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I was very close to my aunt she was like my second mother. I remember lots of incidents with her during the war. The main one happened when we were hurrying along a road in Hockley and on the other side was a school not houses. Suddenly a german plane came down and started to machine gun us the bullets were being fired right at us, two girls and a woman. We managed to get into an alleyway entry to the houses and weren’t injured. The next day we went back and you could see machine gun marks all around the entrance where he’d been aiming at us.

Another story is we went off my cousin and I to stay with one of my aunts friends at Codsall. We were going for the weekend and left on Friday. My aunt was going to meet us on the Saturday morning in Codsall then take us back on Sunday. But on the Friday was the worse bombing on Birmingham and we could see it all happening where we were. We were meant to meet my aunt off the bus at about 8 in the morning but she wasn’t on the bus. We met every bus that came to Codsall from Birmingham but she wasn’t on them and I thought my whole family was dead. It was the worse experience of my life but then she finally turned up in the evening. She’d not been able to get on a bus before then because of the bombing and they were sending children out of the city centre and there was no room on the buses. I was so pleased to see her and know the family was ok.

My older sister was once saying goodnight in a doorway to a soldier. Two ladies passed by one with a proper helmet on and one with a colander tied on her head with a scarf. The soldier said to my sister what a funny woman and my sister couldn’t tell him it was our mother!

I also remember one night of a raid and a very nervous old lady. We were in the shelter and could hear her outside saying she couldn’t find her way in, she was so frightened and nervous. We were telling her where to go and she couldn’t find her way in . then someone opened the door to the shelter and said you silly old bugger you’re in the wrong garden!

this story was submitted to the People's War website by Liz Goddard on behalf of Mrs Woodward who fully understands the site's terms and conditions

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