High Explosive Bomb at Folkestone Road

A Canning Town Evacuee — Part 1

My name is Reg Yates. I lived in London at Canning Town, London E.16 and Plaistow E.13 during WW2, going to Beckton Road Junior and Rosetta Road Schools except for my periods as an evacuee to Bath during September to Christmas 1939,then Cropredy May 1940 - July 1942.

I then worked at A. Bedwells, Barking Road delivering groceries for the rest of the war.

I'm still alive and kicking! Anyone remember me?

A Community Coming Together

War clouds came and we had to dig a big hole in each garden at least three and a half feet deep, at least six feet wide and roughly eight feet long depending on the size of the family using it, an awesome task. All the neighbours pooled resources and after about two months hard work most houses had a hole and had the Anderson Shelter erected to the supplied instructions. We had to make sure the rear exit worked properly. Two-tier bunk beds 2 x 6 feet one side and one other bunk bed and two chairs were there along with a bucket for the toilet and a bucket of water to drink. We never knew how long we would have to stay in there. During The Blitz we had to stay all night.

The shelters proved to be a godsend as they survived everything except a direct hit. They survived near misses and houses falling on top of them. People came out shaken but alive. They were worth their weight in gold.

There was another shelter built to fix over the kitchen table, steel top and legs for people who could get underneath in an emergency. Safe from falling masonry, it was called a Morrison Shelter after Lord Morrison a Labour Lord at the time.

I started smoking about this time. I could buy five woodbines and a box of matches for two pence, boys will be boys. I also remember going on an errand for my Dad, I had to take a letter to a house in Wanlip Road, Plaistow and she had tiles on the walk up from the gate to front door. She went ballistic because I dared to skate up to her front door. She made me take them off whilst she wrote a note to my Dad saying what a cheeky so and so I was for skating up to her door and that if I came again I would have to walk to teach me a lesson.

There were plenty of rumours about kids having to get evacuated very soon and on 1st September 1939 we were transported to Paddington Station and put on a train to the country.

We all had to say goodbye to our parents at school after they tied a label around our necks with name, date of birth, religion and which school we were from. So just after my eleventh birthday I said goodbye to Beckton Road School for the first time and landed up in the old city of Bath in Somerset.

Evacuated For The First Time

It was only two weeks after my eleventh birthday when we arrived at Bath Junction signal box, and someone said “just the thing for you kids from the smoke, a bloody great bath.” I didn’t realise what he meant until years later!

I was sent to a place called Walcott in Bath, and I was sent to a Mr & Mrs Pierce who to my eyes, were quite old looking. However, they were very nice people and looked after me very well.

They had a middle-aged navvy with whom I shared a bedroom, and our own beds I’m glad to say. I remember him getting dressed for work, hobnail boots, corduroy trousers and he tied about nine inches of car tyres around his kneecaps. He had a walrus moustache and looked a fearsome bloke to look at, but was a gentle chap really.

My two sisters were evacuated to a house just around the corner up a steep hill. Doris was eight years old and Joyce was thirteen and a half. They stayed with nice people who had two girls of their own of about eight to ten years of age. We all went to the local school along with about forty other kids from London.

We all had to sing a hymn ‘For those in peril on the sea.’ Just before Christmas we lost an aircraft carrier, HMS Glorious, with great loss of life and most of the sailors came from the West Country. The local rag had pages and pages of photos of those lost on the carrier.

Sometime in November 1939 I was playing a game called catch and kiss with some of the locals. This time they went along the road at the top of the hill. On one corner was a grocers shop, which had a wall with big white letters, “we sell Hovis bread”. What I didn’t know at that moment was that the police had very recently made the shopkeeper black it out as it could be seen from an aeroplane.

Running at full pelt, I ran straight into it thinking it was the turning. I was in hospital for three weeks. When I started school again, I could not see the teachers’ writing on the board.

At the end of December our Mum came to Bath to see us, and after saying goodbye to my sisters and all the other kids, she took me back to London so I could have treatment for my eyes. I had damaged my optic nerve and have worn glasses ever since.

Joyce came home in February 1940 when she was fourteen, but Doris stayed there until just before the end of the war in 1945.

Home Again

Christmas and New Year came and went, 1940 began and the war was getting worse. I think rationing was introduced about now and some foods were already becoming scarce. Cigarette cards disappeared from packets to save paper and you couldn’t buy pickles loose in a basket.

A couple of weeks went by and the time came to go back to school. Nothing much changed as most children who got evacuated the previous September were still away, but a few more seemed to come back every weekend.

The Beckton Road School was taken over by The National Fire Service, a first aid post and umpteen other things so they found the kids another school called Rosetta Road (off Freemasons Road) that was built of wood and all on one level after the First World War when all the servicemen came home.

