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I was aged 11 when I was evacuated. I lived in Salisbury Road, Wavertree and went to Lawrence Road School. One Sunday, I went onto a double decker bus from the school. My mum and dad came to see me off. I spent the first night in the upper part of a barn. I laid on staw and there was a bucket for myself and some others to use as a toilet. I remember getting a brown paper carrier bag. The only thing I can remember in the bag was a big bar of Cadbury's milk chocolate.

The next day, Zelda Cudlip and I (she lived opposite me in Salisbury Road) went to a large semi-detached house with a big garden. We slept on a mattress on the floor in a very small bedroom. I remember my first meal had gravy on (I wouldn't eat gravy at home). I started to eat what I thought was mashed potato- it wasn't nice- I eventually found the potato. I then learned that the other stuff was vegetable marrow. There were wasps and bees on the windows, which I am still terrified of.
The couple we stayed with had a young son about 4 or 5 years old. He would get the bees and wasps, pull their wings off their bodies on a pin and run after us with them. I had never been away from home before. I was so homesick, apparently I wrote a letter to my mum and signed it "your broken hearted daughter." My mum came in a private car the following Sunday and brought me home. The only other thing I remember was climbing over a stile and there were cows in the field. The trauma was too great for me- the other part is blocked out of my life.

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