2
25
335
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1616/21569/file 1c.1.jpg
9271d85262c3a163bb5654b371b12f2c
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1616/21569/file 2c.1.jpg
6ed97e5820874d51ef1e0e8a79203886
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Se trovate un oggetto simile non toccatelo! Avvisate subito i carabinieri
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
A boy in tears with amputated hands is holding a green toy truck. His stumps are bandaged. Behind him, an explosion is throwing in the air four maimed children. On the reverse, different kinds of explosive devices are shown. The text urges not to touch these and similar object and to report all findings to the police.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Italy
childhood in wartime
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2219/39733/SReidK473650v20005.1.jpg
e3c9a85aac8d480fd2a560c1dc6a548d
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2219/39733/SReidK473650v20022.2.jpg
756667f42aa010fd1c2b212c12cdbe25
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Reid, Kathryn. Songs and poems
Description
An account of the resource
Thirty-seven items - songs/poems about wartime experiences.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by David Stuart Miers Reid and catalogued by Nigel Huckins
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-01-23
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Reid, K
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[underlined] SALLY LANCASTER [/underlined]
Little Sally Lancaster
You are remembered down the years
By aircrews of 100 Squadron.
And how you helped to allay flying fears. It was a strange coincidence
Intriguing and quite true
That your surname should be the same as the plane in which they flew.
In 1944’s war torn summer
Young aircrew would be seen
Cycling down the steep village street
Racing past the village green
At a breakneck pace,
With one hand on the handlebar
And the other
Holding precariously perched in place
A parcel of washing for your Mother.
Summer swallows chased them
Darting and diving around, having fun.
Birds and boys enjoying
The “circuits” and bumps of the laundry run.
“Landing” safely at Sally’s cottage
To deliver their laundry there.
She would greet them with a happy smile
As they gathered round her chair
To watch her knitting woollen dolls
In patriotic red, white and blue.
Good luck charms three inches high
To take with them when they had to fly
And dice with death in a hostile sky.
Pretty Polly Lancaster
With lovely auburn curls
Sadly, you could not walk and play
With the other village girls,
But you labour of love, in the work of your hands
Wrought mascots of magic and the record stands-
In the invasion summer, until December
100 Squadron had the longest spell of good fortune
That anyone could remember.
Though heavily engaged in war,
The cost? Only one aircraft lost!
Four aircraft survived more
Than 100 operations.
Magnificent Men and Machines.
Bravery beyond believing
Endurance, sacrifice, guts and pluck
All played their part.
But little Sally Lancaster
Wise beyond her years
Knew ------ they [underlined] also [/underlined] needed [underlined] LUCK. [/underlined]
Kathryn Reid
(Half Pint)
[page break]
[underlined] SALLY LANCASTER [/underlined]
Little Sally Lancaster
You are remembered down the years
By aircrews of 100 Squadron.
And how you helped to allay flying fears. It was a strange coincidence
Intriguing and quite true
That your surname should be the same as the plane in which they flew.
In 1944’s war torn summer
Young aircrew would be seen
Cycling down the steep village street
Racing past the village green
At a breakneck pace,
With one hand on the handlebar
And the other [inserted] a parcel in place of [inserted] Their [/inserted] washg [sic] for your Mother [/inserted]
Holding precariously perched in place
A [deleted] parcel [/deleted] of washing for your Mother.
Summer swallows chased them
Darting and diving around, having fun.
Birds and boys enjoying
The “circuits” and bumps of the laundry run.
“Landing” safely at Sally’s cottage
To deliver their laundry there.
She would greet them with a happy smile
As they gathered round her chair
To watch her knitting woollen dolls
In patriotic red, white and blue.
Good luck charms three inches high
To take with them when they had to fly
And dice with death in a hostile sky.
Pretty Polly Lancaster
With lovely auburn curls
Sadly, you could not walk and play
With the other village girls,
But you labour of love, in the work of your hands
Wrought mascots of magic and the record stands-
In the invasion summer, until December
100 Squadron had the longest spell of good fortune
That anyone could remember.
Though heavily engaged in war,
The cost? Only one aircraft lost!
Four aircraft survived more
Than 100 operations.
Magnificent Men and Machines.
Bravery beyond believing
Endurance, sacrifice, guts and pluck
All played their part.
But little Sally Lancaster
Wise beyond her years
Knew ------ they [underlined] also [/underlined] needed [underlined] LUCK. [/underlined]
KTHRYN Reid
(Half Pint)
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Sally Lancaster
Description
An account of the resource
Ode to a local village girl whose mother took in washing from aircrew. Refers to 100 Squadron. Two versions both annotated 'Kathryn Reid, (half pint)' and other notes.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Civilian
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Poetry
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One page printed document
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending text-based transcription. Under review
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SReidK473650v20005, SReidK473650v20022
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Tricia Marshall
100 Squadron
aircrew
arts and crafts
childhood in wartime
home front
superstition
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1641/26129/PSaundersRA-HE17050029.1.jpg
e95e94aa4194a0585a7c1069b3691c76
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Saunders, Roy and Honor. Saunders Family
Description
An account of the resource
27 family photographs
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-03
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Saunders, R-H
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Roy Saunders, Boy Scout
Description
An account of the resource
Roy in scout uniform, September 1942.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1942-09
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PSaundersRA-HE17050029
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-09
childhood in wartime
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1110/26206/PSaundersRA-HE1734.2.jpg
2d91c1886ef3fd6491dcddeb52948c6a
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Saunders, Roy and Honor
Roy Saunders
R Saunders
Honor Saunders
H Saunders
Description
An account of the resource
158 items. Oral history interviews with Roy Saunders (b. 1930) and Honor Saunders (b. 1931) and six albums of family photographs. Both experienced the London Blitz. <br /><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1638 ">Foreshaw and Carter Photos</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1639 ">Foreshaw Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1640">Roy and Honor Saunders</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1641">Saunders Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1642">Thorpe and Diver Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1643">Thorpe Family</a><br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Roy and Honor Saunders and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-03
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Saunders, R-H
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Roy Saunders, Boy Scout
Description
An account of the resource
Roy on VE day, wearing his boy scout uniform.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-05-08
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PSaundersRA-HE1734
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-05-08
childhood in wartime
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1110/26205/PSaundersRA-HE1733.2.jpg
129817759b0b5dfbccbf28c538409ce9
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Saunders, Roy and Honor
Roy Saunders
R Saunders
Honor Saunders
H Saunders
Description
An account of the resource
158 items. Oral history interviews with Roy Saunders (b. 1930) and Honor Saunders (b. 1931) and six albums of family photographs. Both experienced the London Blitz. <br /><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1638 ">Foreshaw and Carter Photos</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1639 ">Foreshaw Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1640">Roy and Honor Saunders</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1641">Saunders Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1642">Thorpe and Diver Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1643">Thorpe Family</a><br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Roy and Honor Saunders and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-03
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Saunders, R-H
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Roy Saunders
Description
An account of the resource
A half length portrait of Roy Saunders, aged eight.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PSaundersRA-HE1733
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
childhood in wartime
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1815/32688/BCrawfordJCrawfordJv10001.1.jpg
448b1758abc5a342fad44e5e4c1a81b6
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1815/32688/BCrawfordJCrawfordJv10002.1.jpg
3f228d3d186954e52a12f7ad0ab90612
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1815/32688/BCrawfordJCrawfordJv10003.1.jpg
876ae7c708bd34a0574d4c9675170117
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Crawford, Jean
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-03-22
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Crawford, HF
Description
An account of the resource
7 items. The collection concerns Jean Crawford (nee Taplin) and Hector Crawford and contains photographs and memoirs.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Jean Crawford and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[bold] REMINISCENCES OF MRS JEAN CRAWFORD (nee Taplin) [/bold]
[bold] HOME LIFE [/bold]
The earliest I remember is a black kitchen range for cooking cakes and Sunday roasts in the oven and vegetables on the top. There was always a kettle on the hob, ready for tea. I had to walk to the village pump to fill a three pint milk can of water until 1946. We were in the council houses when they were built in 1939 (numbers 1-4). Numbers 5-8 were built in 1946/47. We used to fill a bucket full of ain water to flush the toilet. The water was not available although the taps and a cistern were there. A copper was in the corner of the kitchen to boil the washing in, heated by a wood fire underneath. Rainwater was used for bathing and washing. Electric coppers and cooker were used soon after the War in 1947/48. Bread was delivered Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The Butcher came on Wednesday and Friday. Groceries were delivered on a Wednesday and you gave your order for the following week.
No central heating of course – as you let the kitchen fire out, we lit the living room five. Mainly wood was burned. My Dad had a cut in Charndon Wood. He would buy a section for pea sticks, bean sticks, firelighting wood (to be tied in faggots) and some thicker bits to be cut into logs. He brought this home in one of the first tractors- Standard Fordson and trailer.
In Winter we lived on rabbit stew and vegetables with dumplings. Dad shot the rabbits and sold them for two shillings and sixpence (half a crown) in the village. We always had a roast on a Sunday, cold on Monday with bubble and squeak as this was always washday. Mum made rissoles on Tuesday. We always had a fruit pie on Sunday, jam tarts for tea, suet puddings such as jam roly poly, spotted dick, or syrup dumplings. In the Summer, we lived on lettuce sandwiches – the lettuce was always out of the garden – never bought. We also had a pig in a sty which was killed once a year and stored it in the bedroom and kitchen. This made two big hams. At killing time there were chitterlings to fry. The fat to cut up and frizzled until all the fat was out which was lard. This left us with scratchings to eat cold with bread which were delicious. The liver was good also. I didn’t like pig’s head – mum used to make brawn.
Mum made all sorts of jams – plum, blackberry and apple, gooseberry, damson. Marmalade was made in January/February with Seville Oranges bought from the greengrocer. The fruits were either grown or relations gave them to you to make jam. We also picked blackberries off the hedgerows.
Another thing of course was chamber pots, always one under each bed for night use only.
At Christmas time some people had a Christmas Tree but we didn’t. My Gran and Grandad would fatter up a cockerel to about 7lbs. This was good cooked with our own vegetables. Gran used to make the pudding and boil in her kitchen copper (with the fire going underneath for 8 hours). She also kept chickens so we had eggs. She used to make rhubarb wine – which was her speciality. We children were not allowed to drink any!
When people died they were kept at home and often the coffin came out of the bedroom window and on the bier to Church. This was a trailer with four wheels and a handle and pulled along manually. The mourners walked behind, always in black.
[bold] WARTIME [/bold]
A Lockheed Hudson crashed by Gubbin’s Hole bridge in Mr Benfield’s field.
A Handley Page Hampden crashed down and all the crew got out. They thought they were in Holland and set fire to it!
I was staying with my Grandparents at Cuddington when a doodlebug switched off as it flew over and crashed at Brill. This frightened them but I was in bed asleep.
[centred] 46 [/centred]
[page break]
[bold] LEISURE [/bold]
As children we would walk down to Charndon Wood (where the rubbish tip is now) and would pick basketfuls of primroses and later on bluebells. The ground was covered in primroses so peaceful and safe. On the entrance bridleway to the wood gypsies would live for two weeks at a time with the horsedrawn caravans, making clothes pegs from the willow or nut trees, selling them round the village. My mother always bought some.
[bold] WORKING LIFE [/bold]
Two village pumps, one just opposite the Fox Public House and one left of the public footpath to the side of the Leach’s property. They were gravity fed pumps – the two wells were situated in Mr. Howlett’s field by Tim Benfield’s orchard.
In the Summers during the 1950’s and 1960’s the village men used to take a stick and hook and each cut a section of the churchyard and then visit the Fox Inn for light refreshment – a good time was had by all.
The brick lorries used to block the road from Calvert through Edgcott on their return from a day’s delivery of bricks at 20 m.p.h. They were not on piecework then!
After the Second World War women of the village would pick washing trays full of blackberries to sell to a manufacturer to make jam at 2 pence a lb. – going up each year. The youngsters would collect conkers, take them to a collecting point to make glue for the war effort – also rosehips for rosehip syrup and sheep wool off the barbed wire. We used to collect it in buckets, shopping bags or hessian sacks for conkers. Every lawn was dug up and vegetables grown.
Most village people that were not in the Forces were volunteered for the Home Guard. My father worked on the farm (he had a hearing defect). He was up at 5.30 to milk 40 cows by hand, (no heating). Home for breakfast at 8 a.m. – always fried egg and bacon and fried bread. He was back to work at 8.30 a.m. to clean the cowsheds down, sweeping and shovelling the much into a wheelbarrow, putting clean litter down when they stayed indoors in the winter. He swept the yard up when it was laid down to concrete in the late 1940’s. Dinner was at mid-day until 12.30 – 1p.m. depending on whether it was haymaking or harvest time. Milking again at 3.30 p.m. and back home at 5.30 to 6 p.m. depending on whether a cow was calving. In the summer it was back for haymaking and then harvest. Home then was 10 p.m. and a wash with a kettle full of hot water, no shower or bath. That was once a week job on a Friday night in front of the fire in the kitchen.
We went on holiday every other year. Mum would buy the food and make the menu out for the landlady who would cook it for us. Dad would have three pints of milk a day and more in the evening if he wanted it. It was always in a milk can.
[bold] VILLAGE PERSONALITIES [/bold]
Louis Busby lived in Rose Cottage as it is now. He was a very perky 5ft. 7ins. Dressed in a trilby hat, black trousers and dark shirt, very quick in movement and talk – a likeable man.
Old Mrs. Small, whose house was between Rose Cottage and the Post Office, had white hair which she used to put rag curlers in. A rounded lady, always pleasant. Freddy Bradburn found her dead in her cottage when delivering bread.