Council workmen had dug some slit trenches just in case of an air raid but they looked useless to me, because if it rained it would be like running into a mud bath.

There was some talk about kids having to leave London again and come May it proved to be true and about seventy of us from this school were sent to Banbury in Oxfordshire.

Later in 1942 Mum and Dad moved to Wigston Road that was the next turning. Most people had moved because of the bombing.

As told by Donald Wharf

The air-raid siren - as chilling as ever - wailed as the daylight was fading. Having had no serious air-raid for ages, I thought that, perhaps, it was 'nothing' but then came the very familiar 'booms', and so we retired to the shelter. Hitler had, obviously, not given up and, much as I'm sure we all thought it, the excitement had not simply passed us by - the war had come back to East Ham. Next, I detected a coarse, raucous sound that was closing surprisingly fast. 'One of their aircraft in trouble', I thought but, just as it seemed to have passed, the engine cut out - and then it happened: the explosion was not far away. Almost at once I could hear it again, that same unforgettable sound which stopped, like the first time, very abruptly - and so, yet another explosion. This didn't end: it continued to happen amidst some formidable gunfire - something that finally caused me to say, "The bombers, they're shooting them down!" Slowly, my father turned round to one side: he was laying full length on a bunk-bed. "If that's the case then they've got some new gunners", he said - or something like that. When, in the end, after several hours we emerged from our Anderson shelter, all the old smells of the 'blitz' were there - then I realised what this could all mean..... Saturday: would I be able to go? The Odeon: was it still there? Then, as if nothing else mattered at all, I started to question my mother which brought a deservedly curt response - "It'll have to be cancelled", she said.

Cancelled it was, but there wasn't a choice as the bombing looked set to continue. After that memorably noisy night, we learned that we hadn't heard aircraft but, what was referred to as, unmanned missiles, technically known as V1s. These were propelled by a strange type of jet engine, which, when it finally cut out, meant that the missile then dived down to earth with its payload - a ton of explosive. More of them came down the following day which my mother said looked rather ominous.

As it turned out, all her fears were proved right when in no more than four or five days, life was resembling the earlier 'blitz'..... but at that point the guns disappeared! This was because they had moved further south to positions in Sussex and Kent, where hitting and shooting the missiles down wouldn't defeat its own purpose. 'Missiles', in fact, was a rarely used word which, very soon after that Thursday, was replaced by 'flying bombs', 'buzz bombs' or 'doodle-bugs' - words that, to us, had some meaning.

One almost instant change that took place, after the guns had moved on, was our air-raid routine during daylight hours: we no longer stayed in the shelter. Shrapnel was, obviously, not coming down so there wasn't a danger from that, and as for the strange-looking flying bombs - they did, in fact, give us some warning. Firstly, their noise told us when they were coming, then, due to them flying so low, we were able to watch their line of approach - but suddenly all would fall silent: that was the point when we just had to guess where the bombs were most likely to land. Sometimes we did have to dive down the shelter but, mostly, we stayed in the garden.

Naturally, after a period of time, it all became very routine with most people choosing to stay indoors during, what we all called, an 'alert'. Usually, however, a look-out was used who would shout in the case of real danger - this, out of school hours, was me for my house and Roy for his house, next door. Actually, the pair of us worked as a team, up on the roof of our shed which hadn't been used as a look-out post since the days of the Battle of Britain.

******

During the course of July, and then August, parts of East Ham really suffered. We, on the other hand, saw some near misses that still remain etched in my brain but, generally, our stretch of Central Park Road only sustained minor damage. One such 'near miss' came at lunch-time, one day, while I wandered outside in the garden, waiting for something like dried egg and mash that my mother was quietly preparing. Having just come home from school, very hungry, I wasn't a look-out that day! Also, I'd realised, with total surprise, that my father was home for lunch too, so feeling, perhaps, just a little intrigued, I was thinking of asking him 'why?'. This never happened as thoughts such as that were suddenly blown from my mind.

Coming in fast was a flying bomb that I'd, obviously, not been aware of, and flying low, I remember thinking, due to the tone of its engine. Almost at once it careered into view, as I searched for it over the rooftops, blasting its way in a straight line towards me - that was the point when I shouted.....partly, perhaps, to release the tension but also to forewarn my parents. Then, when its engine cut out, right above me, I physically cringed, but I stayed there, knowing that, usually, they dived at an angle but rarely at ninety degrees. This one was different: it flipped itself over then dropped in a vertical dive! Stricken with fear, I just froze like a statue but, after a nasty few moments, two pairs of hands were pushing and pulling me - then, I was down in the shelter, crouching beneath both my mother and father waiting, I thought, for oblivion. Seconds ticked by: perhaps four, perhaps five - "Where is it?", I yelled, "What's happening?" Next came the dull, rather horrible thud..... it was close but at least we'd survived.

