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ll Clear" after the dinner hour you could stay at home.
Mum joined other women in the street to knit string vests for the forces, which was organised by Lillywhites of Regent Street. She also became a regular Blood Donor until she became anaemic.
In May 1941 Dad joined the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Guard, which was voluntary and unpaid. He had refused to join his factory's platoon previously as they had no rifles in 1940, but he promised he would join as soon as they were received - it took a year!. He did his regular job of driving his lorry loaded with chemicals all over the country, once getting machine gunned by a German fighter on the road to Portsmouth Docks. ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Guard duties included exercises on Sundays and guarding the chemical works on one night a week. His platoon also guarded the home of Clement Atlee, the Deputy Prime Minister.
During this time I remember seeing a badly burned airman, still wearing his "hospital blues", who boarded a bus I was on with my mother. I have never forgotten his anxious eyes, and I was so glad the bus conductor sat and talked with him whenever he could.
Rationing got very tight as the years went by and the housewives had a really hard time
feeding their families. Sometimes there was nothing but soup and mashed potato for dinner. I used to share a fried egg at breakfast with my Dad. Mum went without, like most of the Mums when food was really short.
After the nightly air raids the children used to dash out into the street to collect souvenirs in the form of shrapnel. I had quite a lot of rusty metal.
We all thought the war was moving away from us after D Day, 6th June 1944, so when the V1's started landing in the South of England
they were a horrible reminder that we weren't safe yet. These "Flying Bombs",
"Pilotless Planes" or "Doodle Bugs" as they were known were much worse than the previous air raids by manned aircraft, as they seemed so in-human. When the engine cut out they would fall anywhere. One landed on Joseph Tack's home in Mill Hill, North West London, in the early hours of 27th June, killing four generations,from an old lady in her eighties to her Great Grandson of 19 months. Joseph Tack was my Grandfather's eldest son and he gave his life saving his wife Rosina (Rose) who was the only survivor. As she had no family and no home when she left the Red Cross Convalescent ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ in September, she came to live with us for the rest of her life.
In 1945 we saw the newsreel at the cinema of the first concentration camp to be liberated. The audience had been warned thet it would not be pleasant , and the children were told they could wait outside in the foyer until it was over. In her innocence my Mum said I could just shut my eyes, but when I heard the concerted gasp of horror from all the people in the Odeon, my eyes flew open and for a moment I looked at Hell. Mum soon hid my face so I saw no more.
We were a week into May when all the children at Hendon County Grammar School, where I was now a pupil, were told to assemble in the playground, where the Headmaster told us that Germany had surrendered and the war in Europe was over. He then said, after the cheering had stopped, that we could all go home.
That evening Mum, Dad and I went up to Buckingham Palace to see the King and Queen on the balcony. It was wonderful to see the lights on again after all those dark years.

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