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Even at the age of 5 years and 4 months I knew that something highly unusual was about to happen. My family lived at No.63 Jenner Road,Stoke Newington, and being a boy that played outside a lot, I had already inspected the new barrage balloon site that had been set up on stoke newington common, and had seen it raised in several tests. My father had bought me a gleaming black tricycle, (with gold trimmings), for my 5th birthday in April and I used to rush up and down the street, (bordered by Brook road at one end, and the common the other) on it yelling about being a soldier.

The first thing of interest that day was that my uncle Harry came over, (he lived nearby) to help my father tape all the windows of the ground floor flat where we lived, in the shape of union jacks. The "tape" was really rolls of gummed brown paper that you had to lick with your tongue to stick.( no plastics! ) It was a sunny morning I remember, and was told as usual to go outside and not to get in the way, but to keep close to the house and not to take my bike outside.

I should now mention that my mother, unbeknown to me was over 7 months pregnant with my future sister. True I had seen the bulge, but it didn't register in my mind as I knew babies were always brought by storks.

Anyway, suddenly my dad called me in and Uncle Harry leapt out of the frond door running away down the street. I said to dad that I wanted to go out to play again when the air raid siren sounded its worbling song.

Now for those born long after the war, I should point out that there had been practice warnings and drills for months before the start of the conflict. There had been adverts in papers and special issues of picture cards depicting Air Raid Precautions, ( called civil defence today ), which I had collected from cigarrette packs. I should also point out that I could read fairly well by this time. So I knew what the sound meant, we, Engalnd was at war.

Time does funny things to the memory, for the next thing I remember was that my family was all packed up to go on a journey.
Uncle Harry came back to the house in a taxi. We all got into the cab and drove to Kings Cross Station ( I think ). The platforms were all crowded with mums and children. Eventually we got onto the train, Mum, Dad and me. I asked where were we going and recieved the reply that Mum and me were being evacuated to Bishop Aukland in Durham, and that we were to stay with Uncle Lou and Aunt Gladys.

This was all very upsetting for me, and I'm afraid I made a bit of a nusance of myself. The journey was long, and a day that had begun in brilliant sunshine ended in a train carriage lit by a dimmed blue light.

A month later to the day, October 3rd 1939 my sister was born.

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