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I Ray Keats give permission for Valerie Oxford to add my written or transcribed material to the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ People’s War Website

Ray Keats’s Life in Dover as a Child

My two older brothers George and Bryan were evacuated to South Wales in 1940. I was 3 years old and I lived in Union Road, Dover, where the hospital is. The air raid shelters were in the tunnels along Union Road and Noah’s Ark Road. I remember playing in our back garden when Dad told me to lie down on the ground. He was in the house and he couldn’t get to me so he shouted from the window. A doodle bug came over and its engine stopped as Dad yelled at me to lie down. I thought I had done something wrong. It missed me and landed nearby.

When the sirens sounded we went to the tunnels and slept on bunk beds. I remember the community spirit and the singsongs. Dad (George) was in the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Guard, Mum (Gertrude) worked at the hospital.

During the evacuation of Dunkirk I had to stay at my Grandma’s near the hospital. I used to watch the buses come up into the hospital. I realised that they were bringing casualties from Dunkirk.

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