[page break]
They were sisters – the same height – 5ft. 6ins. They were always so neat and trim and very polite and pleasant. They always wore hats and gloves.
Mr. Findlay was a shopkeeper in a little thatched shop where the brick shed is now next to Miss Mortimers. He was tall – 5ft. 11ins., slim and quick walking. He had a glass eye which always stared at you. He sold paraffin for the then much used paraffin stoves to cook on in the Summer.
Old Mrs. Butler – Peter Harper’s Great Grandmother. She was tiny – only 5ft 1in. who was very rounded and also had a glass eye. She always wore black.
Bele Hammond lived in the rectory. She was very much a spinster and always told you off for picking her apples up that had fallen over the hedge. She used to frighten me.
George Barratt lived next door to Manor Farm. He came from Norfolk – a real farm looking gentleman who was a chapel man and also liked hunting. He spoke well and was tallish.
Will Taplin – my father would say what he thought and upset people on several occasions. He used to go to see his father at Grendon Underwood and a neighbour of his told me it was like listening to two foreigners talking. They both had very broad Buckinghamshire accents. Dad used to help the Pensioners in his latter years. He was 5ft.8ins. tall, wore a cap, dark trousers and a jacket and smoked a pipe. He was also deaf but did have a hearing aid the last few years of his life. He loved playing Whist and Dominoes. If you were his partner and played the wrong card you were severely told off!! He died at 80 years.
[bold] EDUCATION [/bold]
Edgcott School closed in 1914/15.
My schooldays began in 1940/41 when my mother took me to school in a seat on her bicycle for 9 a.m. to Grendon Underwood Church of England School. I took sandwiches for my DINNER not lunch. Dinner at mid-day was eater in the playground. Playtimes were at 10.30 a.m. and 2.15 p.m. We did reading, writing and arithmetic, scripture each morning and learned our tables parrot fashion. We had sewing in the headmistress’s garden in the afternoon. 1946 saw me walking to school or maybe a bicycle. Outside toilets were emptied each Friday night. By this time we were having cooked dinners cooked in the canteen built in the playground. We also had cookery lessons in the Saye and Sele Room at Grendon Underwood.
During the war years the evacuees were billeted out to those who had room. Pat Lewis to Mr. And Mrs. Young, Manor Farm, Queenie Lewis to Mr. and Mrs. Barrett next door to Manor Farm. Ann Blue stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Stuchbury at No. 4 Lawn Hill. Betty Pollard, Freddie Bradburn with Mrs Pauline in May House. Shirley Hampton lived in Rectory Farm with her mother and Grandmother – this end nearest the Church when Mr. and Mrs. Dennis Busby lived there. They had a class of their own with their own teacher, Miss Barrett, a fiery woman.
When I was 12 and a half years old I went to Waddesdon Church of England School with all the same age, or older. These were Alan Golby and Brian Bates.
I’d ride my bicycle to Grendon Garage to travel by bus. It took some getting used to. I remember we played netball in shorts and T shirt. I left school at 15 – much to my mother’s annoyance. It was 14 but they put the school leaving age up by one year when it was my turn!
[centred] 48 [/centred]
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Reminiscences of Mrs Jean Crawford
Description
An account of the resource
Jean's stories about growing up in wartime England. Food features in her tales as do crashed RAF aircraft. She describes village life and personalities then tales about her village school.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Jean Crawford
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Three typewritten sheets
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BCrawfordJCrawfordJv10001, BCrawfordJCrawfordJv10002, BCrawfordJCrawfordJv10003
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Aylesbury
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Sue Smith
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
childhood in wartime
crash
Hampden
Hudson
V-1
V-weapon
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1815/32687/BCrawfordHFCrafordHFv10001.1.jpg
376673df660ee460547ed0d14d4c487f
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1815/32687/BCrawfordHFCrafordHFv10002.1.jpg
96ddf98b6d677865836abb44b964a70d
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1815/32687/BCrawfordHFCrafordHFv10003.1.jpg
84db767357c891042366fa03e17cfa00
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Crawford, Jean
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-03-22
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Crawford, HF
Description
An account of the resource
7 items. The collection concerns Jean Crawford (nee Taplin) and Hector Crawford and contains photographs and memoirs.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Jean Crawford and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
RECOLLECTIONS
By Hector Crawford
In 1941 when I was 10 years old my family moved to Lawn Farm, Edgcott. My father rented the farm of off [sic] the landowners and farmed around the vicinity of Grendon Hall during the period of time that the War Department was there. You could access Lawn Farm by way of Lawn House Lane in those days, but the farm is no longer there and the lane is a dead end.
I attended Grendon Underwood School until I left at thirteen and a half. We didn’t go onto Waddesdon School then, you would stay at the same school for all of your school life. To get to school I would either bike or if I had a flat tyre I would have to run – because I was always late! We would take dinner with us or come home and eat. If we came home we would have to eat fast and then get back to school quickly. A typical days lessons during the war years would be learning about aircraft – the difference between the enemies and ours (our drawings of aircraft were hung all around the classroom), scripture, arithmetic, dictation, history and gardening! Mrs Ruth Dawson was the headmistress and it was up to us children to maintain her garden. One way of getting out of lessons was to leave your gas mask at home – you were supposed to take it everywhere with you, if you didn’t have it you were sent home for it. I used to leave mine in the hedge on the way to school – it worked every time!
I would work on the farm to help my father and one of my jobs was to take the shire horses to the blacksmith in Grendon. I would think nothing of riding one while leading another three, the roads were much quieter then. The only vehicles we would get through were army vehicles on manoeuvres. One day I remember riding a horse round to Grendon and I heard this loud rumbling, round the corner came a tank. Well it spooked the horse and I was left hanging on for dear life while this horse bolted. It eventually calmed down as they do. During the war while the War Department was in Grendon Hall some of the F.A.N.Y.S (First Aid Nursing Yeomanry) would hire our shire horses to ride them.
As youngsters we would have to make our own entertainment and on a cold winters night when there had been a snow fall and a good frost, a group of us from Edgcott and Grendon would go to Mill Hill with our home made sledges and have races to the bottom. Due to the lack of drainage in the fields then they would flood in the bad weather and then freeze over so we could safely skate as well. We could ride miles on our bikes or make camps in the woods. For bonfire night we would go round the village collecting wood with a trap. Someone would get between the shafts and pull it along while another person would sit on the top to hold it all down. We would have a good bonfire in the field next to No 1 Buckingham Road.
The war years were a very exciting time for us youngsters – at one time the army was camped in Grendon Wood and were having practise fights in the surrounding area using blank ammunition. There was also a practise bombing ground over towards the A41 where they had an old Bristol Blenheim and a mock up submarine for target practise. They would use 14 lb bombs and we could watch them from Edgcott. This area was under guard but the guards used to fall asleep and my friend and I would sneak in and play in the aeroplane that was used for target practice. One such night we were pretending to fly this plane when all of a sudden they started one of their practice bombing raids – you’ve never seen two boys run so fast – it scared the life out of us!! Another time a British aircraft crashed in a field near to the practice ground. My friend and I ran over to see what it was only to find that the crew had set the plane on fire – they thought that they had landed in Holland because the land was so badly flooded. They assumed they were behind enemy lines and had lost their way.
[page break]
During the war the pub was shut a lot because there was no beer available, there were also no cigarettes or tobacco, people would travel miles to try and find some. The pub shut at 10 pm at night and all day Sunday in those days. On VE and VJ nights there was a massive bonfire outside the pub and every one was celebrating with a drink or a few. My dad would send me down to Old Finlays shop in the village to buy him 3 double Woodbines when they were available. I was allowed a penny to spend in the shop and Old Mr Finlay would serve someone with paraffin and then put his hand in the sweet jar for my pennyworth – they did have strange taste!
At the end of the war the Army moved out of Grendon Hall and it was used as a finishing school for wealthy, middle class Polish girls for a while and then by the National Fire Service. The land my dad rented was bought up by the Home Office and in 1961 Springhill Open Prison was opened, amid much debate amongst the village.
When I got married in the late fifties I got a job as a cowman for Tim Benfield at Rectory Farm. We lived at No 6 Lawn Hill, these were farm workers cottages then. I worked with Sammy Gibbons, the Goodwin brothers and Alan Young. I would walk down to Great Ground and call the cows. Then I would just walk back up the road with the cows following in single file to the milking parlour. You didn’t need to chase them from behind – they knew their routine. The milking parlour was an Alpha Lavelle and we would milk 50 cows. The milk would go into 10 gallon churns and be put on the milk stand that was at the end of the barns at Rectory Farm. It had to be there by 8.30 a.m to be collected by Nestles. We always had a can of milk for our own use. When my son Richard was about 2 or 3 years old he saw some milk bottles on someone’s doorstep and didn’t know what they were. It took a fair bit of explaining by my wife Jean to convince him of what they were.
In Edgcott at this time there were 6 farmers who had milking herds, these were Brooms at Lower Farm, Curtis’s at Yew Tree Farm, Benfields at Rectory Farm, Drapers and Barrett’s at Manor Farm and Rawlings at Perry Hill Cottage – these last three were council farms. Eventually the council built a new farm house at the bottom of Lawn Hill for Rawlings to move into, where Don Edmans is now.
Other jobs that I did on the farm included ditching (this was done manually with a spade) and hedge laying by hand. Each field would have its own pond for the animals to drink from and during the winter when it was frozen over we would have to cut a large square of ice from it and push this under the rest of the ice on the pond so that the animals could get a drink. I would also do some ploughing and drove a Fordson Standard tractor. It had a starting handle and the tractor would start on petrol and then you would have to turn it over to paraffin to keep it going. I would pull a 2 furrow plough and it would take about a week to plough an average sized field. We had to dress up warm then as there was no cab on the tractor so you were exposed to the elements.
During August and September I would be on call 24 hours a day for calving and the same during the spring for lambing. Haymaking was hard work, you had to pitch the hay with a fork, and you would be doing this all day. At about 8.30 pm we would finish as it started getting damp and we would all go down to Marsh Gibbon to the pub for a few beers. In the spring we would be sheep shearing, Edward Benfield would bring us down some beer and we would have one after each sheep – after 10 we would be happy!! I would take the wool to the field opposite the Horse Pond, farmers would come from all over to have their wool graded here. The company would take the wool away with them.
In 1962 we moved to Buckingham Road and I continued farming until 1966 when I started work for London Brick Company at Calvert. I went to Calvert because the pay was better and the hours were less – I had weekends off only having to work every other Saturday morning. Jean and I would borrow her dads (Mr Taplin) Morris 1000 and go to Aylesbury shopping on a Saturday. I would cycle to and from work leaving home at 6.30 for a 7.00 start, and finishing at 4.30. If you were a 1/4 of an hour late you would lose £5 of your wages, and if you had more than 3 days off sick in a year you would lose a weeks holiday.
[page break]
The work was very hard and dirty. We were outside in all weathers. freezing [sic] and wet in the winter and very hot in the summer. It was very bad when it was windy – brick dust blowing all over. you [sic] had to be fit, strong and healthy, but the pay was very good. We were on peace work so the harder you worked the more you earned. My job was blocking which was stacking the bricks and grading them. At the end of the day we would be covered in gritty brick dust. Showers were provided for us to use, but I preferred my own bath. At this time during the mid sixties Calvert was running at its peak, lorries were waiting for loads and there were no bricks standing around. The drivers were not on peace work to begin with and would all go out in the mornings. By mid afternoon they would all be parked up in lay-bys waiting for each other and then they would all drive in a huge convoy back through Edgcott at about 4.30. The company then started up a bonus scheme based on the number of loads they could do in a day, then the lorries were rushing backwards and forwards all day. they were hand loaded then and if they were not loaded correctly they would throw their loads in to the ditches as they negotiated the bends through the village. Other drivers would stop and help to reload the bricks, but invariably the lorries would arrive at their destination without the correct number of bricks on. At Dunmead Turn by the prison playing field, Eric Jackman (farmer at Fox Farm) driving his tractor and trailer met an LBC lorry. The lorry lost its load all over Eric’s tractor and trailer.
LBC were a good company to work for, they paid well, they provided overalls and boots (for which we paid a contribution), there was a good club and family events were held at Christmas. They always bought the children a Christmas present. It was also a strong union company, you had to join! In the summer if the temperature went over 70 degrees, we were given a glass of orange squash. A union man and a works man would watch the thermometer and we only got a drink if it went over 70, at 69 degrees we would go thirsty!
There were fabricated houses and a hostel there that were provided for displaced persons from other countries after the war. There were a lot of foreign people working there and also most of the working population from the surrounding villages were there. This was due to the mechanisation of farms, therefore needing less labour, and the growth of industrialisation. Many men who 10 or 15 years before would have been farming were now at Calvert. They were a good lot of men at Calvert, very good company.
In the mid 1980’s LBC sold out to Hanson Trust and it then started going downhill. House building was slowing down across the country and cheaper bricks were being imported from Holland. There was a spate of gradual redundancies, in 1911 [sic] took my redundancy and changed my job.
I started a very different job as a caretaker at Grendon Underwood School. To start with I found it strange as the pace of life was slower and less physical than the work I had been used to. Gradually I started to enjoy it more, I kept a lot of my own tools there and would do repairs around the building. Twice I had the honour of being Father Christmas for the children’s Christmas party and by the time I retired in 1996 the staff got used to my teasing and leg pulling.
Hopefully this shows how the pace of life has changed over the years in the village and how occupations have also changed.
