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June, my mother, was three years old when the was started and 9 when it ended. She lived in Sunderland which was bombed quite heavily because of the ships built there. Because of the air-raids June, her Mum and Grandmother(and later her brother Keith) were evacuated to the countryside. They went to Aysgarth in North Yorkshire. Her Dad stayed in Sunderland where he worked in the shipyards during the war - shipbuilding was a reserved occupation. June remembers the day that was was declared. She was walking across a field with her Mum when her grandmother came running across the field. She was wearing a big floppy hat which waved around in the wind as she ran. She was shouting "We're at war! We're at War!" Everyone had come out of their houses and was sharing the news. There was a general sense of apnic as if everyone expected that bombing would start straight suddenly.
As told to her daughter, Susan.

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