As luck would have it - that is for us - the bomb had pulled out of its dive and landed just north of the Barking Road, a three minute walk from our house. This wasn't lucky for West Ham United: the bomb had come down on their ground!

One other quite harrowing image of war from the 'doodle-bug' days of that summer, came on an otherwise quiet Sunday morning while lots of us just sat around. Not having eaten my breakfast by then, I have to admit, I was one. First came a few very distant explosions but then, when we thought they were finished, someone outside shouted, "One's coming over!"..... it missed us but not by a lot. Naturally, everyone rushed to their windows or stood in their tiny front gardens to see where the bomb had eventually come down, but it wasn't that obvious at first. Next, I remember, I noticed that smoke was starting to rise in the sky from somewhere - again - near the Barking Road, though I couldn't be sure from our doorstep. Nobody else actually made a suggestion but some said they thought it was nearer. Half an hour later, the sky was still quiet so, with partial parental approval, I ran to where everything seemed to be happening which was where I'd thought it would be.

More than a few of the local people were standing in groups in the road, helpless of course, and looking dazed but most of them would have been neighbours. Then there were firemen and rescue workers, scrambling about in the rubble, heaving great lumps of it out of their way in a desperate search for survivors. What had been, once, just a quiet little street was a scene of appalling destruction. One house - the house at the end of the terrace - had simply been razed to the ground with only some pieces of outside wall still, temporarily, standing upright. As for the next house, the one next door that was still technically standing, though most of its roof had been blown away and two or three walls had come down. Thankfully, further along down the terrace, the damage grew steadily less.

Suddenly, there was a buzz of excitement as someone was found in the debris then carried, precariously, down to the road and into the back of an ambulance. That seemed, at least, like a glimmer of hope but almost at once there was more - a rescue worker appeared through the dust, stumbling, but carrying a child. As I looked harder it looked like a boy but wrapped in an A.R.P. blanket. Naturally, then, we all tried to close in but the A.R.P. wouldn't let us as more of the victims were being brought out in a street getting ever more crowded. Possibly, I'd been reminded of Ginger as, right at the height of this drama, I found myself feeling unpleasantly hot - then I wanted to leave, very quickly.

On the way home, I decided to stop and to sit on the kerb by the roadside. All that I wanted to do, in fact, was to settle myself and cool down, which seemed to me better than getting home flustered and having my mother ask questions. This, it turned out, was doomed from the start when a voice near me called, "You alright?" then I found myself trying to explain that I was to a deaf and persistent old man, who told me that he would accompany me home - so I just had to get up and run. When, minutes later, I walked through our door, I had as it happened, recovered.

After the huge, airy rooms of 'The Manse' (Port Sunlight, where Donald had been evacuated in August 1944) my house seemed even more tiny. As for the garden - I'd almost forgotten the amount take up by the shelter, covered, that Autumn, in long stalky grass and the seed pods of dozens of marigolds. Little had changed though - at least, near to us - except for the wail of the siren. That had, apparently, been very quiet since the 'doodle-bug' era had ended. What had replaced them, the V2 rockets, were able to fly undetected, making the usual defences useless as well as the old wailing siren.

My first experience of this latest weapon came, not on the day I returned, but during the course of the following morning while I was at home with my mother - playing outside in the garden, in fact, as all of my friends were at school. Suddenly, there was a terrible 'bang' which caused me to jump and turn round, just as my mother appeared in the kitchen; "Sounds like a rocket", she called. Then, looking roughly southwest from our house, I saw what was obviously smoke, billowing up and forming a cloud in the area beyond Boundary Road. Nothing but silence reigned, just for a while, but that was soon broken by bells: fire-engine bells and then ambulance bells - the 'blitz' and V1s yet again!..... What was so different, of course, to all that, was the absence of some sort of warning.