Hector Crawford January 17th 2001
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Recollections by Hector Crawford
Description
An account of the resource
Hector's stories about growing up in wartime Edgcott. His family moved there in 1941 when he was 10. He covers his school life, working on his father's farm, mock fighting, playing on a bombing range, working as a cowman, tractor work, working in a brick factory then finally as a caretaker at a school.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Hector Crawford
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2001-01-17
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Three typewritten sheets
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BCrawfordHFCrafordHFv10001, BCrawfordHFCrafordHFv10002, BCrawfordHFCrafordHFv10003
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Aylesbury
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Tricia Marshall
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Blenheim
bombing
childhood in wartime
crash
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44172/EJohnsGSJohnsHJ-F[Date]-010001.jpg
44f7963703d0379a22524dbd28a1be43
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44172/EJohnsGSJohnsHJ-F[Date]-010002.jpg
d92d884e287211a13444bdff6a1fd90b
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Johns, George Shephard
G S Johns
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-08-01
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Johns, GS
Description
An account of the resource
15 items. The collection concerns (Royal Air Force) and contains correspondence, documents and photographs. He was evacuated during the war.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Hilary Jones and catalogued by Benjamin Turner.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[postmark]
Mr [symbol] Mrs H, J, Johns
21, Barrows St.
West Bromwich
[underlined] Staffs [/underlined]
[page break]
[underlined] Tamworth [/underlined]
Dear Dad [symbol] Mum,
Thank you very much for your card I received this morning. Nurse Fields said that she was going to write to you because Brian pushed me out of bed. I have written to uncle informing him that we have 3 weeks holiday we are coming back on Dec. 25th
Love to all [underlined] George [/underlined]
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Postcard from George Shephard Johns
Description
An account of the resource
A postcard from George Shephard Johns sent to his mother and father, Harold Johns and Florence Shephard. In the postcard George thanks his parents for the card he received from them.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
George Shephard Johns
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1939-12-01
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1939-12-01
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Staffordshire
England--Tamworth
England--West Bromwich
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Hand written postcard
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EJohnsGSJohnsHJ-F[Date]-010001, EJohnsGSJohnsHJ-F[Date]-010002
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cara Walmsley
childhood in wartime
evacuation
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1833/36176/PLittlejohnsQ17010001.1.jpg
a58348ff86b35e099f95310e068a5852
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1833/36176/PLittlejohnsQ17010002.1.jpg
d5d7c0e68f7b505be9142e7908f0dc4b
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1833/36176/PLittlejohnsQ17010003.1.jpg
07795c9937e734598c1f83a5b0352be4
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Littlejohns, Queenie
Q Littlejohns
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-04-23
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Littlejohns, Q
Description
An account of the resource
One item. The collection contains a crew mascot.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Queenie Littlejohns and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Popeye mascot
Description
An account of the resource
Popeye doll with red scarf, blue jumper and trousers taken on flights by a crew for luck. The word 'Foreign' is written on the back of its neck.
The mascot was recovered from the crash of Lancaster WS-O LM432. The aircraft was flying from Manston to Bardney and crashed near Horsington in Lincolnshire. It was given to Mrs Littlejohn, then a child, by the salvage team.
Additional information about this item has been kindly provided by the donor.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Physical object
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One Popeye doll
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PLittlejohnsQ17010001, PLittlejohnsQ17010002, PLittlejohnsQ17010003
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1944-03-28
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1944-03-28
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Kent
England--Lincolnshire
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
9 Squadron
childhood in wartime
crash
Lancaster
RAF Bardney
RAF Manston
superstition
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1396/28375/SHookKG195765v10055.2.pdf
6ecc4f054534ff66ef4b59a923757dc8
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Hook, Ken
Kenneth Gordon Hook
K G Hook
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-07-04
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Hook, KG
Description
An account of the resource
53 items. The collection concerns Flying Officer Kenneth Hook DFM (b. 1923, 1335989, 195765 Royal Air Force) and contains his log books, documents, photographs, objects and correspondence. He flew operations as an air gunner with 75 Squadron.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Iain Hook and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Photographs of children killed in Ken's Stirling crash
Description
An account of the resource
Photographs of the five children and their gravestone
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Three b/w photographs
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHookKG195765v10055
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Northumberland
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
childhood in wartime
crash
final resting place
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1751/34066/SWarnerC1801861v10005.1.jpg
935aea3f8462b34703388266be7a8af8
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Warner, Charles Herbert Albert
C H A Warner
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-11-12
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Warner, CHA
Description
An account of the resource
Sixteen items. The collection concerns Sergeant Charles Warner (1801861 Royal Air Force) and and Sergeant J F W Warner (976029 Royal Air Force). <br /><br />Charle Warner's collection contains correspondence, documents and photographs. He flew as a flight engineer on 101 Squadron and was shot down and killed 3 September 1943.<br /><br /> <span class="NormalTextRun SCXW196096160 BCX0">Additional information on </span><span class="SpellingError SCXW196096160 BCX0">Charles Warner</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW196096160 BCX0"> is available via the <a href="https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/124437/">IBCC Losses Database.</a></span><br /><br />J F W Warner's collection contains his service and release book and his decorations. He served as an engine fitter in North Africa. <br /><br />The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Geoffrey Warner and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Photographs of airman
Description
An account of the resource
Top left - a full length image of an airman wearing tunic with half brevet and sergeant rank and a side cap, standing in a garden with a dog seated on his left.
Top right - an airman wearing tunic with half brevet and sergeant rank squatting down in a garden stroking a small dog.
Bottom left - an airman wearing battledress and side cap astride a motorbike with tress in the background.
Bottom right - an airman wearing battledress and side cap standing in a garden in front of a fence with a young child standing in front of him.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Four b/w photographs mounted on an album page
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SWarnerC1801861v10005
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending identification. Things
aircrew
animal
childhood in wartime
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/272/1111/PBubbGJ16010041.2.jpg
53e157063f6f65693adafbb4846a5bd3
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/272/1111/PBubbGJ16010040.2.jpg
a33a2e19f2a759fc4647f1c045aef54e
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Bubb, George. Album
Description
An account of the resource
32 items. The album contains photographs, propaganda, service material, memorabilia and research concerning George Bubb's service with 44 Squadron at RAF Spilsby.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Bubb, GJ
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Personnel in front of Lancaster
Lancaster ND578 KM-Y
Description
An account of the resource
A group of 27 people in front of a Lancaster. Captioned 'Aircrew, ground crew on opposite page'. Photograph shows 26 air force personnel in two rows. The back row standing all have aircrew brevet. 12 are wearing side caps and one an officer's peaked cap. Front row sitting all wearing battledress and side caps apart from seventh from left who is wearing a tunic and has a small boy sitting on his lap. In the background the nose and port inner engine of a Lancaster. On the nose in front of cockpit 107 bomb symbols.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph mounted on a scrapbook page
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PBubbGJ16010040, PBubbGJ16010041
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Civilian
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-03
44 Squadron
aircrew
childhood in wartime
ground personnel
Lancaster
nose art
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1317/19777/PValentineJRM18010093.1.jpg
22aebf08f4cec90446694cede5b965f3
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1317/19777/PValentineJRM18010104.1.jpg
256f742ea334cf654a3d960fe55539af
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Valentine, John. Valentine wartime family photographs
Description
An account of the resource
Series of photographs of baby daughter Frances and wife Ursula sent to John Valentine while he was a prisoner of war
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Party in Lido
Description
An account of the resource
Four children sitting round a table. A girl on the right is in a high chair and a boy in centre is back to the camera. There are Christmas crackers on the table. In the background windows. On the reverse 'No 46, Sergeant J R M Valentine, British P-O-W No 450, Stalag Luft III, Germany, From Mrs Valentine, Lido, Tenterdon Grove, London NW4’. Stamped “Geprüft 32”.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PValentineJRM18010093, PValentineJRM18010094
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Poland
Poland--Żagań
England--London
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
childhood in wartime
prisoner of war
Stalag Luft 3
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/178/5629/PBriggsR1622.2.jpg
bfcfe98b557da1fbd7377b0c59de57ef
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/178/5629/EDaviesBBriggsR[Date].jpg
b0e1e9f5dbce06aac4556b9c832e7c14
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Briggs, Roy
R Briggs
Description
An account of the resource
24 items. One oral history interview with Roy Briggs (1893726 Royal Air Force), his logbook, service material, training material, official documents and 12 photographs. Roy Briggs trained as a wireless operator and flew four operations with 576 Squadron from RAF Fiskerton. He also took took part in Operation Manna and Operation Exodus as well as Cook’s tours over Germany.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Roy Briggs and catalogued by Barry Hunter.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-01-28
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Briggs, R
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. Some items have not been published in order to protect the privacy of third parties, to comply with intellectual property regulations, or have been assessed as medium or low priority according to the IBCC Digital Archive collection policy and will therefore be published at a later stage. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collection-policy.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Operation Manna commemorative tile
Description
An account of the resource
Ceramic tile commemorating Operation Manna. A woman holding a child's hand is waving a handkerchief. the child is waving a Dutch flag. Two aircraft are flying over dropping food. At the bottom the caption reads 'Voedsel-Vrede-Vrijheid 29 April . 1945 . 5 Mei'
The tile is accompanied with a message from Barrie Davies, Sgt Pilot, Army Air Corps .
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One colour photograph
One short message
Language
A language of the resource
nld
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
Text. Correspondence
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PBriggsR1622, EDaviesBBriggsR[Date]
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
United States Army Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Netherlands
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
childhood in wartime
Operation Manna (29 Apr – 8 May 1945)
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1616/21645/file 3.2.jpg
fc1c0d053797be834e61e45f38839509
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
No. C’e’ la morte!
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Description
An account of the resource
A boy in summer clothing is about to touch an unexploded bomb partially embedded in the ground. Behind him, a young woman in anguish with outstretched arm and open palm. Below, line drawings of fuses, bombs and other explosive devices. The text urges not to touch them and to report all findings to the authority.
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Italy
childhood in wartime
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1396/28386/SHookKG195765v10028.1.pdf
da53fe332619189c7734c1dcccb853ba
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Hook, Ken
Kenneth Gordon Hook
K G Hook
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-07-04
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Hook, KG
Description
An account of the resource
53 items. The collection concerns Flying Officer Kenneth Hook DFM (b. 1923, 1335989, 195765 Royal Air Force) and contains his log books, documents, photographs, objects and correspondence. He flew operations as an air gunner with 75 Squadron.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Iain Hook and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[missing letter]LANE KILLS FIVE CHILDREN
CRASHED ON SMALL FARM-HOUSE
Five children, aged from 1 to 9 years, were killed when an aircraft on Wednesday night crashed into Cliffe House, a small farmhouse near Amble, Northumberland. One of the crew was saved. The farmhouse is occupied by Mr. William Robson.
The children were Sylvia Robson (9), Ethel (7), Marjorie (5), William Matthew (3), and Sheila (1). They were in bed at the time following a party, and the father and mother and two friends, Mr. and Mrs. J. Rowall, of Pilston, Amble, were injured, but not seriously.
The survivor of the crew said that the plane had been experiencing trouble, but the pilot managed to keep it in the air until he was safely over the town, but after that was unable to maintain control and crashed into the farmhouse.
The airman saved owed his life to the courage and promptitude of Mr. Rowall, who rushed out and pulled him from the ‘plane though the man’s clothes were on fire. He rolled him on the ground and put the fire out.
With the children’s deaths Mr. and Mrs. Robson have lost the whole of their family.
Mr. James Rowell told a Press Association reporter last night: “We heard a ‘plane flying very low. I shouted, “Look out!” and we all threw ourselves on the floor. The house collapsed above our heads, and, looking upward, we saw the sky. Mrs. Robson shouted, ‘Oh, my poor bairns!’ and tried to make her way towards the stairs, which had been blown away.” The children’s partly charred bodies were later recovered.
Mr. and Mrs. Robson would have been in bed when the ‘plane crashed if they had not been visited by the Rowells. Mr. Rowell said: “We are the luckiest people in the world to be alive to-day. The chairs we were sitting on were smashed, and the walls in that part of the house are n[missing letters] more than 3ft. high now.”
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Newspaper cutting reporting the Stirling crash
Description
An account of the resource
This occurred on 1 December 1943, Ken Hook was the only crew member to survive. Five small children were killed.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Newspaper cutting
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SHookKG195765v10028
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Northumberland
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
David Bloomfield
Anne-Marie Watson
Requires
A related resource that is required by the described resource to support its function, delivery, or coherence.
Workflow A completed
childhood in wartime
crash
Stirling
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/522/32093/BMannAMannAv3.2.pdf
8d2f09c086bd0149c025df13d8536dd3
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Mann, Alan
A Mann
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Mann, A
Description
An account of the resource
An oral history interview with Alan Mann (b.1926). He was an apprentice at De-Havilland during the war and experienced bombing in 1940.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Alan Mann and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-01-30
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
The other day I watched a programme where a family attempted to show what it must have been like to have lived in the war. It involved dressing up in 1940 clothes and spending time in an Anderson shelter, with sounds of an air raid and the music of Glen Miller. I found I could in no way relate to this and felt it did little to show people what it was really like. The war has been very well documented and there is no shortage of material for people interested in reading about the war, but what was it really like for me?
In 1938 I was eleven years old and lived with my parents in Lewisham. I was aware that there was talk about another war with Germany and saw various preparations taking place. I had recently joined my new school, Brockley Grammar in Hilly Fields and there was talk about the school being evacuated. Towards the end of the year the school was evacuated to Robertsbridge in Kent, I chose not to go.
I remember seeing anti-aircraft guns being installed in Hilly Fields, close to my school, windows being taped up, buildings being protected with sand bags and gas masks being issued. Although I can remember a lot of events I cannot recall the specific dates on which they occurred. However with the aid of the modern computer and by re-reading various books on the subject, I am now able to record events more clearly, but for what purpose? Mainly so that my recollections can be easily accessed for future reference and perhaps somebody else may find something of interest. My father served throughout the First World War and I now deeply regret not finding out more about his experiences.
