- Contributed byÌý
- West_End_at_War
- People in story:Ìý
- Ellen Searle
- Location of story:Ìý
- Plumstead, South London
- Background to story:Ìý
- Civilian
- Article ID:Ìý
- A2769032
- Contributed on:Ìý
- 22 June 2004
This story was submitted to the People War’s site by Jane Van de Ban of CSV Media on behalf of Ellen Searle and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site’s terms and conditions
I had a friend living next door, who was the same age as me. On October 8, 1940, it was his birthday, and we decided to commemorate it by going swimming in Plumstead Baths.
We arrived to find that a bomb had fallen on a shelter in Woolwich Arsenal, and it killed 200 people. They were using the baths for the mortuary, so we couldn’t go swimming. So we had to go back home then, and in the evening we had a big raid, so we went into the shelter.
A landmine landed on the fence between their shelter and our shelter, and my friend was killed and so was his mother. And I was blinded, so I lost most of the sight in my left eye, but they operated and saved the sight in my right eye after the war.
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