Browse Items (728 total)
Sort by:
Special Order of the Day
The commander of the local Home Guard thanks the Guard for their loyalty and service.
Letter from Ron Witty to Norman
![EWittyARWitty[Fam]430625.jpg](https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/files/square_thumbnails/1817/32418/EWittyARWitty[Fam]430625.jpg "EWittyARWitty[Fam]430625.jpg")
Catches up with news of Norman's activities. Mentions hearing on the radio of air attack on Hull and hopes family are safe and well. Mentions the importance of having good friends.
Letter from Ron Witty to his mother, father and siblings
![EWittyARWitty[Fam]430625-01.jpg](https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/files/square_thumbnails/1817/32419/EWittyARWitty[Fam]430625-01.jpg "EWittyARWitty[Fam]430625-01.jpg")
Part 1. Catches up with family news and comments on time mail takes to reach him. mentions he had heard of heavy air attack on Hull and hopes that they are all OK. Catches up with other news and gossip. Mentions bomb site scroungers and that he is…
My Maternal Grandparents - Their Family Childhood and Wartime Experiences
![MSaundersA[DoB]-171003-01.pdf](https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/files/square_thumbnails/1110/26180/MSaundersA[DoB]-171003-01.jpg "MSaundersA[DoB]-171003-01.pdf")
A document written as a Summer Project whilst Aidan was at school. She discusses their early years after her grandparents got married in London. During the war the family moved to Wales for safety. After the war John, (possibly her brother), became…
Letter from Alan Green to his Family
![EGreenAWGreenWH-[Mo]-G4011XX-0001.jpg](https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/files/square_thumbnails/1541/28173/EGreenAWGreenWH-[Mo]-G4011XX-0001.jpg "EGreenAWGreenWH-[Mo]-G4011XX-0001.jpg")
Alan writes during his training at Torquay. He had just heard about the bombing of Coventry, where his family lived. He has arranged leave to visit his family. His course has finished and he has been made Guard Commander.
My recollections of the War - Alan Mann
He reminisces about pre-war and early war days as a schoolboy in Lewisham, recalling events at the beginning of the war. Includes photographs of aircraft and naval ships. He continues with history of events through the war's early years including:…
William North's 1940 diary
Contains notes about work, cadets and Local Defence Volunteers, the weather and films seen.
Interview with Alberto Dini
Alberto Dini recalls his wartime life in Trieste starting from the declaration of war until the end of the conflict. He describes life under the bombs, highlighting disruption of utilities, devastated streets and chequered schooling history. He…
Interview with Angelo Bencina
Angelo Bencina recalls wartime memories in Monfalcone: a cave being modified as a shelter; the descent of bright red and white target indicators at night; a bomb which narrowly missed him but did not explode; Window radio countermeasures being…
Interview with Paolo Vivoda
Paolo Vivoda remembers a bombing attack which started moments before the stage show of magician Delfo, during which his mother barely made it to the shelter and was injured; others died. Paolo lost contact with his parents, but was reunited with them…
Interview with Alberto Buvoli
Alberto Buvoli recalls his wartime childhood in Udine, where he lived in the railway station area. He describes how furniture was moved to a safer place at the onset of the war and explains air raid precautions, such as leaving the windows open and…
Interview with Inge Nicolis
Inge Nicolis, the daughter of a Swedish engineer faher and an Italian mother, reminisces about her wartime experiences in Milan. She stresses the sense of having been thrown into a tragedy and the anguish of not being able to evacuate Milan, on the…
Interview with Nino Tenca Montini
Nino Tenca Montini reminisces about his wartime experiences in Udine and the Friuli region. He describes the family shelter as a concrete reinforced basement, sparsely furnished with wooden benches. He recalls the urge to escape the vigilance of…
Interview with an eye-witness of Milan bombings
The interviewee describes two bombings in the Sesto San Giovanni and Niguarda areas, which he eye-witnessed. During the first, he was in a basement adapted as underground shelter: he recollects women reciting the rosary and a queasy sensation in the…
Interview with Guido Toccacieli
Guido Toccaceri remembers his wartime experiences as a schoolboy in Milan: the day war broke out; food shortages; his father working at an airfield near Bergamo; train strafing; basements used as makeshift shelters; being evacuated outside Milan,…
Interview with Lidia Vendramin
Lidia Vendramin recalls her childhood in Sacile, including details on her primary schooling, family, and town life. She contrasts the public manifestations of joy the day the war was declared, with the shock and dismay of her parents, whose lives had…
How to Cook in War-Time
A war time cook book.
This item is available only at the International Bomber Command Centre / University of Lincoln.
This item is available only at the International Bomber Command Centre / University of Lincoln.
Interview with Ronald Roffey
Ronald was born in Charlton, London. He went to Charlton Junior School and was nine when war was declared. He remembered being fitted for a gas mask at his school. His aunt, who lived in Torquay, found a private billet for him and his mother in…
Enrico da Ronca persuades the partisan 'Romano' to stop the violence
In a town square, a figure in priest's clothes approaches a partisan who is brandishing a sub-machine gun. Two other figures in uniform are featured on the right hand side. Three Italian flags are visible on a bell tower with a clock.
Label reads…
Label reads…
Interview with Richard Suchenwirth
Richard Suchenwirth recalls his wartime memories as a Flakhelfer in Pasing, a district of Munich. He tells of his father who was the author of three books on the Luftwaffe, the founder of the Austrian Nazi Party, a political orator and initial…
Interview with David Brewster
David was born in 1931 in Sutton on Sea and recalls living in a spartan house with no toilet, lit by gas lights and with a water pump in the garden and his father keeping pigs to augment their income. His family ancestors had sailed to America in the…
Interview with Margaret Ottaway
Margaret Ottaway lived in Louth, the sixth of seven children, and tells of her childhood there. She describes an air raid shelter they had in the house. As a seven-year-old, Margaret witnessed an enemy air raid on 19 February 1941, which caused…
Interview with Elsie Davis
Elsie Davis was raised in Balham by her mother after her father died when she was a child. She worked in a factory and then at the start of the war she went to work as a bus conductress because it was a Reserved Occupation. She witnessed bodies being…
Interview with Elizabeth Ann Rogers
Elizabeth's earliest memories include the family’s Anderson shelter, later replaced by a Morrison shelter where she slept during air raids. She recalls the sound of planes overhead and the impact of nearby bombings, including shattered windows and…
Interview with Norman Rutherford. Two
Norman Rutherford discusses his schooling during the war and how few male teachers remained. He recollects the scarcity of food and the blackout. As a child he was briefly sent from his home in Cleethorpes to stay with his music teacher at…