In starting to write this I find it difficult to accept that the war started over sixty five years ago and must now be considered history, but here goes!
My first recollection connected with the forthcoming war was at a Biggin Hill flying day. Together with my parents we used to visit RAF Biggin Hill for their annual flying display, held to celebrate Empire Air Day and visited the last one on the 20th May 1938. Being very interested in aircraft I was well aware that the Germans had a modern air force and a very formidable new fighter, the Messerschmitt BF 109.
At the show we were treated to air displays by the squadron’s Gloster Gauntlets, Gladiators and other biplane aircraft. As I recall most of the show consisted of ancient biplanes, fighters and bombers, however we did have a fly past by our latest monoplane fighter, the Hawker Hurricane. On the ground we were allowed to see a closely guarded Hurricane and Spitfire! The Spitfire shown was evidently the first production model. Also featured were the latest additions to the RAF, a Wellington Bomber, a Blenheim and a new monoplane the Defiant. I remember leaving the show being very impressed with the Hurricane and Spitfire but also concerned that the squadron’s main aircraft was still the biplane Gauntlet, certainly no match for the Messerschmitt.
Gloster Gauntlets, top speed 230 mph Messerschmitt BF 109, top speed 350 mph
I had seen pictures showing the results of the German air force bombing villages in Spain,
(Spain’s civil war, 1936 to 1939) and was well aware what could be in store for us in the event of
Page 2
another war with Germany.
During this period I had attended various local schools catering for those children not evacuated, ending up at a local school called Morden Terrace. Eventually I was offered a place at the South East London Technical Institute (SELTI) and in September 1938 began a three year course in mechanical engineering.
To add some order to these recollections I have decided to place them in the order they happened, beginning with the day Germany invaded Czechoslovakia.
In March 1939 Germany invaded Czechoslovakia and then on the 1st September invaded
Poland. We gave Germany an ultimatum which they chose to ignore. As a result our Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain announced at 11am on the 3rd September 1939 that we were once again at war with Germany. France joined us as did most of the countries in the British Empire and the Commonwealth.
This was a very sombre occasion as my parent’s memories of the last war were still very fresh in their minds. Shortly afterwards the air raid siren sounded and we expected the worse, but fortunately it was a false alarm. We obtained our main information about the progress of the war from the radio, especially the evening 9 o’clock news. The BBC had decided to name its announcers so that we could distinguish them from imitations by the German propagandists. I still remember the start of the news which began “Here is the news, and this is Alvar Lidell reading it”.
The BBC news bulletins, although censored, gave us an idea of the progress of the war and generally determined how we felt. Initially we expected heavy bombing by the German air force but as this did not materialise we began to feel more confident.
The main evacuation of children from our cities commenced shortly afterwards, although the first evacuation had occurred at the time of the Munich Crisis, a year earlier.
Following the German invasion of Poland in 1939 the British Expeditionary Force was sent to France shortly after Britain and France had declared war on Germany. It was commanded by Lord Gort, who was under the command of the French General Maurice Gamelin. The BEF was considered to be a formidable fighting force and together with the huge French Army we had every reason to think the war would soon be over, however most of us were unaware of the political situation in France at the time. The senior French generals could not agree on a coordinated plan of attack, preferring to wait to see what the Germans would do. In the pre- war years the French had built a series of fortifications known as the Maginot Line and the Germans had built a similar one called the Siegfried Line. Most of the allied forces were sent to reinforce the Maginot Line against the expected German attack.
At this time the French had the largest army in Europe, with the support of a large air force and navy, however its Generals were mostly veterans of the First World War and consequently thought in terms of defeating an expected attack at the Maginot Line.
On the 14th October.1939 our battleship HMS Royal Oak was hit by 3 torpedoes and sunk with heavy loss of life, whilst at anchor in our Naval Base at Scapa Flow.
On the13th December.1939 we lost an aircraft carrier, HMS Courageous. I remember visiting this ship earlier in the year at a Royal Navy open day at Portsmouth and being impressed with its size. The German submarine U29 fired three torpedoes with two hitting the ship. It sunk in less than 15 minutes killing 518 of its crew, including the Captain. This was not a good start to the war!
German warships and in particular their pocket battleship Graf Spee, had been very active in sinking our merchant ships. The Graf Spee was eventually sighted by three of our cruisers, Ajax,
Achilles and Exeter and after a short engagement was eventually scuttled on the 13th December
1939 in what has since become known as the “Battle of the River Plate”. At last we had some good news which helped to cheer us up!
In 1939 Britain only grew enough food to feed one person in three and the German submarines and surface ships now threatened to starve the U.K. into defeat. But it was not just food, many other
Page 3
essential things had to be imported such as rubber, wood, crude oil etc, were now threatened.
Petrol (distilled from imported crude oil) was rationed soon after the war started and butter, sugar, bacon and meat rationed from January 1940. so even before the first signs of war in France we were already feeling the effects of the war.
HMS Courageous HMS Royal Oak
The first deployment of our forces was completed by the 11th October 1939 at which point 158,000 men and their equipment had been transported to France. It was lead by our General Lord Gort, aged 53, under the Supreme Commander of the French Army, General Maurice Gamelin, aged 68, both veterans of the First World War. The majority of his troops were stationed along the Franco-Belgian border at the Maginot Line. Belgium and Holland were not at war and so no troops were sent to them.
By September 1939 we had rapidly modernised our Air Force which now featured over 500 of the latest Hurricanes and Spitfires. Although still falling far short of the estimated strength of the German Luftwaffe, it was a considerable improvement on our resources in 1938, at the time of the Munich Crisis.
Most members of the French army were in the infantry. The first armoured divisions had just been formed but the first three would not be ready for action until the spring of 1940. At the start of
the war the French air force had 826 fighter planes, including 370 modem fighters capable of taking on the latest German fighter, the Messerschmitt 109. It also had over 400 modern bombers, plus a large navy featuring some very useful capital ships. By the spring of 1940 the French air force had increased to 740 modern fighters.
Over the next few months troops, materials and vehicles continued to be sent to France and by the 13th March 1940 the BEF had doubled in size to around 316,000 men, with further tanks, guns, ammunition and supplies including an initial RAF detachment of about 500 assorted aircraft. With our combined Forces it did not seem unreasonable to expect that we would quickly defeat the German army. . However after establishing our armies at the German frontier General Gamelin, instead of attacking, decided to wait to see what the Germans would do.
On the 1st January 1940, conscription began of all able-bodied men between the ages of 18 to 27, later this was increased to the age of 50. You were exempted if you could prove you were employed on vital war work. My brother, an apprentice printer aged 20, had already volunteered for the RAF. On completion of his training, as an airframe fitter, he was transferred to an RAF training airfield at Oudtshoorn in South Africa.
In early February we became aware of a German merchant ship called “Altmark” which we understood contained a number of crews from merchant ships sunk by the German pocket battleship
“Graf Spee”. We then learnt that it was located in neutral Norwegian waters, however, despite this,
on February 14th 1940 our destroyer HMS Cossack sailed into Jossing Fjord and with the call “OK
mates the Navy’s here” rescued 299 of our sailors. At last we had something to be proud of, but not for long!
It soon became apparent that Gamelin was not willing to engage in an attacking battle with the
Page 4
German army, somehow hoping this could be avoided. This indecision gave Hitler time to decide when and where to attack. When he was ready, on the 9th April 1940, Germany avoided the Maginot Line by invading neutral Denmark and Norway and then followed with the invasion of Holland, Belgium and then attacked France, avoiding the Maginot Line by going through Belgium.
This took the French generals completely by surprise as they were not expecting or prepared for this development and never recovered in sufficient time to confront the Germans with any great force. Without leadership the French morale soon crumbled under the sudden attack from the air and German armour.
The German advance had been achieved by the combined use of tanks, infantry and aircraft in what has become known as a blitzkrieg.The word, usually shortened to blitz, means a “lightning war” and is associated with a series of quick and decisive short battles aimed at creating fear and confusion in the opposing force and delivering a knockout blow before it could fully recover.
The German air force (Luftwaffe) played a very important part in this exercise using the Junkers 87 Stuka dive bomber to create panic and confusion in both the troops and retreating civilians.
Junkers JU 87 “Stuka” dive bomber
When the fighting in France finally began it soon became apparent that the majority of the French forces were already demoralised, due to bad leadership and political corruption and when the Luftwaffe started their bombing campaign the French army quickly disintegrated, leading the way open for immediate action by the German army. French troops were seen to throw away their guns and even discard their uniforms to join the fleeing civilians. There were even reports about some French pilots actually trying to prevent our aircraft from taking off for fear of reprisals, saying "why risk your life when the war is already lost".
On May 10th 1940 Chamberlain resigned due to ill health and Winston Churchill became our new Prime Minister, this despite some hostility from members of our government. Some, like the French, thought the war was already lost and that we should be talking with Hitler in an attempt to obtain the best terms for surrender. Fortunately Winston’s inspiring oratory resulted in a small majority in favour of us continuing to fight.
Without the full co-operation of the French forces and the almost immediate surrender of both Belgium and Holland, General Gort decided that our continued presence in France had become untenable and on the 26th May we began evacuating our troops from Dunkirk.
Although we managed to save 338,226 allied troops we had to leave all our supplies behind, including 615 tanks, 2,472 guns, 65,000 vehicles, 25,000 motorcycles, 416,000 tons of stores, 75,000 tons of ammunition and 162,000 tons of petrol. (These surprising and very precise figures have been obtained from historical records and demonstrate the extent of the disaster).
In just a few weeks Britain had gone from having one of the best equipped armies to being almost non-existent, and this without engaging the enemy in any major battle. We at home could not
believe it and wondered what disaster was going to happen to us next!
During the few weeks of actual fighting it has been estimated that the French lost 757 aircraft
(mostly on the ground) and two million French soldiers had surrendered. However some must have
Page 5
fought because the French lost nearly 94,000 dead with 250,000 wounded. The British lost 3,475 dead and 15,850 wounded, with many thousands taken prisoner.
General Lord Gort, commander of the BEF was subsequently criticized for his actions during the short French campaign, but most realised that without support from our allies he had little choice but
to withdraw. His subsequent actions meant that a high proportion of our troops were saved and thus able to fight again, but the loss of so much equipment was extremely serious.
While the RAF’s Hurricanes and Spitfires had already proven themselves against the German Luftwaffe the RAF had lost a considerable number of its valuable front line aircraft and experienced pilots. The operations in France cost the Royal Air Force a total of 959 aircraft, including 477 of its latest Hurricanes and Spitfires and other aircraft including bombers operating from UK. bases. Two hundred and eighty of our fighter pilots had lost their lives or had been taken prisoner.
Well aware of the speed with which Germany had just conquered most of Europe we wondered just how much time we had before Germany turned its attention to us. Before using its ground troops the German Air Force had softened up the target by intense bombing and we expected the same would happen to us. There were plenty of rumours about German agents (fifth column) being already here, the forerunner of an attack by German airborne soldiers. This was reinforced by the German radio frequently giving accurate reports about local conditions in the UK.
This waiting for the expected attack was unnerving while we waited for the sound of church bells, the warning that an invasion had began, however unlike the French and other Europeans we were prepared to defend our Country, although unsure what with! True we had a newly formed Home Guard, formed of civilians either unfit or too old to join the regular forces, armed with a variety of home made weapons and little else, apart from a display of British defiance!
We had heard frequent reports of atrocities being carried out by the Germans on prisoners and refugees which only hardened our resolve not to let them land. Our immediate problem was how were we were going to stop them? After Dunkirk we had no army and a depleted air force with only 331 modern Spitfires and Hurricanes to defend Britain from the expected invasion. If the Germans attacked Britain right away Dowding, who was in charge of Fighter Command, was concerned that his forces would be hard pushed to keep them at bay, and it was an immediate attack that was thought most likely.
Seeing the remnants of our army arriving back in the UK we had to accept how vulnerable our position had suddenly become. On the home front we were already suffering from the effects of both food and material shortages and with the fear of an invasion imminent our future suddenly looked very bleak When war was declared on September 3rd 1939, together with the considerable forces of France, we had every reason to expect a quick end to the war; however things had not gone according to plan and in just ten months we were facing defeat!
Like the French we had many people saying the situation was hopeless and that we should try to get the best possible terms for surrender, but unlike the French we now had a fighting Prime Minister in Winston Churchill. Through his broadcasts he encouraged us to keep our nerve and to fight on. Despite little resources he assured us that we could and would eventually win. Then to make matters worse, on the 10th June thinking the war would soon be over and wanting a share in the spoils, Italy declared war on us.
On the 22nd June Franc finally surrendered. All this happened within a few weeks from Germany commencing the ground war in Europe. We had no doubt what was in store for us and wondered how long we had before the invasion of our island. Winston Churchill, our new prime minister, then assured everybody that we would and could fight on. There can be no doubt that his attitude and speeches helped us to believe we still had a future, despite certain defeat staring us in the face. Unfortunately some modern historians find it difficult to accept the fact that without Churchill’s leadership our government, with some public support, may well have been seeking the best terms for surrender. People alive at this time will remember the importance of Churchill’s oratory on our morale; we trusted him and his leadership.
Page 6
Although the French Army was shattered, the French Navy was still very much intact. Darlan,
the Admiral of the French Fleet, had told Churchill that the Fleet would be sunk before it ccould be
surrendered to the Germans; however Churchill was not convinced. If the French Navy had fallen
into German hands the situation at sea would have become critical. Added to all our other problems this could have been the last straw.
Adolf Hitler, Chancellor of Germany Winston Churchill, UK Prime
from 30th January 1933 to 30th April Minister from the10th May 1940
1945 until 26th July 1945
Churchill was therefore faced with a decision, either to trust that Darlan would and could keep his word or that events would quickly determine the result. On the 22nd June France finally surrendered and it was time for Churchill to decide what he had to do.
