蜜芽传媒

I left school in July 1939 and by this time our school and local parks had air raid shelters also sand bags had been placed around important buildings i.e. [Hospitals,] and temporary wards were built at the hospital in Stratton a suburb of Swindon. Some parks and country houses which had large gardens were cultivated and vegetables were grown.
The Milton road swimming baths which consisted of a large and small pool, the large pool could be boarded over so it could be used for dancing and other such functions. During the war this was used as a hospital for wounded soldiers.

In September 1939, I was fire watching at my old school Euclid Street, I was asked if I would be willing to help when the evacuees arrived. Some of the boys had made plum jam in readiness for breakfasts. One of the cooks was 15 year old Wolf Mankowitz and he had made the jam with other evacuees from East London. The mature pregnant mothers, mothers with children under five, all arrived at the school about 8 o鈥檆lock. We had milk for the children, tea for the rest and afterwards took them to the mattresses that had been on the floor of the hall and classrooms. One elderly lady had left Germany in 1938 and settled in London but found herself a refuge once again, she could not speak english however two of the staff had studied German but that was 30 years ago so it was difficult for them to keep up a conversation with the old lady.

One night when fire watching at the school in Euclid Street the sirens sounded, the five of us on duty had to man the stirrup pumps to douse any incendiary bombs that fell. We heard bangs and a man passing was heard to say 鈥渋ts Swindon tonight?鈥� At the end of my duty I caught the bus home and over heard a passenger say 鈥淜embrey Street has gone?鈥� This was at the rear of my home and only a row of terraced houses were between the bombs and my home, I was worried what I would find when I arrived.

When I got home my mother was sweeping the glass from the stairs the bomb blast had damaged the roof and broken some windows we hoped the temporary roof would keep out the rain until a complete repair could be carried out.

Another clear memory took place in June 1940, we had heard all about the evacuation of the BEF from Dunkirk but one Saturday morning we were surprised to see a group of weary soldiers their faces ashen with lack of sleep walking almost disorientated and slowly up Cricklade road which is the road our house was in. They were going to a piece of grassland belonging to the local authority, (a school was built on the land after the war) where they would sleep. On the Sunday morning an officer knocked on our front door, 鈥淕ood Morning Madam have you a bathroom, so that a couple of our men from France could have a bath?鈥� my mother said 鈥渙f course they can?鈥�, the soldiers arrived in their dirty clothes which as you can imagine were very grubby and somewhat smelly as they would not of changed since Dunkirk, the officer informed the soldiers that once in the bathroom to throw there dirty clothes out the window and put on the clean clothes in their kitbags. We had a cast iron Jack Horner copper in the bathroom which was heated by a coal fire so that meant the room was very warm needless to say the men were very grateful.

On the same morning a German plane flew east to west over Ferndale road firing at the Great Western Railway gas holders in Iffley Road before the plane could turn round to shoot from west to east, the Great Western Railway Fire brigade were in attendance and were attempting to plug the holes with clay, the Fire Chief was on top of one of the gas holders wearing his bowler hat putting clay on the holes made by the bullets, in the meantime the plane was on its way back the rest of the fire crew dived under some coal wagons while the fire officer remained on top of the gas holder.
My fianc茅 and his father were in the Great Western Railway fire brigade and heard of the bombing near my house, that evening he came to see if my mother and I were safe.

One evening quite late there was a loud knock at the front door, I said to mum 鈥渟hould we answer it?鈥� to which mother said yes, 鈥渂ut we need to protect ourselves?鈥� I said, with that mother looked at me and I notice she had a hammer in her hand. We went down stairs to the front door and opened it there stood an American soldier who was slightly worse for wear, the soldier then explained that he had walked a girl home and unfortunately missed his liberty bus back to base. Mother invited him to stay the night on the sofa which he agreed. In the morning mother and I got up and invited the soldier to have breakfast with us at first he declined saying, with the rationing of food he did not want to leave us short, but mother insisted this was not a problem and eventually he joined us and mother cooked him egg, bacon and one slice of bread to which he was most grateful. After thanking mother and me for our hospitality He managed to catch the liberty bus back to camp. We thought that would be the end of that but a few days later we were pleasantly surprised when a parcel full of fruit arrived it was from the American soldier as a thank you for our warm hospitality.

This year my husband and I celebrate 60 years of marriage.

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