Evacuation

In August 1939, aged 13, I was on holiday. There had been much talk of war for over 12 months and we cut our holiday short in order that my parents could attend my half brothers wedding which had been brought forward as he was being called up into the army.
The following week we were called back to school to prepare for evacuation. Each day we attended school as normal taking a suitcase with essential clothes which were checked each morning by our teacher followed by gas mask drill. We then played various indoor games until home time. On Friday 1 September we were told that we were leaving and duly labelled, lined up to march to Upton Park station. I had always been a fussy eater and a very bad riser but the ‘bush telegraph’ had done its job and most of the parents were at the school gate to see us off and call loving messages, mine being ‘Get up first call and eat everything that’s put in front of you.’
Why we didn’t go round the corner to East Ham station I do not know but we marched in crocodile behind the headmistress singing ‘ I have lost the doh of my clarinet, the me, fah etc.’ and caught a train to Ealing Broadway where I believe we should have caught a train to Cornwall. However, we were put on a train for Oxfordshire and told we were off to Kidlington. We soon ate our sandwiches and then settled down to watch the countryside speeding by. Some time later we arrived at Bicester where we were taken to the village hall and given a drink of milk, put on to buses and driven to Kidlington. Another village hall, where we were put into groups and sent round the village to be billeted. By now it was getting quite late but on we trudged stopping at various houses to leave girls at their new homes. At the end of the Banbury Road there were four of us left and we knocked at a door and a very pretty little lady came running round the side and we entered in, and that was how my friend Joan and I met Mrs Maycock. Two other friends were welcomed next door, and after something to eat we had to write a card to our parents with our new address and then met Mr Maycock and a short while later we went to bed. Mr. & Mrs ‘M’ as I called them had only been married for 2 years and in later years I really pitied them having to take in 2 teenagers, mind you, teenagers in those days weren’t anywhere near as stroppy as they are these days.
On the Saturday the teacher in charge of our group came to check that we were ok and then we had little to do. Mrs ‘M’ suggested that we took a walk over to the aerodrome which we did and gazed at the one mechanic, the petrol pump and the [plane.
On Sunday 3rd September we went to visit Mrs Maycock senior who lived by the canal and heard the prime minister declare war. I was somewhat bemused to see Mrs Maycock senior crying at the thought of war.
For a few weeks we shared the senior school with the local children, they going for lessons in the morning and we having the use of the school during the afternoons. This worked quite well as we had games and nature rambles in the morning, but soon afterwards we were given an old zoo house with various barns where the animals had been kept. As this was the other end of the village Mr ‘M’ who was a keen cyclist made me up a bike from spare parts which helped a lot. My parents came for a visit and laid down the ground rules and both Joan and I settled into a routine. Come Christmas I had a new cycle which I must say had better brakes that the other one. Joan decided to go home as there had been no bombing and I moved into the small bedroom. Mrs’M’ began to let the double room to air force personnel for weekends and longer when their wives visited.
Our teachers had been very strict about school uniform but once clothes rationing came into force we were allowed a little latitude. The winters were very cold and I suffered badly from chilblains but there were compensations in that we used to go to ice-skating on Benheim lake, and come the summer we used to go fishing in the river and canal. Our gym mistress used to take us swimming in the river and used to insist we swam in the nude much to the joy of the local boys on the other side of the river. It was freezing. I only went home occasionally when there were lulls in the blitz, my mother had returned to nursing and worked shiftwork. Returning home one night in a heavy raid she was crouched against a wall when something touched her shoulder. Convinced that she was hit by shrapnel she turned round fearfully to find a ginger cat patting her shoulder.
Mr ‘M’ was a bricklayer by trade but all civilian building stopped when war broke out so he got a job at the local bacon factory and used to bring home offcuts which Mrs’M’ made into delicious pies. He was also a very keen gardener and we never lacked fresh vegetables. With the hens which they kept and the odd pig or two they were always busy. I tried my hands at growing vegetables but was not keen on weeding and had quire a few lectures. The school dinners were very small and I suffered badly from hunger, present nutritionists tell us we were better fed in wartime but as a growing girl I dispute this.
The council house where I lived had one cold water tap between four houses and the first one up in winter would boil a kettle of rainwater and pour it over the tap to defrost it. We had a shed in the garden with a bucket for a toilet which was emptied by a collector once a week, and on one memorable occasion the axle broke on the cart and the contents spilt all over the road in the centre of the village.
We had loads of fun and lots of hard work. When we had RAF personnel staying we would play darts in the evening which I enjoyed even though it meant I had to get up early to do my homework. My mother would never have recognised me especially when I got up early on May morning to cycle to Oxford to hear the choir on Magdalen tower.
We regularly attended church and also the cinema in the village especially when Deanna Durbin was on. Mr & Mrs ‘M’ treated me to the pantomime in Oxford and occasionally we went dancing at the aerodrome after Mr ‘M’ became a handyman there. Though I must admit that as a skinny fifteen year old I was hardly ‘Belle of the Ball’.
I was a member of the school guide company and enjoyed getting badges. The Maycock family treated me as one of their own and we have remained friends all our lives, Mrs ‘M’ and some of her family are still alive (2004) Sometimes I would go to Woodstock where Mrs ‘M’s mother managed a sweet shop and I remember sitting in bed with her sister Lilian and Mr ‘M’s sister eating unrationed sweets. My friends and I tried smoking in the blackout but when I was 16 Mr ‘M’ gave us a box of cigarettes and told us it was now legal. We didn’t bother any more!
We had very little German air activity over Kidlington. Once when my parents were visiting a plane came over and my father said it was a german, and everyone laughed until a stick of bombs fell on the aerodrome. The pilot got away because the airman manning one of the guns had hopped over the fence to meet his girl in Oxford. A plane was shot down one Xmas time and one of our RAF friends was guarding it in bitter cold weather so we cycled out with hot soup for him.
Eventually we took our exams and left for home with mixed feelings. Some of the girls couldn’t settle in their foster homes and they opened a very large house where they lived for four years. I had loved being one of a large family but looked forward to my new life at work. I was so lucky to have the billet that I did and Mrs’M’ was paid the princely sum of 7/6 (37 1/2p) for my keep. My mother gave some extras such as blankets and as I said we have always remained friends.