On the 1st of July Churchill, with the backing of our government, gave Darlan an immediate ultimatum regarding the fate of the French Navy. On the 3rd July the British surrounded the French Fleet at the port of Mers-el-Kebir right outside Oran, Algeria. Churchill's message was loud and clear, “sail to Britain, sail to the USA, or scuttle your ships within the next six hours, or we will be forced to take action”
At first the French refused to speak to our negotiators. Two hours later the French showed the British an order they had received from Admiral Darlan instructing them to sail the ships to the USA if the Germans broke the armistice and demanded the ships. Meanwhile the British had intercepted a message from the German sympathetic French Vichy Government ordering reinforcements to move urgently to Oran. This was not good news. "Settle everything before dark or you will have reinforcements to deal with” Churchill told them but received no reply. Churchill was left with no alternative other than to order an immediate attack on the French ships.
An hour and a half later the British Fleet attacked and in less than ten minutes, 1,297 French sailors were dead and three battleships sunk. One battleship and five destroyers managed to escape. We suffered no loss or damage.
While the French were furious over the events the reaction in England was the exact opposite. For the first time since taking over as Prime Minister Churchill received a unanimous standing
ovation in parliament. Churchill had a message for the British, for Hitler, and for the rest of the world and that message was heard loud and clear, England was prepared to fight on whatever
the outcome!
Page 7
Sometimes at weekends and evenings I cycled with a school friend to see what was happening
at our local airfield, RAF Biggin Hill. We had discovered a field in Downe which gave us a good view of the northern part of the airfield. The main road from Bromley to Westerham, which
previously passed through the airfield was now closed, the traffic being diverted through country lanes to Westerham.
From our vantage point we had a good view of the aircraft, which were mostly Hawker Hurricanes. The squadrons had been very active having been involved in the battle for France and our subsequent evacuation from Dunkirk. The aircraft and buildings had been camouflaged during September 1938 at the time of the Munich crisis, when Hurricanes slowly began to replace the Gauntlet biplane fighters. Although we saw little of the German air force it was evident that air battles had been occurring off the coast, from news we heard on the radio. The war news was not good, as we had already lost some of our capital ships and the German submarines were very active sinking our supply ships. The war was already beginning to have an effect on our well-being and we were very apprehensive as to what the future held in store for us.
From the 10th July, now recorded as the start of the “Battle of Britain”, the Germans carried out heavy raids on Falmouth, Swansea, Aberdeen and Cardiff. This was phase two of four phases in the German plan deemed essential to obtain air superiority prior to a successful invasion of our shores.
Phase 1: The Luftwaffe would attack our shipping in the channel to test our RAF’s response.
Phase 2: Eagle Attack, an attack on our air defences and southern towns.
Phase 3: The Attack on Airfields intending to destroy our RAF.
Phase 4: The Blitz, an attack on the civilians in London. causing them to seek a surrender.
Hitler was convinced that in our current situation our government would have no choice but to seek talks in order to secure the best terms for our surrender. By demonstrating the strength of his Luftwaffe Hitler hoped to speed these talks on their way.
On the 19th July Hitler gave us the last chance to surrender on his terms and on the 22nd July Lord Halifax responded by saying that we would continue to fight until we had secured freedom for us and others. This was good to hear, but did little to convince us that we had much left to continue the fight. All we had to stop the Germans was our Royal Navy and a depleted Royal Air Force. Up to now the RAF, mainly consisting of Hurricanes, had shown that they could compete against the Messerschmitt 109 and were more than a match for their bombers. We were aware that the German Luftwaffe had already shown itself to be a very formidable fighting force, much larger than anything we could offer. Our Royal Navy was busy protecting our merchant ships and was prepared for possible action against German capital ships.
At this stage I had personally seen little of the fighting, apart from watching news reels and hearing the news on the radio, both censored in our favour. However this all changed on the 18th August with the introduction of phase three of Hitler’s plan, with attacks on our air fields, including Biggin Hill.
Thirty bombers attacked the airfield causing damage to the motor transport sheds. Two airmen were killed and three wounded. A number of high explosive and delayed action bombs were dropped on the airfield, but it remained operational. Three further raids occurred on the airfield on the 22/23rdAugust and the following two days, but the airfield didn’t suffer any further damage. I was unaware of these raids when, with a school friend, we decided to visit the airfield on Saturday the 30th August.
I remember it was a sunny evening and, with my friend Ron Poole, decided to cycle to our local airfield to see what was going on. We arrived about 5.30 and settled in at our usual place. Nothing much appeared to be going on apart from a few Hurricanes being refuelled when suddenly we saw many aircraft coming in very low and then things began to happen. We heard the rattle of machine guns and then the deafening sound of bombs exploding, much too close for our comfort. The noise was terrific and in a very short time our airfield was in a mess with planes and vehicles burning
everywhere. There had been was no warning that anything unusual was about to happen, but in a
Page 8
few moments the scene had changed and the airfield was now in a mess, with fires, explosions and the noise of fire bells and smoke and dust covering the airfield.
When we first saw the aircraft we thought they were Blenheims, but soon became disillusioned! After the initial shock we decided it was time to leave and didn’t visit the airfield for some time after
that.
An official report of the raid reads as follows:
“Saturday August 31st 1940 at 1800 hours.
For the second time that day Biggin Hill was bombed and almost put out of action. Oil tanks were hit and set ablaze, the main electricity cable was hit and cut the power lines to all buildings. With hangars and roadways cratered it was anticipated that the airfield would be out of action for at least two days.
Nine Ju88 bombers had managed to get through the British defences taking everybody by surprise and struck Biggin Hill with a low level bombing attack, dropping 1000 lb bombs and causing mayhem. The transport yard was destroyed, storerooms, the armoury and both officers and sergeants messes were severely damaged, two hangars had been wrecked earlier in the day and now another hanger was almost flattened and on top of all that telephone and communication lines were severed and gas and water mains ruptured. Casualties amounted to thirty-nine personnel killed and thirty five injured”.
Raids continued on the airfield until the 20th April 1941, a total of 25 causing considerable damage. 42 personnel were killed during the raids with many injured. Biggin Hill was considered a very important target by the Germans, but remained operational throughout the war. During this period the weather was very good and we watched many contrails in the sky, caused by the fighting aircraft and sometimes heard machine and cannon fire. The good news was that we were told we were winning the battle.
On the 7th September the Germans put into action phase three of their plan to terrorise the civilian population and, as a result, force our Government into suing for peace. The German Luftwaffe switched their attack from the RAF airfields and attacked London, which became the official start of the “Blitz.” This was very fortunate as it allowed the RAF to recover, but not so good for the Londoners. This switch of the German attacks away from our airfields has been considered by historians as a great German blunder that may well have lost them the war.
On Sunday the 15th September1940 we were informed that we had shot down 183 aircraft for the loss of only 30, good news indeed. In fact actual figures compiled after the war showed that we had destroyed 56 for the loss of 26. However it was apparent that the Germans could not sustain these losses, especially the loss of their experienced aircrew.
In the meantime our bombers had been attacking the embarkation ports and destroying their invasion barges. Goring had promised Hitler that the RAF would be destroyed in a maximum of three weeks, allowing the invasion to take place. This obviously was not happening and Hitler decided to delay the invasion and to concentrate on the invasion of Russia. Unfortunately we did not know this at the time and still thought that the expected invasion could still occur at any moment.
History shows that although we had lost a lot of aircraft, the loss of experienced pilots was more serious. The figures showed that the situation, prior to switching the attacks away from our airfields,
was such that our RAF would have been unable to continue for much longer, perhaps days at the most!
While the critical Battle of Britain officially commenced on the 10th July 1940 and ended on the 31st October, the air raids and destruction continued long afterwards. However for me the real Battle of Britain began on the 26th May 1940, when our troops began to arrive back from Dunkirk, and didn’t end until the fear of an invasion had receded, when the Germans invaded Russia on the 22nd June 1941. This was the period when I felt we could and probably would lose the war.
Phase four of Hitler’s invasion plan began on the 6th of October and continued until the 31st of
Page 9
October. As the long hot summer ran into October the German daylight bomber losses became too heavy to sustain, and they started to operate only at night.
The London Blitz started on the 7th of September 1940 and continued until the 19th of May 1941, for 76 consecutive nights, resulting in over a million London houses being destroyed or damaged. During this period many of our other cities were also attacked, resulting in further damage and loss
of life. Coventry, for instance, was almost completely destroyed on the 13th November 1940. In one night, more than 4,000 homes were destroyed, along with around three quarters of the cities
factories. There was barely an undamaged building left in the city centre. Two hospitals, two churches and a police station were also among the damaged buildings. More than 600 people were killed and over 1,000 had been badly injured.
The Blitz had killed at least 60,575 with 86,182 wounded; however the bombing had not achieved Hitler’s intended goal of demoralizing the British into surrender and by June 1941 the threat of an invasion of Britain had passed. Hitler had by this time realised that the British were not going to be terrorized into accepting defeat, as had happened to the rest of Europe. He then turned his attention to attacking Russia and the Battle of Britain was finally over and Germany finally conceded that she had not won the battle to gain air supremacy necessary for an invasion of our island, despite all the odds being in her favour.
When the Battle of Britain officially ended, figures obtained after the war showed Germany had lost 1389 aircraft with 643 badly damaged. As the battle took part over the UK, most of the German aircrew shot down were either killed or became prisoners. We lost 792 aircraft shot down and a considerable number destroyed on the ground. Apparently the loss in aircraft was never serious as these were being replaced. However the loss of experienced pilots was crucial. We had lost 544 pilots killed, with a large number seriously wounded. This represented a very high proportion of the pilots available to continue the battle. It was calculated that if these losses continued the RAF would soon be put out of action, perhaps in days.
What did the battle achieve? The answer is very simple; it prevented the Germans from
obtaining air superiority, allowing us to remain in the war. If we had lost the battle the Germans may well have invaded and we would have had very little to stop them. We would then have become another member of the Third Reich! Some youngsters may well ask would this have been a bad thing? To this I would say look at what had happened to those countries already under German rule and if you really care, take the time to study the considerable amount of documentary evidence available. If this was done then I am quite certain the question would not arise. We should never forget the debt we owe to those who lost their lives fighting the “Battle of Britain” and remember the considerable part my local airfield, Biggin Hill, contributed to winning this battle.
At the start of the Blitz my brother was in Africa, my father was working at the Evening Standard, a newspaper owned by Lord Beaverbrook, and my mother was working part time at the Dockhead School, Bermondsey, where Tommy Steele (aged about 6) was a pupil. We kept chickens in the garden and I had a mongrel dog called Raff and a pet tortoise. My father was trained in first aid and was an air raid warden. Food was in short supply as was clothing and other items considered essential for a normal existence. We still thought invasion was imminent and generally felt very depressed with the war news.
Frequent telegrams were arriving indicating the loss of loved ones. Two of my brother’s friends in the RAF had already been killed and my parents talked of others they knew who were no longer with us. A lot had already happened before the first bombs had fallen on London, mostly bad news, all contributing to our general depression.
Some house-holders had an Anderson shelter. The Anderson shelter was designed to go in a garden and over one million were issued by the end of 1938. Eventually over 2.5 million were issued, free to people earning less than £250 per year, otherwise the cost was £7. They measured 6.5 ft. by 4.5 ft. and consisted of curved corrugated iron sheets. They had to be sunk 3 ft. in the ground
and covered with earth and sandbags, the front entrance had a sandbag blast wall. They were
Page 10
designed to accommodate 4 to 6 people. They were cold, draughty and damp, but nevertheless saved a lot of lives. They were usually lit by paraffin oil lamps and unheated. Like most things paraffin, candles and batteries were all in short supply. Everything needed for creature comfort seemed to be unavailable; “after all there is a war on” we were told
My father had strengthened our cellar and placed planks of wood on which we tried to sleep. It had electric light, but very few other luxuries. For the first weeks the Germans seemed to do as they pleased, with little opposition. We heard a few anti-aircraft guns firing, but saw little of any real
opposition from our fighters. On most days and nights we heard bombs exploding and the bells of rescue lorries. The next day we saw damaged houses and heard about people being killed and
wounded. This was mostly by word of mouth as the news on our radio and newspapers were
censured. If we listened to the German radio an Irishman, William Joyce, known by us as “Lord Haw Haw“ gave his version of the air raids. In the evening we listened to the radio and sometimes played card games or Monopoly.
I remember my mother frequently joining a queue, although mostly she had no idea what she was queuing for. It didn’t matter, if it was still available when she got to the head of the queue she bought it anyway. A sausage, rabbit or even offal was considered a luxury. Lack of essential food was becoming a problem, even fruit and vegetables were now in short supply.
The actual Blitz has been very well documented, so I will only comment on my experience. I spent a lot of my school attendance in their air raid shelter. Sometimes I accompanied my mother shopping at Lewisham and Catford, but nearly always spent some time in a convenient surface shelter. We later heard that these were not safe. They were constructed with a brick wall and a heavy concrete roof. Consequently if a bomb landed nearby the blast could cause the walls to collapse and the heavy roof fall on the people inside. We had heard of deaths so caused, but with bombs exploding near by it somehow seemed safer to get under cover. Incendiary bombs were falling everywhere and to make life even more exciting, the Germans added a device which caused the incendiary bomb to explode, causing an extra hazard.
