute. We were all told to stand back whilst the men grabbed pitch forks or whatever they could find to capture the enemy pilot. However, he was badly injured as his parachute hadn't opened properly - he was only young.
Another time a plane came down my brother and I were in a tree, and the top of the plane brushed the trees, crashing into the next field. My brother says we could see into the cockpit!
There were plenty of dog fights in the sky for us to watch - the Battle of Britain. You soon came to distinguish between the sound of the differet engines - theirs and ours.
We were finally sent off to Blackpool. My Dad came to see us off an a special train, he looked very different in his uniform. I remember my brother crying when we said goodbye. The train journey was very tiring, and we were shunted onto side lines to let the troop trains pass with priority. There were no facilities on the train, no catering. We arrived at Warrington late that night, in complete darkness, and slept on the floor of a school. The next morning, they made a huge container of porridge, and after a plate of this we were sent on our way.
The day we arrived in Blackpool was my 5th birthday. There were several coach loads of people - all refugees in their own country. We were driven round the streets, asking who would take us in and give us shelter. It wasn't easy for my family, as there were 5 of us; Mum, my brother, Grandmother, my Aunt and me. Eventually we were put with a mother and daughter who ran a boarding house.
Unfortunately, once they realised they got paid more from the Governement to house Polish air men they made life very difficult, simply to make us move. It came to a head when we weren't allowed to go through the kitchen to the toilet - we had to go out of the front door, to the end of the street, and then back again via the alley that ran along the back of the houses. Apart from us chidlren, my Grandmother had a heart problem, so we did move out after a year there, and went to live in another house, which we shared with about 6.
The only thing I missed from this move was being made a fuss of by the Polish men, who'd had to leave their families in Poland, and the chocolate they always gave me!
Sadly,life in Blackpool was not made easy because of the prejudice and resentment that was felt by Northeners for the Southeners. Many Londoners preferred to return home to face the bombs, but we had no home to go to. The first family we lived with was one of these, they spent the rest of the war years in Shadwell London, in the heart of the bombing.
We then had a Jewish woman with her two sons; Jonathon and David. I remember terrible quarrels between her and my Mum, she wasn't as clean as my mother. She adored David, but left out Jonathon- we looked after him alot. What a terrible time this must have been for my mother, with all the responsibility for her family, and having to share a gas-stove with another woman!
After the war was over, the Jewish lady wanted my mother to go to New York with them, (they were friends by now) but we didn't. I never knew what became of them, except her husband returned home safely, and Jonathon became a Rabbi.
Life was hard in Blackpool. The house was horrible, it was infested with cockroaches and bedbugs. We used to put the light on and stamp our feet before we came downstairs in the morning, and they would all scuttle away behind the old range.
My mother and Aunt did night work in the factories. One was a sweet factory (Walkers) making chocolates solely for the forces. If we were good we'd wake up and find perhaps 2 or 3 on our pillow - a great treat! The other was packing food parcels for the troops. They had to walk across Blackpool every night to reach the factory and in winter this was hard as they often had to cope with 3-5ft snow drifts. Then Mum still had us to look after the next day. I remember her telling us that one of the girls in the factory could sing, so they put her up on the conveyor belt to entertain them, and they all absorbed her job in with theirs.
Life went on, Dad came once or twice, and Mum and I visited him in Lincolnshire where the airfields were. I was taken to Hull once, the desolation from the bombing was frightful. I also went to London and stayed with cousins in Bethnal Green. We slept in the air raid shelter but I don't recall any raids at that time. It became commonplace to see the ruins.
Sadly my Gran died without ever returning to London. She'd never even been away from it before this. Everyday the BBC news took priority; when the news was bad she'd always cry.
We attended school but didn't receive much attention. My bother was quite clever and he won a scholarship, but he wasn't allowed to take it up because places were for Blackpool children only. It was too late when we returned to London.
The best thing that happened was the birth of my sister, and the fact that we all survived the bombing. Gradually, as news filtered through about the end of the war, life became better. Mum went to London to find us a house, and we all left on a train for the evacuees. The Blackpool Gazette sent a reporter who photographed me and my family waving from the train window, saying "Goodbye Blackpool".
There were happy moments in Blackpool - days on the beach, Pablo's Icecream that we queued for every Sunday, childrens' Tea dances in the Tower Ballroom - I had a cousin in the WAAF who use to take me. When we were invaded by the Yankies we'd say "any gum chum?"
But when we finally all arrived back in London, it was coming home indeed.

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.