I was evacuated from Eastbrook Senior School in Dagenham, Essex on 2nd September 1939. We left on the Ford Motor Company Jetty, Dagenham on the River Thames.

We went on a paddle steamer to Lowestoft, Norfolk. I walked with my borthers Denis and Ted; our ages were mine (8), Den (9) and Ted (12). It was cloudy and windy; the moon was seen now and again through the clouds.

We carried our clothes and others bits in white pillow cases. To me it was scary walking past an old barn at Dagenham Village High Street. At the Jetty a cry went up ‘the gates are locked.’ We hung around a bit. Gates opened and we went. All I can remember about the trip was me running up and down the steps, watching the paddles go round. Watching girls queuing up for a cup of tea at a tea urn on a lower deck for Mum’s surprise.

On arrived at Lowestoft, we were taken to a local school for sandwiches and drinks. I slept on a sack full of straw. I was woken up, told the air raid siren had gone and was taken to sleep the rest of the night on the school field. A full moon was shining.

In the morning, we were loaded onto coaches. I was given a brown carrier bag with a bottle of water, orange, apple, a big bar of chocolate, I was told not to eat any of it, it was emergency rations. I ate the chocolate as soon as the coach started.

My brothers and I handed up at Thurgarton Rectory, Thurgaton Village, near Norwich 3rd – 4th September 1939.

When we went to bed, I asked my brother Ted ‘Where is the toilet?’

Over there, he said. I got up in the night to use the toilet for a wee. Couldn’t find it in the dark. Tiddled on the floor.

Mrs Steadman cried out, ‘What’s going on?’

We had half days at the village school. To go to school we walked through fields full of horses. Field with heifers and a big black bull with enormous horns. We used to ride on the heifers.

Being townies, we didn’t know the heifers kept the bull! Two horses in a field, you walked slowly, they never took any notice of you. If you ran, they chased you. I always ran. I got to a fence just in time to climb up on it. They were big, good at snorting over my shoulder, great fun. We went to the local church every Sunday morning.

Inside it was whitewashed walls. Mr Steadman the vicar got very ill. We were moved to Mrs Barbar, Shop House, Thurgarton, on 30th October 1939. I remember coming down for breakfast, a table was full of food. Lovely.

Our mum bought us back home early November ’39 by coach. All I remember is fields with hundreds of pee-wits flyaround.

I lived in 77 Standfield Road, Dagenham, Essex. IN 1940, the spitfires used to fly over the house to land at Hornchurch aerodrome. There was always one missing, I could tell. Spitfires flew in vics of three.

When I got a bit older, I realized what was going on. I had a cousin, Eric, who was a air frame fitter stationed at Hornchurch. Eric would stay at 77 for 24 hour leave. Eric used to sit and just look out of the front room window. My mum told me to, ‘Leave him alone,’ Did as you were told in them days.

My brothers and I were evacuated again late in 1940 to Gloustershire by train. All I remember is sitting in the carriage with other kids.

I was put in a house in Tewkesbury with my brother Denis. We were told we had scabies. I remember telling people quite clearly, ‘I haven’t got it.’ And I didn’t. But I soon got it from other boys and girls who had it.

I was cured and sent to live in Twyning Manor House, Tywning, 4 or 5 miles from Tewksbury town. Twyning was on the river Avon. A bank in the river was dug for us kids to swim in.

I had a portrait painted of me by the daughter of Manor Lady. Six pence for every sitting. A fortune. I went back after the war. No sigh of a portrait.

I lived at Manor with another boy. My brothers were at a cottage at Hill End. The bedroom was about sixty foot long. It’s a luxury flats complex now.

I was thrown out of Manor House. I would not wear a tie at the food table. I never had one, looking back.