Eventually we had more anti-aircraft guns and these brought another danger, that of falling shrapnel. I remember my father saying that there was more chance of being hit on the head with
a piece of hot shrapnel than being hit with a bomb! One thing I recall is that our Navy brought some ships up the Thames to assist the London anti-aircraft guns. Cycling to Greenwich I remember seeing a destroyer which we were informed was the famous “Cossack,” the destroyer which had achieved fame when it had rescued our merchant sailors from the German prison ship, “Altmark”.
The London Blitz officially ended on the 19th May 1941 but we were unaware of this at the time
and still expected the raids to continue. The Germans had decided to halt the bombing when it
became apparent that bombing alone was unlikely to cause the British civilians to request their Government to surrender. The Germans apparently could not understand this as bombing civilians, or even the threat of bombing had worked very successfully before, as in Belgium, Holland and France.
During the Blitz on London more than 36,000 bombs had fallen, killing 12,696 with over 20,000 seriously injured. More than a million homes had been demolished and many more badly damaged. Germany had hoped that the civilian population would be forced to surrender, but I was not aware of any such feeling. Hitler had certainly made us very angry, but all this did was to make us more determined to continue the fight. Unfortunately we civilians had nothing with which to fight back, however it helped boost our morale when we heard that our bombers were active over Germany, especially when they bombed Berlin!
When I hear people calling our bomber boys murderers I despair, how can they ignore the fact that the Germans were the first to bomb civilians and then to ignore the indiscriminate blanket bombing of our cities, with the intention of destroying the morale of its citizens?
Fire watching had now been introduced and employees became responsible for detecting fires
in their buildings. My father had to spend several nights a week on fire duty. Those of us who
Page 11
ventured out at night had to contend with the black out. It was almost impossible to see
anything. In the winter houses and factories burnt a very sub-standard coal called nutty slack, this resulted in a sulphurous gas called smog. It was far from pleasant when this was added to fog and the blackout. Despite the London Blitz being very well documented I feel it is necessary to list a few of the instances in order to show the result of some of these raids.
On the 7th September 1940 300 bombers accompanied by over 600 fighters bombed the London docks and central London, starting over 1,000 individual fires and causing a considerable amount of
damage; 430 people were killed and over a thousand seriously injured. The fires were clearly visible by me in Lewisham.
17th September Marble Arch underground station received a direct hit, killing 17 and injuring
many others. By mid October well over 250,000 Londoners had been made homeless.
11th January 1941 the Bank underground station received a direct hit and killed 117 and
left hundreds seriously injured.
19th March 500 bombers accompanied by a large number of fighters attacked the docks and central London. 750 were killed and over 1,000 injured.
16th April 685 bombers accompanied by 700 plus fighters dropped a large number of high
explosive bombs and incendiaries causing more than 2,000 individual fires. Over 1,000 were killed and many more seriously injured. The all clear sounded at 6 am on Sunday morning when over 700 acres of London had suffered severe bomb damage, with 11,000 homes destroyed or badly damaged.
The bombing had extended as far as Lewisham, Deptford and Croydon. Main line railway stations had been put out of action, including Waterloo and thousands of streets made impassable. Over 600 water mains were broken and the supply of gas and electricity badly disrupted. Telephone lines were broken, adding to the communication problems of essential services. The last fires were finally extinguished four days later. We could clearly see the fires at the docks from Lewisham and heard the sound of bombs dropping ever closer. The Germans seemed to proceed unhindered with little anti aircraft fire or the presence of any of our night fighters. Next day we discovered more wrecked and damaged houses close to where we lived. It took several weeks before services were back to some normality. Fortunately there were few follow-up raids to disrupt the necessary repair and salvage operations.
Although the above lists only some of the serious events even a single person killed would cause hurt and despair to the family affected. During every raid I wondered if I would survive or if I should suffer a serious injury, a loss of a limb or eyesight.
After the raid, those of us not directly affected just carried on as usual. Somehow we were grateful to still be alive and determined to make the most of the next day, after all what else could we do? I think most of us felt that if we could only survive the present day, tomorrow had to be better or perhaps the next day! The last thing we wanted was for the Germans to win. We were pleased every time we heard our bombers had raided Germany, but concerned to hear of our inevitable losses.
The Churchill broadcasts helped tremendously by strengthening our morale. The radio and newspapers also helped by concentrating on whatever good news they could find and censoring the bad. We were certainly not enjoying life and wondering just how much more we could take when suddenly Hitler decided to turn his attention towards attacking Russia, in order to gain access to its oil, mineral and other resources. Hitler expected it to be a quick victory and it nearly was until the Russian winter took a hand. While this saw the end of the concentrated raids, the bombing of civilians still continued.
During the Blitz my father and his crew were busy dealing with incendiaries, while the experts dealt with the unexploded high explosives, sometimes with tragic results. We owed a lot to them
and many others, especially the firemen and ambulance drivers who regularly risked their lives and to the women who were seen driving the rescue vehicles and helping in so many other ways. In one
of the raids, just before Christmas, I lost a cousin Olive who was an ambulance driver. It was
Page 12
amazing that so many people were ready to risk their lives while helping others, the events certainly brought out the best in people.
The Italians had a formidable navy based at Taranto, in the Mediterranean and on our navy decided it was time to do something about it in what has become known as the Battle of Taranto.
On the night of 11/12th November 1940 our Royal Navy launched the first all-aircraft ship-to-ship naval attack in history, flying a small number of obsolescent Fairy Swordfish biplane torpedo bombers from an aircraft carrier, the HMS Illustrious.
The first wave of 12 aircraft left Illustrious just before 21:00 hours on 11th November 1940, followed by a second wave of nine about 90 minutes later. Of the second wave, one turned back
with a problem with its auxiliary fuel tank and another launched 20 minutes late following
emergency repairs to damage from a minor taxiing accident. We lost two aircraft shot down.
The devastation wrought by the British carrier-launched aircraft on the large Italian warships was the beginning of the rise of the power of naval aviation, over the big guns of battleships and was subsequently copied by the Japanese on Pearl Harbour. The Italian fleet lost about half its strength in one night, and the next day the Italians transferred its undamaged ships from Taranto to Naples to protect them from similar attacks. This was news we badly needed to hear!
Fairy Swordfish
In April 1941 Germany launched their African offensive and invaded Yugoslavia and Greece. Then on the 24th May we heard that our most famous capital ship, HMS Hood had been sunk during an engagement with the German battleship, Bismarck. The Hood had a crew of over 1,700 and only 3 survived, we couldn’t believe it! Later we heard that Winston Churchill ordered the Bismarck to be sunk at all costs and on the 27th May it was! Nevertheless we couldn’t help wondering what was wrong with our warships. We knew our Navy was doing an excellent job protecting our merchant ships from submarine attacks, but when faced with the more modern German surface ships and attacks from the air the results were not so encouraging.
Now a teenager I was well aware that my schooling was seriously lacking, although by experience I had learnt about the things that really mattered, the help and friendship of others when most needed. Wealth and status meant little in an ir raid we were all equal, just people trying to survive.
In May 1941, aged 14, I had finished my three years at SELTI and went to work at the Redwing Aircraft Company in Croydon. I was shown how to rivet fuel tanks for Wellington bombers, but the interest did not last long. I sought something more interesting and, on the 17th June, joined the No.1 Maintenance Unit and Barrage Balloon Centre at RAF Kidbrooke as a Trade Lad, on a seven year mechanical engineering apprenticeship. This was also the home of the RAF Skyrockets Dance Orchestra conducted by Paul Fenhoulet and my introduction to dance and swing music.
If I remember correctly I started work at 7.30 until 5.30 and on Saturdays until 12.30, to complete a 50 hour week. We had a ten minute break in the morning and afternoon where we were allowed to sit down. I remember my wage was 17shillings and sixpence (85 p). I worked with a
Page 13
Rolls Royce fitter who had recently returned from fighting in Africa. He had been with the 8th army as a gunner in a tank and had suffered ear trouble. When told he had Gunner’s Ear he was puzzled as he thought the doctor had said Gonorrhoea! Our job was to repair damaged Merlin aero engines.
Being a reasonable distance from where I lived meant that I could cycle to work; this in itself could be quite eventful, as I remember arriving at work in a very dishevelled state after cycling into a recently created bomb crater. Cycle and car lamps had to be hooded to prevent any light escaping upwards; unfortunately this also prevented most of the light reaching the ground!
On the 22nd June 1941 Germany invaded Russia. June also saw the start of clothes rationing and the utility system for retail goods. In November, unmarried women aged 20 to 30 were conscripted into the services or other war work. By mid 1943 most single women, between the ages of
20 and 40 were conscripted into the forces or industry. My uncle Reg had to report for work in the
building and repair industry, this meant that he was away from home for considerable periods, his wife Ethel was detailed to work in the local laundry. Apart from young men away in the services we now had families broken up by older members being detailed to join various civilian services on war work. While not affecting my parents or me directly, it did add another concern.
By the end of the year food had become a major problem and we were all feeling the effects of
rationing, this had begun in January 1940. We had been issued with a food ration card and had to
register to buy food from a specific shop. The shop was then issued with the relevant amount
of food for the number of registered customers. However, as food was in short supply, the shops often did not receive enough for all their customers. News that a delivery had arrived at the shop
spread fast and long queues soon formed as everyone was keen to get their share before it was all
sold.
Each person’s weekly allowance was 4 oz of bacon and ham, 2 oz of butter and 8 oz of sugar. In March meat was added to the value of 1 shilling and 6 pence (6p) and. over the next two years other foods added including 1 fresh egg, 1 packet of dried eggs every 4 weeks, 4oz of margarine, 2 oz of cheese, 2 oz of tea, three pints of milk, 1 pound of jam every eight weeks and12 oz of sweets every four weeks.
Other foods rationed between 1940 and 1942 included dried fruit, canned fruit, rice, cooking fat, biscuits and breakfast cereals, while some foods such as potatoes, onions and fish were not rationed but difficult to obtain. Fresh fruit was also in short supply but was not rationed. Only fruit which could be grown in Britain, such as apples, pears, raspberries, blackberries and strawberries were sometimes available. Imported fruit such as bananas, oranges and peaches were not available in the shops.
Clothes and furnishings were rationed on a points system, in1943 we were each allowed 66 points a year, reduced to 48 in 1942, 36 in ’43 and 24 by the end of the war. A man’s overcoat took 18 coupons, a suit 26 and shoes 9, a woman’s simple dress took 11 and her shoes 7. Children aged 14 to16 got 20 more coupons. However we had a flourishing black market run by “spivs” who managed to obtain most things to be sold at an inflated price.
As well as food and clothing many other items were in short supply. A utility range of household furniture was introduced. The items were plain, functional and hard-wearing, but the only option for people who had lost their homes in the bombing and for newly married couples setting up their first home.
Canteen food was not very appetizing and I remember frequently feeling very uncomfortable after a cooked meal, so mostly stuck to salads or things that I could recognise. In restaurants a meal was limited to five shillings (25p) and could not have more than three courses; with meat and fish unable to be served at the same sitting.
Establishments known as British Restaurants appeared and were run by local authorities, who set them up in schools and church halls, intended as a temporary emergency system for feeding those who had been bombed out. By mid 1941 the London County Council was operating 200 of these restaurants and from 1942 to 1944 there were around 2,000 of them open to anybody. They
Page 14
proved very popular and greatly appreciated as a three course meal cost only nine pence (4p in new money).When I used them I had no complaints and found the meal better than some others I had experienced.
Despite the end of the blitz raids by German bombers and fighter bombers continued to cause damage and disruption. Barely a day or night passed without the sound of an air raid warning.
After two years at Kidbrooke I realised that at the end of a seven year apprenticeship the best I could hope for was to end up as a competent fitter, not what I wanted. Somehow I managed to get an interview with the station commander, Wing Commander Clapp, to ask if it would be possible to have my apprenticeship transferred to an aircraft Company, I was 16 at the time! Surprisingly he found time to talk with me and agreed to consider a transfer if I could find an aircraft company to take me. As a result in June 1943, my apprenticeship was transferred to the famous de Havilland Aircraft Company and after a year training in their technical school started work in their engine division at Edgware. The journey from my home in Lewisham was daunting to say the least, Lewisham to London Bridge station, then underground to Edgware followed by a fifteen minute walk to their works at Stag Lane, to clock in at 7.30 am.
I remember people sleeping on the underground platforms and the smell; there were no proper toilets, the smoke filled railway carriages with the windows heavily taped and shut during the blackout, the crowded trains and delays caused by enemy action, the smog and frequently travelling next to somebody being sick, this was all part of the war as I remember it! Despite the problems of getting to work we, apart from office staff, had to clock in and five minutes after starting time the
clock cards would be removed. After that you had to ask the foreman for permission to start work and pay was then deducted per quarter of an hour.
.
Sleeping in the underground stations
I joined the Air Training Corp shortly after it was formed and particularly enjoyed the weeks spent at RAF airfields. For a week we became part of the airfield’s wartime routine, hopeful for a
chance of a flight. During my stay in the ATC I had visited three RAF airfields, at Odiham, Wing and Holmsley South, enjoying flights in six aircraft, a Cygnet, Lysander, Wellington, Ventura, Tiger Moth and Dakota. .
The Commanding Officer at Wing was Wing Commander Lionel Van Praag, a speedway rider I remembered from the pre-war days when I had regularly visited the New Cross Speedway with my father. Lionel won the Speedway World Championship in 1936 riding against Eric Langton and I can still remember the event. Many years later I met a WAAF officer who in 1942 was stationed at Wing, she was surprised that I had even heard of Wing let alone knew the Station Commander’s name!
In March 1941 a new shelter appeared, the Morrison. This was a steel structure designed to hold 2 to 3 people lying down. It had a thick steel roof with open wire sides and intended to be used as a
table. It was not very popular and could be a death-trap if the building collapsed on it. Figures
Page 15
revealed that in November 1940 the majority of Londoners were not using special shelters, 27% used the Anderson, 9% public shelters and 4% used the tube stations the rest, including me, slept in their homes.
