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My War by Peggy Cavallo.

When the Second World War broke out in 1939, I was a child of nine year old. My three brothers and I were evacuated to Luton in Bedfordshire leaving the rest of the family in London. We stood on Kings Cross platform a poor dejected four, wondering why our mother had sent us away. We did not realize that it was for our own safety and that the family had not taken the decision lightly. There we stood with our battered suitcases, our gas masks hanging from our shoulders, each clutching a pack of Mum’s corn-beef sandwiches.

Our destination was Leagrave, a suburb of Luton. We were bewildered and a little frightened, as most of us had never been parted from our families before. We were marched around the streets of Leagrave, the person in charge of us knocked on doors enquiring if the occupants would accommodate one or more of our party of evacuees for the duration of the war. I was billeted with a childless couple that showered me with love and kindness. Anything that I desired would have been granted to me. Yet in spite of their kind care of me, I was not happy. I desperately missed Mum, Dad and the family. I felt a sense of loneliness and isolation. However, we were soon united with the family, when Mum, Dad and my elder sisters Eva and Ivy moved to Luton and what a glorious day that was for the members of the family who had been evacuated.

My brother Fred and my sister Eva’s boyfriend Harry were conscripted into the army. In fact Harry was one of the thousands of troops, who were rescued by a flotilla of small civilian boats (fishing boats to ordinary cabin cruises, boats of all shapes and sizes) all making a brave passage across a very volatile English Channel to pluck our stranded army from the French beaches where thy were trapped with the German army at their backs and the sea in front of them.

We owed a great debt of gratitude to those men of the small boats because many made the ultimate sacrifice. They bravely ran the gauntlet of the German air-force and the guns of the ever-advancing German army.

In comparison with other towns and cities, the area of Leagrave had fewer German bombs dropped on it so suffered a lot less devastation. Nevertheless, the amount of bombs that were dropped on us was very frightening as they brought death, injury and destruction to people and buildings. The most deadly weapon was the V2 Rockets, as they silently crept upon you with no warning. If you were in their pathway your chances of coming out alive were nil. There was a disturbing incident, when a V2 dropped on Commer Cars canteen in Luton when most of the firms workers were having their lunch, it was a massacre with so much lose of life and injured.

Dad was an air-raid warden and it was his job to roam the streets in his area watching for any light seeping from the blacked out windows. Regulations stated that all windows must be completely covered. Should even a glimmer of light escaped from any window, it would shine up in the sky like a beacon for the enemy bombers and act as a flair path for their high explosives.

We were very lucky and emerged unscathed from the war with no serious damage to ourselves or our property. The only real damage that we suffered was when dad tried to open the front door on one occasion and it came off in his hand because it had been damaged through bomb blast. When the air raid siren sounded, the family would not go to the air raid shelter that Dad had built in the back garden of our house as we were supposed to do. The problem was that it invariably filled up with water when it rained and drowning was not an option.

We would all shelter under Mum’s large solid oak table in the back room. We, kids were not afraid; in fact it was fun to be out of bed in the middle of the night singing songs and telling stories. It was comforting to be squashed with the family under Mum’s table. Sometimes we stayed in bed defiantly and challenged Hitler to do his worst.

Rationing was a headache for our Mum because of the shortages of food and other commodities. You had ration books for food and clothing as well as for furniture. My Mum was a great juggler, she always managed to make something out of nothing and keep us healthy. Our favourite dinner was bone stew which consisted of: - vegetables, animal bone and delicious thick suet dumplings. The smell that came from the bubbling pot really tormented our taste buds and set our tummies longing for this culinary delight, it really made a very substantial meal for us growing kids.

Christmas was very austere during those dark days and the Christmas puddings were made out of a mish-mash off: - Carrots, apples, date, prunes and the usual binding ingredients. The thrill of our Christmas puddings was the silver three-penny bits that Mum hide amongst the mixture. This caused great shouts of delight, when one of us found a coin in our portion of pudding. Tea rationing was a problem as my Mum had an addition to caffeine. We solved this problem by take a large empty jug to the local greasy spoon café and purchased a jug of tea for a small charge. We made many such trips in order to satisfy Mum’s craving for caffeine as she said that it soothed her nerves. Usual tea time consisted of bread and jam or dripping. However, every Sunday teatime, we were served a great treat as our meal consist of a boiled egg, with bread and butter, and a plate of tinned fruit covered in shaky milk [which was our pet name for evaporated milk].

On the lighter side, there was a therapeutic wartime pastime called queuing. If you saw a line of people outside a shop, you would blindly joined them, not knowing what was on offer until you got to the shop counter. As everything was in short supply, the obtaining of one of these shortage items would be like a gift for heaven. You could be queuing for a bunch of bananas or a pound of oranges, even a pairs of silk stockings. If you were queuing outside a bakers shop the delights you could obtain were doughnuts, cream cakes and sticky buns. We, children were starved of sweet stuff during the war so when these confectionery could be obtained, we ate them with relish. British folk had to contend with the sparse life, hard work, the tension and fear that the next bomb that was dropped would blow you into oblivion. The importance of these little luxuries was a great boost to the moral of the people in wartime.

Basic amenities were seriously affected even water was rationed. You were only allowed three of four inches of bath water to wash in. The younger children in the family willingly gave up their bath times for elder sisters who wanted to smell nice for their night on the town. Mind you, a little money did changed hands between us but our philosophy was that there was no point in getting clean when you only got dirty again.

Our schooling was interrupted because of the shortage of teachers; our lessons were fragmented as the young men and women were either drafted into the army or were on war work. The gap was filled by retired teachers, but the children did not mind this state of affairs. The had a happy outcome for us was that we had better things to do like playing war game and searching for bits of shrapnel to keep as souvenirs.

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