I ate with the servants. I was sent to live in the gardener’s house called ‘the stables’, all part of Manor House grounds. A nice family by the name of Beacham. Went back for a week to stay after the war.

Across the yard was the chauffeur’s house. Nice family. Had a girl evacuee with a crippled leg. She was great. Her leg didn’t stop her playing with boys.

My brothers and I would walk for miles up the Beacon Hill with just a bottle of water and cross the Avon on a ferry punt, half a penny each.

We caught a village bus that ran Wednesdays and Saturdays only to Tewksbury. If you wanted to see the end of a film at the cinema, we had to walk back to Twyning on the main road in the dark. The bus always left ten minutes before the end of the film. Done a lot of walking.

At school the headmaster was a nasty man.

One day at school a skua dive bomber of the Fleet Air Arm was practising dive bombing over the fields. He got into trouble. You heard the engine coughing.

The airplane came very low over the school. I waved to the man at the back; next minute the plane crashed. Big cloud of smoke went up. The teachers hushed us back into school. Sad.

After school, my brothers and me had a look at the crash. Lots of blood. Bodies taken away. I took a lot of bullets. Police came and took them away later.

I watch Bristol burning one night.

Then I was brought home with Denis. Ted stayed at Twyning for years.

At home the mini blitz was on. My mum used to wake me up, saying, ‘They’re over, make a cup of tea.’ Every night. Got a bit tired.

My eldest brother Bob joined the RAF in 1940. He ws the first ATC cadet to get his pilot wings. The mayor of Dagenham presented Bob with a wrist watch. In 1941 the Mayor-Alderman Clack, presentation at Bonham Road School Dagenham. Bob crashed in Northamptonshire July 12th – 13th 1942. Killed. He was burned to death. My mum nearly fainted. I wish I hadn’t told her.

Bob’s funeral. From my house, had my dad marching behind with borther Len in Home Guard uniforms, ATC cadets alongside the cortege and behind to Eastbrook Cemetery. Past Eastbrook School, school boys and teachers lined outside by air raid shelters. I have the photos.

A V2 rocket blew up at the school in Heathway, I fell off my chair.

A Doodlebug blew up at Osbourne Square. I stuck my head out of the bedroom window to see it come down like a falling leaf. The blast hurt my ears. Perforated one. A lot of trouble over the years with that.

I was riding along Hunters Hall Road, Dagenham, when a buzz bomb came along just over the roof tops. A riad warden blew his whistle and rattle: ‘When I tell you to lay down, you bloody well LAY DOWN.’ The warden was about four foot ten tall.

I used to go bike riding at the weekend to see the damage done. Riding along a rocket V2 blew up in the air over Rainham Road South. A piece just missed my head. I picked it up. Lots of bits fluttered down too, in the ditches.

My brother Len who joined the RN, he was a gunner on a destroyer on D Day. He sold it to an Aussie sailor for £5. My brother Len used to come home from Chatham for 48 hour leave with a few mates. My mum would be up. Get out of bed: ‘The Navy needs it.’
I was in the back garden when a load of German fighters (FW190) came over very low. Saw pilots and bombs.

Germans shot my dad up at Barking Bus Garage. He came home. He said, ‘Bastards missed me.’ Dad had got through 1914 – 1918.

On a bike ride, I used to look at German prisoners at Purfleet (now ‘The Tavern’) prison camp. I just looked at them, then rode off.

I started work at Blacksmith Shop River Plant 1945 Briggs Motor Bodies. I had the pleasure of seeing a Workers’ Play Time (Chequers Lane).

On VE Day, I sat in the back garden thinking of all who lived in the road and were dead: soldier next door, air gunner, a friend blown to bits, a Merchant Navy 16 year old drowned.

At school 1944 we had a man on a trower ‘Briggs Motors’, Rainham Road North. If a Buzz Bomb was coming. If a buzz bomb was coming he waved a red Flag, blew a hooter. We would run like mad to get in an Air Raid Shelter.

I was born on March 12th, 1925. Actually there were two of us born that day, as I had a twin sister, Eileen. I also had two elder sisters Rose and Hilda and a brother, John. My father John,(called Jack) worked in the Royal Albert Docks as a labourer. Together with my mother, Elizabeth, we all lived in an upstairs flat of a terraced house in Monega Road, Manor Park, East London. My mother used to tell us to say our prayers and ask God for a little house. Our prayers were answered when, in 1931, we were given a new maisonette in Hartshorn Gardens, on a new estate in East Ham. It was like a palace to us, three bedrooms, our own bathroom and garden. We were so happy.

In 1938 our world began to change.My twin-sister and I went to Vicarage Lane School in East Ham. During the summer of that year we had two German Jewish sisters come into our class. Their names were Fannie and Peppie, aged ten and thirteen. The younger one would cry quite a lot. I did not know at the time of the terrible circumstances that had brought them to our country, and that they would probably never see their parents again.

