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I was only 2 years old when the war started,but my earlist recollection is being carried out of the house in the night,wrapped in a blanket to the shelter at the bottom of the garden.
There I remember hearing the droning of planes, the booming of the anti aircraft guns in Barking park and the clatter of the shrapnel on the roof of the house.When the all clear sounded,Mum would put her head ouside of the shelter and Say 'the roofs still on'
Dad was in the ARP,and would come home smelling of smoke and dettol !
The smoke from the fires he had been near and the dettol from treating the casualtys.
The noises and smells are the most ligering memories of that time.
And of the morning Dad brouht home an incendary bomb that had not exploded and put it down the bottom of the garden until the bomb disposal chaps came to deal with it.Mum went mad!. Dad did not do it again.

I'm not sure of when , but it may have been 1941 when without warning two German planes flew down the street at roof top height, and strafed the street.
My mum, aunt,and me dived in the cupboard under the stairs.By the time we got there the planes had gone leaving some holes in some walls and roofs.
I never knew if there were any casualties.My other memories are later in the war 1944 when all the streets were lined with all sorts of vehicles, tanks, ambulances, gun carriers, which were waiting for the D Day invasion to start.
They were building up over several weeks, and then suddenly they were all gone!
I recall my mother discussing with neigbours
if 'this is the day' they meaning the invasion, but I was not sure what they meant.Also the V1 AND V2'.The V1's,'doodlebugs were creepy to hear the throb of the engine getting louder and hoping it would keep going to some other unfortunate area, or if it cut out, getting down or under some shelter rapidly.
V2's were a different experience altogether.
I think they used to say that if you hear the 'bang ' you were still alive.
One evening I had come home with Mum and Dad and was playing with my dads 'big' ARP torch, and shining it on the house across the street. As soon as I flashed it,or as it turned out, thought I had flashed it on the house opposite,I was lifted with a gust of wind and floated down the hallway ,to be caught by Dad who happend to be coming from the kitchen. Next there was the bang of what turned out to be a V2 exploding a few streets away.
Finally at the end of the war were the street parties and bonfires in the middle of the road, and flags across the streesd, and someone produced some fireworks !

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