On December 7th 1941 Japan bombed Pearl Harbour and at last America was forced into the war. A few days later, on the 10th December, we were shocked to hear that Japanese aircraft had sunk two of our capital ships, our latest battleship the “Prince of Wales” and our battle cruiser “Repulse”, few of the crew were saved. Would the bad news never end?
The first US infantry troops of around four thousand men arrived in Britain on January 26th, 1942 and eventually swelled to more than 1.5 million. We began to see the first of the Americans
and I was not particularly keen on what I saw. To me they appeared brash and cocky, wore smart
uniforms and had plenty of money to spend. It was obvious that they had not just endured three years of war! Not surprisingly they were just what our girls wanted; with their boy friends and husbands away they were not concerned at being seen in the arms of the GI’s. It may be significant that the Ministry of Health launched a campaign to warn the public against Venereal Disease shortly after the GI’s arrived!
Prince of Wales Crew 1,600 plus Repulse Crew 1,000 plus
Commissioned 19th January 1941
Venereal disease I am sure was news to most of us, it certainly was to me. My main contact with girls had been in the factories and I was not impressed. These were girls who had been conscripted for war work and away from home for the first time. Sex seemed to be their main topic and they delighted in embarrassing young apprentices with suggestive talk and displays of naked flesh.
With the shortage of suitable male partners many of the girls had apparently formed liaisons with other females and appeared not to be concerned when caught in comprising positions. Some men working in the factories had recently returned from our Forces and were not impressed to see how their wives might have behaved when they were away. I was reassured to learn that my colleagues also felt uncomfortable when in the company of these girls, especially when serving time in the work shops.
It may have been noticed that I have not mentioned our Army apart from their evacuation from Dunkirk. The simple reason s is that there was very little good news to report and to make matters worse, on the 15th February 1942 General Percival surrendered Singapore to the Japanese in what has been described as the worst and largest capitulation in British history.
In only seven days of fighting Singapore was surrendered and about. 80,000 of our troops joined the 50,000 British, Australian and Indian troops already captured during the disastrous Malayan Campaign. The Japanese treated our troops with appalling cruelty and inhumanity, many dying in captivity. Churchill was not amused and confirmed our opinion that something was seriously wrong with our generals.
October 1942, at last we had the prospect of good news when General Montgomery commenced the greatest bombardment in history with a surprise attack on the German army in North Africa,
Page 16
This started on the evening of 23rd October and, together with the RAF, eventually resulted in the end of Rommel’s African Campaign.
Sometime in November, about 3 o’clock in the morning, I remember it was cold and raining, our house at 43 Overcliff Road, Lewisham received a direct hit. My Aunt Ethel and Uncle Reg were staying with us as their flat in nearby Brockley had been badly damaged. We prepared for bed soon after listening to the 9 o’clock news, the siren had already sounded and we could hear the usual noise of aircraft, anti-aircraft guns and bombs dropping in the distance. We tried to sleep in old clothes on wooden planks covered by a blanket. The planks were placed both sides of the cellar accommodating the five of us. With a supply of coal at the far end of the cellar the air was far from fresh. At the time we were hit, although I was awake (the noise of an air raid did not encourage
sleep) I cannot remember hearing the actual explosion of the bomb, but became aware that I was
suddenly in darkness and covered in dust and rubble. It was completely dark, I heard my father calling to hear if we were all right and we all replied saying we were. Evidently both my mother and aunt said that they couldn’t move because they were covered in debris. I was still lying on the wooden planks but found it was difficult to move and breathe because of the dust and rubble.
My uncle had been in the garden to have a smoke and said he clearly remembered hearing the sound of bombs dropping and then reaching the top of the cellar stairs, but little else. He landed on top of my father. My father was asking us to turn off the gas. Something was lying on my legs and I discovered it was the gas meter. I could smell gas and hear water running but was disorientated and couldn’t find the tap to turn off the gas.
I cannot remember how long we lay there, but the next thing I remember was hearing somebody asking if we were all right. A torch shone and soon people were lifting us out. We stood in a rubble
strewn road, in the wet and darkness, but could not see our house! Luckily apart from some cuts and bruises we were all in one piece. I remember feeling thankful that we were all alive but feeling very cold, wet and dirty. There seemed to be a lot of people speaking and helping us and the next thing I remember was being taken to a disused snooker hall in nearby Catford, which was being used as a rescue centre. My memory is vague as to what exactly happened next, but somehow we ended up with a mug of hot tea and clean dry clothes.
My next memory is going back with my father to see what could be rescued. I was surprised to see our house was just a heap of rubble, the house and the adjoining house, number 45 had just gone! Where our garden should have been was a big hole. No chickens, tortoise or dog. We could not even discover the cellar door or the stairs leading to the cellar. How we had survived was incredible, there was nothing left to save!
My uncle said he believed my dog was in the garden with him but despite hoping that somehow he had survived we never saw him again. It was like losing a member of my family and somehow I felt responsible.
A lot of our elderly neighbours had moved into the country and their empty houses were commandeered by the council. We were given one of these houses as temporary accommodation, but we did not realise how temporary it was going to be! A week later a bomb had fallen nearby and the house was declared unsafe. We were then given another house, where we managed to stay for the rest of the war, despite replacing windows and other damage.
During the Blitz and early part of the war we listened to the radio which featured plenty of dance music and variety shows, but I cannot remember hearing any American bands, including Glen Miller. My first introduction to Glen Miller was probably at the cinema. Miller and his band appeared in two Twentieth Century Fox films, in 1941's Sun Valley Serenade and 1942's Orchestra Wives. I remember buying a 78 rpm recording of Joe Loss playing In the Mood which became a UK’s best seller, but this was probably after the Blitz. At the beginning of the war, all cinemas were main introduction to American bands came from listening to radio broadcasts from the American however this did not last very long and most cinemas had re- opened by the time of the Blitz. My
Page 17
main introduction to American bands came from listening to radio broadcasts from the American Forces Network; however this didn’t start until July 4th, 1943.
Air raids continued to have an effect on our lives. The raids were being carried out mostly by fighter bombers. These came in very fast and frequently without warning. At 12.30 on Wednesday afternoon of the 20th January 1943, several Focke Wulf 190’s fighter bombers came in fast and low (the balloon barrage was down) and without warning began machine gunning the streets in Lewisham. Many people reported near misses, including my father who was coming home for lunch. As the aircraft flew overhead machine gun bullets hit the houses and streets. My father said that he was aware of the sudden noise of the aircraft but they flashed past too quickly to see much else. They eventually dropped their bombs on a school at Sangley Road, Catford, killing 38 children and 6 teachers. 60 children were seriously injured. The air raids and killing had not stopped with the Blitz.
I recently read in a local newspaper of eye-witness accounts of how the Germans had especially
targeted the school and people remembering seeing the pilots waving as they flew overhead! One woman who was having her hair done heard the noise of the aircraft and rushed outside to see the Germans circling and targeting the children in the playground.
The school was in a built up area and the aircraft were flying very low at over 300 mph, which is 440 feet per second, so the aircraft would have been visible for only a fraction of a second, assuming you were looking in the right direction at the time. It makes no sense that the pilots would risk their lives just to target a school, despite how we felt about them at the time. While these reports may make interesting reading I don’t see the value in reporting incidences that obviously cannot be true.
The result of five years bombing was to be seen everywhere. While the streets were cleaned, nothing could be done to hide the damaged and demolished buildings. On the 3rd March 1943 there occurred the greatest loss of life in one single incident. On that day there had been 10 raids on London and at 8.17 pm the alert sounded at Bethnel Green. In the tube station 500 people were already installed. It was raining and the entrance to the station dimly lit with only a 25 watt bulb. The stairs were wet and slippery. A large number of people were approaching the station when the local “Z” anti-aircraft battalion fired 60 rockets. The noise was deafening and caused an estimated 1,500 people to surge towards the entrance to the station. Somebody slipped and people behind fell down the stairs crushing those below. This resulted in 173 people being killed, including 62 children. There were also a large number of serious injuries.
6th June1944 was D day when we landed back in France. At last the end of the war appeared in sight. By this time we were really feeling the effects of the war, the shortage of food, clothing, loss of loved ones, the long working hours with little time for relaxation and the uncertainty as to what the future would hold. Would this end in disaster? Historians are fortunate in that they are able to review events knowing the result, whereas those actually living the event did not. Unfortunately many of today’s representations of events in the war do not portray them as I and other veterans, remember.
While we were hoping that the war would soon be over we were in for another shock. On
June 13th 1944 the first of Hitler’s revenge weapons hit London, landing at Hackney and killing six. The V1 flying bomb (Doodlebug) carried one ton of high explosive and no pilot. It flew at about 350 mph. By the end of August over 3,000 had been launched with 500 hitting the South East of England and London. They landed at any time, day or night. Eventually the flying bombs were intercepted by our fighters, anti-aircraft guns and barrage balloons, the launching sites receiving the attention of our bombers.
I am disgusted how some today are all too ready to criticise the supreme effort made by the bomber arm of our air force. Flying in a British bomber during World War Two was one of the most dangerous jobs imaginable. 55,000 aircrew died during the war with many more taken prisoner, the highest loss rate of any major branch of the British armed forces. Yet there is no official campaign
Page 18
medal commemorating the sacrifices of these men. It is seldom mentioned that we lost over 2,000 American and British air crew during the bombing the launch and development sites of the V weapons. Those bombs which did get through caused a tremendous amount of blast damage. We listened for the V1’s engine to stop and knew that we had only seconds to wait for the explosion. When the sites were overrun the flying bombs were launched from the air by Heinkel bombers.
The flying bombs killed 8,938 with an estimated 25,000 seriously injured. Lewisham came third on the list of hits with 114; Croydon came top of the list with l4l and Wandsworth second with 122.
The original German plan was to launch 200 bombs an hour, but the most they ever achieved was 200 a day, but this was enough to severely dent our morale! People were leaving London in huge numbers. In mid July 1944 15,000 were estimated to be leaving the main London stations a day! Between 1.5 and 2 million people had left during the summer, which had been particularly wet and cold. Many businesses and Civil Service departments were evacuated and the absence of people
became noticeable, especially to those having to travel through London. Some of the worst incidents
occurred in South East London, close to Lewisham where I lived. I recall one event which occurred on my mother’s shopping day.
Friday the 28th July at 9.41 a V1 bomb landed at the Lewisham market, killing 59 with 124 seriously injured. The resulting blast destroyed and badly damaged over a hundred shops, flats and houses. It came as a great shock to see so much damage where our local shopping centre had once been. Everybody seemed to know somebody who had either been killed or seriously wounded.
My mother went shopping as usual in the afternoon, unaware that her shopping centre had been
demolished. She didn’t do much shopping that day and had a harrowing story to tell when I arrived home in the evening.
Lewisham market after being hit by a flying bomb on the 28th
July 1944
8th September 1944 the first V2 rocket landed in Chiswick, killing 3 with 17 injured. The
rocket hit at about 3000 mph, with no warning. It carried a ton of high explosive and the impact caused a deep penetration. The effect was like a mini earthquake, with damage being recorded up to a quarter of a mile away.
The high death rate was mainly caused by the lack of any warning. Some of the worst tragedies again occurring in South East London, many close to where I lived.
Over 500 were killed and many more injured in just 14 instances, with the worst one occurring at New Cross on the 15th November, when a rocket landed on a Woolworths store killing 173 and
leaving many more seriously injured. I lost another cousin, Joyce.
27th March 1944 was the last day of the rocket attacks, unfortunately one of the final rockets
Page 19
fell on Hughes Mansions, in Vallence Road, Stepney, killing 134 and seriously injuring many
others. The last rocket fell in Orpington on the same day and the final flying bomb in
Swanscombe the next day. The intention of the V weapons was to kill and wound civilians in the hope that it would destroy their morale, but it didn’t happen and future generations should realise this and that they owe their freedom to this generation.
The later attacks affected us even more; because they were unexpected and by this time we were feeling very exhausted and thinking the war would never end, and then on the 30th April we heard that Hitler had committed suicide.
On the 7th May 1945 Hitler's successor, Admiral Donitz, offered an unconditional surrender to the allies and on the 8th May we celebrated Victory in Europe day. On Monday the 7th May 1945 Germany finally surrendered and at last the European war was over. We officially celebrated victory with a holiday on the following day, called Victory in Europe day or VE day. What happened on
this particular day? Did we all get drunk and dance around merrily? I saw little evidence of that. It
is true that there were thanksgiving services, victory salutes and impromptu street concerts, but the majority of us were just thankful that we had survived physically uninjured.
Pierre Clostermann, a French pilot who had flown from Biggin Hill, wrote “That evening the Mess was like some extraordinary vigil over a corpse. The pilots were slumped in their chairs; no one spoke a word or sang anything. Round about eleven o’clock someone switched on the wireless and we listened to some music.”
Lieutenant Colonel H.W.L. Nichols wrote from Germany “We were all taken by surprise when
the surrender was announced on the wireless, as we had no hint of it coming so soon. It was a bit of an anti-climax though and there was no excitement in the mess. We trooped into the bar had a drink on the strength of it and were all in bed by 10.30”. Major A.J.Forest also wrote from Germany “inwardly I felt melancholic, I wanted quiet to absorb this overwhelming blessing, the restoration of peace after six years of war and above all to be alone”
I spent VE day with my parents and had difficulty in accepting that the war was over and would no longer suffer the apprehension felt upon hearing the sound of an air raid warning. Next day we went back to work and found that little had changed and then realised that the war would not finally be over until Japan had surrendered. It looked as if the war with Japan would be hard fought and an eventual end to the war a long way off.