There was talk of war in late summer, and the school began to make arrangements for us children to be evacuated. We had to have a small bag packed with underclothes and little personal things, and were given labels to go on our clothes for identification.

September 29th, 1938, the Prime Minister, Mr Chamberlain, went to Germany to appease Hitler, and at the expense of Czechoslovakia came back waving a piece of paper saying it was 'Peace in Our Time.' Our evacuation plans were all cancelled.

The following year I left school and started work in a wholesale stationer's, P. G. Hicks, of Wakefield Street, East Ham. I had only been at work for two months, when Hitler invaded Poland, and consequently, on September 3rd, England declared war on Germany. Apart from a few air-raid warnings which we presumed were false alarms, things went on as usual. The council gave us an Anderson Shelter, but this lay in the garden for a couple of months, as there was no sense of urgency at that time.

July 10th 1940 was the start of the 'Battle of Britain.' The German air force came over with the intention of getting our 'planes into the sky in the hope they could destroy them. We would be out in the garden some days watching them twisting and turning in combat. Germany lost many planes and their plan did not go as they had hoped.
They decided to concentrate on bombing London. On September 7th, 1940, I went with my mother to buy some groceries. The air-raid alarm sounded, and the shop-keeper advised us to go into the cellar. We were there for three hours, and we did not know then that we were going to experience the first major raid in London. When we came out, there was a terrible smell of smoke. The Royal Albert Docks were on fire all around. We were only two miles from the docks. A direct hit had come down on Woolworth's in the High Street, with many killed, and a jewellery shop was hit with people sheltering in the cellar, and they all drowned as the water mains burst and they could not get out. We all knew then that we were in for it. We were all issued with identity cards. The ships ceased to come into the London docks, so my father went to work for the council, supervising the men who put up the shelters.

My father and my brother had already put up our shelter(or 'dug-out') in 1939, at the bottom of the garden. Everything was fine at first, but when we had a spell of rain we found we were treading in a foot of water. A concrete floor was put in, and bunk beds, and it was made a home from home. People went to work, then when they got home, as soon as it was dark, the raids would start. We then went into the dug-out, until the 'all-clear' sounded in the morning. I would go to work looking all around me on the way, to see what had been hit. At times the roads were cordoned off, as there were time-bombs waiting for the Army to attend to them.

We were issued with gas masks which we carried every day. They were in a cardboard box with a shoulder strap. After a while we looked upon them as fashion accessories and had all sorts of fancy containers. It was a competition, to make sure your friend did not have a better one than you!

My eldest sister, Rose, trained as a V.A.D. nurse (Voluntary Aid Detachment) with the Red Cross before the war. During the war she was a shop assistant in a large departmental store, and at weekends and some evenings she would do shifts in the local hospital. It was a 'Casualty Clearing Station' and many times she would get home and be very upset at the terrible things she saw of the bomb victims. She would join us in the shelter, and when the 'all-clear' went in the morning, went off to work again to do her day job at John Lewis, Upton Park.

In 1940, my sister, Hilda, had a baby boy, Alan. She had been evacuated, but came back to Barking to have her baby at home. Her husband, Frank, was working locally on munitions. There were nights when she was on her own, so my twin sister and I took it in turns to stay with her. One Sunday morning, whilst I was staying with Hilda, my twin, Eileen, arrived from East Ham, crying. That night a family living three doors from us were all killed, the mother and five children. A bomb had come down directly onto the Anderson shelter. The house was still standing with just a crack down it, which seemed to prove a point that night.

Rose was married to Eddie in January, 1941. The church, St. Mary Magdalene in East Ham, had been badly damaged by a bomb a few days before. There were no windows, and only part of the roof. We were freezing in our bridesmaids dresses that day, otherwise everything went well!

My brother John had been called up in 1940, and was serving with the 1st Army, 56th Heavy Regiment, Royal Artillery. He was away for about five years in all, and saw active service in Algiers, Tunisia, Italy and France.

(JOHN HUDSON'S MEMOIRS ARE ALSO AVAILABLE ON THIS WEBSITE, REFS: A3878760 and A4148633)

We had rationing in 1941, clothes, soap and sweets, and a points system for food. There were queues for various things. We would see a queue and get on the end, even though we did not know what it was for, but it was usually something you were pleased to get!

I used to go to the 'pictures.' While you were in there, if there was an air-raid, they would put an announcement up on the screen. The lights would go up and those wishing to do so could leave. Most people stayed, and when the screen announced the all-clear had sounded, we would all cheer. One night I went with a boyfriend to see a film. As we came out, and were on our way home, the sirens sounded. The anti-aircraft guns started up, and shrapnel was falling all around us. I must say I was scared that night.

