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This contribution was submitted by Christine Gough to the People's War team in Wales. It is added to the site with her permission.

My first memory of the war would be the German planes coming over and the bombs….and sitting under the stairs as the planes were going over. And up the top of our street in Barry they were dropping bombs and some friends of ours were killed they dropped the bombs on the house and they were killed. The whole family were wiped out.
It was very sad.

I remember the blackout — you weren’t frightened of the blackouts. We had all the soldiers down by the docks, but you didn’t worry about it. I remember the young ones saying “Any gum chum” to all the Americans. I also remember going to a party. My cousin had the same name as me — Christine Powell — but her mum and dad, my uncle and aunt, had died. They owned a pub out near St. Athan and one died of TB and one died of kidney failure so my other aunt, my father’s sister, brought the children up. Well during the war the Americans used to give parties for the children …and my cousin, being orphaned, was invited to this party…but I was allowed to go to the party as well because I had the same name! We got to this party, we had a lovely time and there were all these gorgeous presents from the Americans — but I didn’t get any because I wasn’t an orphan! But I do remember having a big bag of Smarties and ring donuts and going home — they dropped me right outside the house — in an open top bus.

We had two bakehouses at the bottom of our lane. One was Wards and one was Barnes. Wards made the lovely Hovis bread and the jam tarts, and Barnes made the lovely batches and jam donuts. So we always seemed to be very lucky to get sweets…we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves — in a sense - when we were young. It didn’t enter our heads — being so young — that it was a bad war. When the war ended we had bonfires..and the bonfires were in the streets and of course the streets are narrow and the big bonfires were in the streets. And all the other streets had their bonfires and what used to happen was you’d have gangs from each street and they all used to set fire to other people’s bonfires! So you’d have to go searching then for firewood to make another bonfire.
When the war ended I was nine…so I do remember it. And it was a good time, everybody seemed to help one another — they don’t in this day and age — but if anybody had anyone ill, or wanted something, you’d help them. If they were short of coal they’d come up to Mrs. Powell (my mother) and she’d give them some. Good times I think, much better than now.

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