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I was born on the 14th April 1937 in a village called Totton (near Southampton)
My father, Reginald, worked as the Yard Foreman in a Timber Yard owned by Burt Bolton and Haywood Ltd in Eling (a parish in Totton). We lived in a rented house, belonging to the company, on the edge of the Timber yard. The house was of wooden construction and was situated in Eling Lane.
On 26th March 1941 I was waiting at the backdoor of the house with my Mother,Lucy for my Father to come home for lunch. It was an overcast day and as my Father was walking up the garden path, having come through a gate into the Timber Yard, an aircraft suddenly appeared out of the clouds. I remember to this day seeing the black crosses on the wings and the open bomb doors. As we watched in disbelief, several bombs dropped from the aircraft followed by explosions on the ground whereby the whole scene in front of us erupted into a sea of flame and smoke. A large part of the Timber yard was soon ablaze with stacks of telegraph poles and railway sleepers burning fiercly. I was petrified and on turning round to run indoors to get away from the conflagration, I noticed a large bolt had penetrated the door behind us. This bolt must have gone over our heads before becoming embedded in the door, but neither my parents or I saw or heard it. The remains of tar tank from which the bolt had come was later found several miles away at Marchwood. I remember that the fire burned all day and I thought that the house would catch fire. However I was sent to friend's house some way off, to return later that day when the fire was under control and the house was no longer in danger. The memory of the aircraft was so vivid, and still is, that I could later identify it as a Heinkel he111. The attached photograph shows the yard burning and you can make out the stacks of creosoted telegraph poles and railway sleepers, also the tar tanks. There were several casulties during this raid but as it was lunch time, they were not as severe as they might have been had it taken place during working hours.
This was not the first time that the yard had been bombed as some time befor I remember that we were sheltering in the basement of the Yard's office building, having had the sirens warn of an air raid. On this occasion a string of bombs was dropped parallel to Eling lane. Fortunately our house did not receive a direct hit although it was damaged by blast. Some houses and the Fitters sshop belonging to the company were hit and there were casulties.
Following these raids my Mother would not remain living in the house and we moved some distance away. The timber yard was not bombed again with high explosive bombs although it received a few hits with incendary bombs. However these were extinguished by personnel on fire watch, including my Father, who was frequently on there during the night. I lived through the rest of the war dreading the air raid siren and being scared stiff when German bombers flew overhead on there way up-country to Coventry etc. Duthis time the place was covered in shrapnel from the local anti-aircraft battery at Hounsdown and it was not prudent to venture outside when they were firing. Later we did have an air raid shelter but it would only have been effective against blast.
Apart from the constant activity in the air my other vivid memory is seeing a V1 (doodlebug) flying over, the dreadful experience moment when the engine stopped and hearing the explosion as it hit the ground, fortunately for us, several miles away at Netley Marsh.
The other unfogettable experience is having the road full of vehicles prior to D-Day and then suddenly they were all gone, also the sky being full of aircraft towing gliders. There was also an American camp just up the road and we used to go to the gate and say 'got any gum chum' they were very generous and gave us oranges etc. but they also disappeared overnight.
I now live on the other side of Southampton but people who know the Totton area do not believe that so much happened there during the war

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