The planes came over mostly at night. We knew by the steady droning when they were loaded with bombs. After they were dropped, they had a lighter sound as they went back for more supplies. We stayed in our shelters as we knew another wave would be over. At one period of time, the raids went on for 100 nights non-stop.

'Lord Haw Haw' would broadcast every night from Germany to England, trying to break our morale. We looked upon him as a comedian, and had a laugh with our mates when we went into work the next day. He was the traitor William Joyce, and was hanged after the War.

Our bombers increased their bombing of Germany, consequently the raids over England died down. One morning, I got up and picked up the newspaper from the front doormat. My mother usually asked for the headlines, and when I told her the Germans were 'in catastrophe', she exclaimed: "Oh! My God! Where's that?"

In 1943, I received some call-up papers, which meant I had to go into the forces or a munitions factory. The family firm (Hicks)that I had worked for since I was 14 wrote to have me deferred, as they had lost so many staff. I wanted to go into the Womens Land Army, and in July 1944 the deferment was cancelled. On August 24th I reported to the Womens Land Army in Harlow, Essex.

My twin sister did not receive any call-up papers. She worked for the London Co-operative Society and her firm claimed that their work came under food distribution and all were deferred.

Meanwhile, we had another bit of trouble, as the Germans started to send the flying bombs over, called the V1. They made a terrific noise as they went over. Once they had passed over and the engine shut off, you knew you were safe, as they could not turn back. You just hoped it would come down in a field, but sadly that was not very often the case.

We then had the V2 rocket, which you did not know was coming, until you heard the terrific explosion when it hit the ground.

I enjoyed my life working on the land, staying in a hostel, which was in a mansion, Mark Hall, in Harlow, taken over by the government. We came under the 'War Agriculture Committee' and would go out, about forty girls to a lorry, to be dropped off in groups at various farms. I ached so much after the first day's threshing that I thought I was going to die! There was potato picking, sugar beet 'bashing', hoeing, and many other jobs that we got used to. Then we had the hedging and ditching in the winter.

We had late-night passes, and on occasions the RAF or Americans would send trucks to the hostel and pick us up for their dances at the camps.

I was a 'tractor-driver's mate' for a while, and we would go to farms taking machinery that had been hired, such as ploughs and disc harrows, etc. We would winch them up on our trailer. After a while I had a provisional driving licence, and had my own road tractor, a Ford Ferguson. I felt like I was King of the Road (or Queen!) I then went to Bedfordshire, where I went on a driving course. I was attached to a hostel there, at Hassles Hall, Sandy, and had my own three-ton truck. I was a spare driver for a while then one day I was called upon to take forty girls to work. I had never driven a big truck before on my own! I had a few hair-raising experiences that day, but I managed to get them all back in one piece!

During the potato harvest, workers were in very short supply, so after we had taken the girls to work, we then had to go to various places to collect potato pickers. I went to Cardington RAF Camp, Bedford Prison, and a camp where Yorkshire and Welsh miners lived, who had come to work on the land apparently to get some recuperation from being in the coal mines and having to work extra hours. They would work on the land for two months, and I would work with them all day, mostly potato-picking. I would then take them back to their camp, then go and pick the Land Girls up and take them to their hostel.

The local people and the farmers wondered what had hit them when we swept through the villages! Forty girls, mostly Londoners, singing at the top of their voices, 'old-time' Cockney songs that our parents used to sing, like "I'm 'Enery the Eighth, I am" and "My Old Man said Follow the Van."

The war in Europe was drawing to a close in May 1945, and on May 8th was VE Day (Victory in Europe.) A group of us Land Girls went up to London for the celebrations. We managed to get to the gates of Buckingham Palace, shouting: "We want the King!" with thousands of others. Everyone was dancing and singing, it was a great day, and we joined on the longest 'Conga' ever.

The Land Army was still needed, as food was short. Our men were having to carry on the fight with the Japanese, and it finally ended in our victory, in August 1945.

I stayed on for a few more years, and dreaded the thought of working again in a closed atmosphere. The Land Army was finally disbanded, and I settled down to civilian life. I met Bernard again, who was a friend from my school days, and had been stationed in India.

We married and had two children, Pauline in 1956, and Martin in 1961. After living in London for 77 years, we are now living in a bungalow in the village of Glemsford, Suffolk, where we are very happy.

I am proud that I lived in London during the War Years, and I am thankful that we all came through in one piece, but I do not forget those who were not so lucky.

GLADYS LEVINGBIRD (nee HUDSON) DECEMBER 2004