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Interview with Edith Taylor
Edith Taylor (née Tate) grew up in Manchester and experienced the bombing of Manchester. When the war started, Edith, her mother and two siblings, were evacuated to Leek. Edith was separated from Dorothy and her mother. Billy and Edith had two…
Interview with Edvige Colombo
Edvige Colombo recalls her life in wartime Milan and describes an occasion when the alarm sounded and she and her family went to the basement, used as a shelter. She recollects moments inside, re-emphasizing how there was nothing to do, just standing…
Interview with Edward Allan McDonald
Allan McDonald was born in Hull and worked as an apprentice electrician before joining the Air Force. He passed the exams to become aircrew and trained as an air gunner. During training, his aircraft crash landed and he was soaked in petrol. He flew…
Interview with Edward Allan McDonald. Two
Allan McDonald was born in Hull and watched Alan Cobham’s Flying Circus as a child. He worked as an apprentice electrician before joining the Air Force. He served as ground personnel in Northern Ireland until he passed the exams to become aircrew…
Interview with Edward Davies
Edward Davies (Sonny) joined the RAF at seventeen as a rear gunner. Having crewed up he joined 103 Squadron and flew on fifty operations. Sonny describes being in the rear turret and how close the crew were, so much that they sang to him on his…
Interview with Edward George Key
Ted Key was a flight engineer. He was born to a large family in London which he remembers coming down from Norfolk to visit. His father was in the Navy as a chief petty officer and away a lot. Ted was in the air defence cadet corps before he joined…
Interview with Efrem Colombi
Efrem Colombi recalls his care-free childhood, initially in the Bergamo countryside and then in Milan. He emphasises his life-long, radical, anti-Clericalism and recounts how he ran away several times from Catholic boarding schools due to his…
Interview with Eileen Handley and Dennis Bush
Twins, Eileen and Dennis, were born in Waddington in 1929. They give a detailed account of their experiences living adjacent to RAF Waddington throughout the Second World War. Summer evenings were spent waving to aircraft departing on operations,…
Interview with Eileen Widdowson
Born in Peterborough, Eileen Widdowson’s father died when she was quite young, which resulted in the family moving to Grantham. With the East Coast main railway line and also a munitions factory, Grantham was a regular target for the Luftwaffe.…
Interview with Elena Fornari
Elena Fornari (b. 1936) tells of the private shelter in her house in Rome and describes daily life under bombing. She recollects the frightening encounter with two German soldiers asking for information about her father.
Interview with Elizabeth Zettl
Elizabeth Zettl was born in Croydon. Her father was a stockbroker and she had a sister who was ten years younger. At ten Liz went to school in Hillcotte in Eastbourne until she was 18. She went to college for six months to train as a secretary and…
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 on the buses as a conductress because it was a Reserved Occupation. She witnessed…
Interview with Enrica Mariani
Enrica Mariani recollects her wartime experiences in Milan: her brother dying of bronchitis after spending too much time in the shelter and her father working in an armaments factory; the aggressive fascist militiamen and the long hours she spent in…
Interview with Eraldo Bessone
Eraldo Bessone (b.1925) describes the bombing of an industrial area close to the Lingotto district in Turin. He tells how it was completely unexpected and stresses how the population was totally unprepared. Eraldo describes his attempt to reach a…
Interview with Eraldo Bessone
Eraldo Bessone (b. 1925) remembers the bombing of the Borgo San Paolo neighbourhood in Turin and how, due to the extensive damage it suffered, people started calling it the 'Stalingrad neighbourhood'. He also describes how the extensive damage led to…
Interview with Eraldo Bessone
Eraldo Bessone (b. 1925) remembers the bombing of Turin, 18 November 1942, the first intense attack after a series of operations which caused limited alarm and little damage. He gives a vivid and emotional account of the destruction of a nearby…
Interview with Eric Brown
Eric left school at 14 and worked, initially, in a bakery and then moved to accountancy. Aged 17 he volunteered for aircrew and trained as a flight engineer. He became a pathfinder and carried out operations to Hamburg, Karlsruhe, and Dortmund,…
Interview with Eric Coling
Eric Coling’s father died when Eric was a child which left his mother to cope on her own economically. Eric and his sister were sent to live in an orphanage but their mother was able to visit monthly. When Eric left the orphanage he began working…
Interview with Eric Horsham
Eric Horsham was born in East London in 1923. Leaving school at 14 he was a messenger at the Royal Ordnance Factory before working for the railways. In 1937 he joined the Air Training Corps and learned about aircraft maintenance. On his first attempt…
Interview with Eric Parker
Eric was born in 1924 in West Derby, Liverpool and volunteered for the Royal Air Force at the age of 17 and a half, finally being called up in January 1942, when he became a navigator/bomb aimer on Lancasters. After completing his training in Canada,…
Interview with Eric Peel
Eric Peel worked in the Cotton Exchange in Liverpool before he volunteered for the RAF. He trained as an armourer and was initially posted to 56 Squadron at RAF Sutton Bridge where he worked on Hurricanes. He then was posted to 103 Squadron at Elsham…
Interview with Eric Reginald Barton
Flying Officer Eric Barton flew operations with Bomber Command. Eric talks about the various aircraft he flew in, and recalls an incident at Banff in Scotland where, following a night exercise, his tyre blew out on landing. He gives an account of an…
Interview with Eric Varney
Eric Varney completed 28 operations as a mid upper gunner with 207 Squadron from RAF Spilsby. After the war Eric worked as a bus driver, coal miner, long distance lorry driver and coal merchant.
Interview with Eric Wilkin
Erik Wilkin worked on the railways before he joined the RAF. Initially he wanted to be a pilot but it would be a significant wait for training. He trained as an air gunner and was posted to 115 Squadron. On one occasion his aircraft made an emergency…
Interview with Eric William Harrison
Eric William Harrison joined the RAF in 1943 and trained as a flight engineer at RAF Locking, RAF St Athan, and RAF Chedburgh, where he flew Stirlings and recollects that they were a terrifying aircraft compared to Lancasters. Harrison formed a crew…