Six de Havilland Students, photographed for the DH magazine
I am standing top left. The aircraft is an Avro Lincoln.
Early in 1945 I had been transferred to work at Hatfield, promoted from a trade apprentice to an aeronautical student. This meant that I could now continue my training in their design offices; it also meant a considerable increase in travelling time, as I was still living in Lewisham. The factory working week was 50 hours including Saturday mornings, reduced to 48 for senior staff and office
Page 20
workers. As a student I was now expected to aim towards becoming a member of a professional body such as the Royal Aeronautical Society. To do this I had to attend evening classes, preferably at Hatfield. After much discussion I was allowed to enrol back at my old school, the South East London Technical Institute, in order to study for the Higher National Certificate in mechanical and structural engineering, three nights a week!
It was a rush to get back from Hatfield in time to start evening classes at 6.30 pm; however I cannot remember having any time off due to stress or illness. It was later shown that despite the
horrendous working conditions very few days were lost due to sickness or other causes. If we were lucky we had a whole week off for a holiday, which if I remember correctly, was unpaid. I cannot As far as I was concerned the war might be over but nothing much changed, the daily chore was just the same. Food and other materials were still in short supply and rationing still continued. Thr remember either my family or me actually having a holiday during the war.
As far as I was concerned the war might be over but nothing much changed, the daily chore was
just the same. Food and other materials were still in short supply and rationing still continued. The war with Japan was still going on but seemed too distant to be of particular concern until the 6th of
August 1945, when we became aware of a devastating new weapon called the atom bomb. The
United States had dropped an atom bomb on Hiroshima causing extensive damage and loss of life.
The Americans gave the Japanese an offer to surrender but the Japanese generals refused and so on the 9th of August the US dropped a second atom bomb, this time on Nagasaki.
The Japanese government then realized that they had little alternative but to immediately consider a surrender. On the 14th August the Japanese unconditionally surrendered to the allies and on the 2nd of September 1945 the U.S. General Douglas Mac Arthur accepted Japan's surrender thus formally ending the Second World War
Subsequently historians have reviewed the use of this deadly weapon forgetting that we were still at war. Without employing this weapon there can be no doubt that the Japanese would have continued with their horrendous form of unconditional warfare, with death seen as an act of heroism. This would have cost the lives of many more Americans and allied troops. If the Germans or Japanese had such a weapon do these historians really believe they would have hesitated before using it? Who knows what might have happened if the war had continued and Germany or Japan had been allowed to become the first to use an atomic weapon.
One of the last of our Bomber Command raids was on the German city of Dresden. Many historians have managed to convince our younger generation that we had committed a horrendous crime against innocent civilians. They forget that we were still at war having experienced five years of indiscriminate German raids on our cities, with Hitler promising even more deadly attacks. We rejoiced when we heard our bombers had caused maximum damage to their German cities, letting them experience what it was like to be on the receiving end of bombs they had enjoyed dropping on us.
The result of reviewing this one raid on a German city is that the tremendous sacrifice made by our bomber boys during the war has been forgotten. Instead of being considered heroes they have been unjustly vilified, but was the Dresden raid justified? I recently came across a thist statement written by a German scientist:
“Dresden was not simply a cultural centre, there were factories there manufacturing weapons and equipment for the Nazi war effort. To produce an atom bomb a supply of heavy water is needed and
the main source had already been destroyed in Norway. There is sufficient evidence that the Nazis
were producing heavy water in the centre of Dresden, under the impression that because of the large civilian population it would not be bombed. Dresden was also an important rail base for the Nazis to
send troops and equipment to the front and so would be considered an important war target.”
I have also read that right up to his suicide on April 30th 1945 Hitler was still hoping for news that much of the evidence being destroyed in the latter stages of the war, we cannot be certain just how
Page 21
advanced the Germans were towards obtaining such a weapon and did the raids on Dresden on the 13/15th February finally convince him that this was not going the happen?
We will never know if this was true, but if it was suspected that Dresden contained such an important war target then it was right to be attacked. While historians argue that with Germany’s surrender only weeks away we should not have bombed the city. The truth is that I, and probably most of us, did not know the end of the war was only weeks away and felt as though it would go on for ever.
Demobilisation began on the18th June 1945. Bread was rationed after the war, on the 21st July 1946, and food rationing did not finally end until July 1954.
At the end of the war I was aged 18 and with three years of my apprenticeship to complete had enjoyed very little social life. I had had some contact with factory girls but had not been impressed. I
was thankful that I had not suffered any injuries nor lost any of my close family, although my brother
had lost his wife.
During my brother’s stay in South Africa he had married the daughter of the owner of a well known Cape Town newspaper, Cape Argus and on his return to the UK he had to leave without her; however some months later she managed to get a passage on a merchant ship but never arrived. My brother received a telegram to say she had become ill on the voyage and had subsequently died and been buried at sea. It was a sad occasion for me to accompany my brother to Southampton to collect her things, which included presents for us.
In May 1944 there were nearly two million American service men over here, plus
Canadians and other nationalities. The American GIs had plenty of money to spend (the ordinary GIs earning five times more than a British private) and a smart uniform, their accent reminding us of the glamour of Hollywood films. They had gum and candy, silk stockings, plenty of cigarettes and were generally very polite. What else did a lonely girl need? As a result these friendships produced a lot of “Dear John” letters written to their husbands and fiancés overseas. Some of our returning soldiers (over 265,000 had been killed) did not find the expected welcoming homecoming.
To become pregnant out of marriage was considered a very serious breach of family life. I have had personal experience of this when my cousin became pregnant by her American boy friend and was asked to leave home. Despite subsequently keeping in touch with my uncle I never found out what happened to her.
By the end of 1945 the number of divorces had reached 25,000, compared with less than
8,500 in1938. By the end of the war over 100,000 British girls had married American and Dominion servicemen. The number of illegitimate births had reached 64,000 by the end of the war. Venereal disease had become a major concern and there was an added problem of relationships ceasing, when their lovers had to return overseas, some to their wives! The end of the war certainly raised many problems. To many the peace was going to prove a very difficult time!
Perhaps the reader can now see why dressing up in war time clothes, sitting in an
Anderson shelter and listening to a recording of bombs falling has little to do with the reality of my war. One important ingredient missing is how we felt at the time, personal memories which can only be recalled by those that were present at the time. For some the memory may be of a particular instance which is very painful to recall, for me it was part of my teenage experience.
I was too young to do any fighting, but at least I had survived and with my war years still
reasonably clear in my memory have been able to document some of my wartime memories.
Hopefully this recollection will do a little to help; if only to cause the reader to reflect that there was more to the war than can be depicted by sitting in an Anderson shelter. A famous
novelist, J.B.Priestly wrote, “The British were absolutely at their best in the Second World
War. They were never so good in my lifetime before it, and I’m sorry to say that they’ve never been so good after it”
I am very grateful that my computer and reference books have allowed me to quickly
check facts and figures which the passing years may well have caused my memory to distort.
Page 22
Having asked my wife to read this, in order to correct any grammatical and spelling mistakes, she said it was a noble effort, but what was the purpose, who would be interested? I had no idea, I just felt the need to record the war as I remembered it and to express my concern at some of the inaccuracies being displayed in recent television programmes and films. I have no problems with most documentaries; they are generally excellent, especially those of the Great War.
When I see pictures of the terrible trench war I think of my father. He had joined as an
infantry man at the beginning of the war in 1914 and was present at some of the famous battles. However I showed little interest in hearing about his wartime experiences, after all to me it was ancient history! Now I deeply regret the lost opportunity. His war ended on November1918 with a horrifying casualty rate of 35.8 %. But just a few years later he must have been well aware that
another war was a distinct possibility. I can now imagine how he st have felt, with memories of his
war still very fresh in his mind! I also think about the problems faced by my parents and others,
in trying to look after their families.
After the war we learnt that Hitler had not approved any plans for an invasion of the British Isles. None of the plans submitted were considered feasible, especially with the Royal Navy still intact a seaborne invasion was out of the question. But Hitler assumed invasion
would not be necessary, based on what had happened in Europe. After a short blitz on the British civilian population he assumed we would soon sue for peace, especially following the defeat and evacuation of our troops at Dunkirk. Most thought it would be a matter of weeks before Britain admitted defeat, including America but they had not reckoned with the courage of our youngsters in the Royal Air force and the character of the British people, led by our exceptional Prime Minister, Winston Churchill.
The war was certainly a defining moment in my teenage life, having come so close to being a witness to the end of the British Empire.
Alan Mann
June 2008
Revised February 2017
I acknowledge that without a computer and access to the Web for additional information and pictures, my teenage memories of the war would have remained just memories.
Alan
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
My recollections of the War
Description
An account of the resource
Reminisces about pre-war and early war days as a schoolboy in Lewisham. Recalls events at the beginning of the war. Includes photographs of aircraft and naval ships. Continues with history of events through the war's early years including conscription, German actions in Europe, battle of France, Dunkirk and the battle of Britain. Included detailed accounts of German air force attacks. Continues with account of the Blitz, details of bomb shelters and casualties. Includes photograph of Hitler and Churchill. Describes Royal Navy attack on Taranto and includes photograph of Swordfish. Continues with German offensives in North Africa and the Balkans. Mentions his job at the Redwing Aircraft Company and joining No 1 Maintenance Unit and Barrage Balloon Centre at RAF Kidbrooke as an apprentice. Continues with more war history and details of rationing. In 1943 transferred his apprenticeship to De Havilland Aircraft Company. Discusses life during the war including bombing and people moving to the country. Mentions D-Day, V-weapons, Bomber Command operations. In 1945 was transferred to Hatfield. Goes on to describe events in 1945 and the end of the war followed by comments on American servicemen in the United Kingdom.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Alan Mann
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2008-06
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Twenty-two page printed document with colour and b/w photographs
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BMannAMannAv3
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Kent
England--London
England--Hertfordshire
England--Hatfield (Hertfordshire)
England--Herefordshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1938-05-20
1938
1939
1940
1941
1941-05
1942
1943
1944
1945
2008-06
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
bombing
childhood in wartime
firefighting
home front
Hurricane
incendiary device
Me 109
Normandy campaign (6 June – 21 August 1944)
RAF Biggin Hill
RAF Hatfield
shelter
Spitfire
V-weapon
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1110/26180/MSaundersA[DoB]-171003-01.pdf
204a034a79927b297e3e2b0268d8af8b
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Saunders, Roy and Honor
Roy Saunders
R Saunders
Honor Saunders
H Saunders
Description
An account of the resource
158 items. Oral history interviews with Roy Saunders (b. 1930) and Honor Saunders (b. 1931) and six albums of family photographs. Both experienced the London Blitz. <br /><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1638 ">Foreshaw and Carter Photos</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1639 ">Foreshaw Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1640">Roy and Honor Saunders</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1641">Saunders Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1642">Thorpe and Diver Family</a><br /><a href="https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/show/1643">Thorpe Family</a><br /><br />The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Roy and Honor Saunders and catalogued by IBCC Digital Archive staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-03
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Saunders, R-H
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
My Maternal Grandparents
Their Family, Childhood and War Time Experiences
Description
An account of the resource
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 a respected vet who specialised in cancer.
There are short biographies of Alfred Carter and John Carter.
Aidan then details the plan for her project.
There are questions and answers for her grandmother, Honor Saunders, the war time questions and family history display great detail.
Her grandfather, Roy Saunders is also questioned in detail. He was unfit for military service, worked for the railways then applied and was accepted for work on the railways in Nigeria.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Aidan Saunders
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
61 typed sheets
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Text. Personal research
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
MSaundersA[DoB]-171003-01
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--London
Wales--Llandovery
Singapore
Burma
England--Colchester
Poland--Warsaw
England--Ely
England--Isleham
England--Looe
Nigeria--Lagos
England--Brighton
England--Lancing
England--Welwyn Garden City
England--Wantage
Poland
Nigeria
England--Essex
England--Herefordshire
England--Oxfordshire
England--Sussex
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
African heritage
bombing
childhood in wartime
Churchill, Winston (1874-1965)
evacuation
faith
Hitler, Adolf (1889-1945)
home front
propaganda
V-1
V-2
V-weapon
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/133/1296/PBeechH1702.1.jpg
50998cdeb9d44f987e2667829c8c7065
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Beech, Harold
Harold Beech
H Beech
Description
An account of the resource
Seven items. The collection consists of three oral history interviews, three photographs and one artwork related to Harold Beech (b.1933). He was a schoolboy in Market Rasen, Lincolnshire during the war and experienced an aircraft crash.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Harold Beech and catalogued by IBCC staff.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-03-17
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
One item in this collection has not been published in order to comply with intellectual property law.
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound. Oral history
Still image. Photograph
Still image. Artwork
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Beech, H
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Mary Brophy at Middle Rasen
Description
An account of the resource
Mary Brophy, in summer dress, is sitting on a brick wall; behind the wall is a hedge and tree in full foliage and in front of the wall a grass verge. Mary Brophy remained in the village after the war to go to grammar school. Captioned 'Mary Brophy. An evacuee from Leeds sitting on the bridge, Gallamore Lane, Middle Rasen. Mary lived with Mr and Mrs Swaby'
Additional information about this item has been kindly provided by the donor.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
One b/w photograph mounted on a page
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
PBeechH1702
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Middle Rasen
England--Lincolnshire
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Photograph
childhood in wartime
evacuation
home front
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/2216/40631/BDixonMDixonMv1.1.pdf
0e155ee83b563115a56feaece34b9c11
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Dixon, M
Dixon, Margaret
Description
An account of the resource
Three items. The collection concerns Leading Aircraftwoman Margaret Dixon (b. 1926, 2137383 Royal Air Force) and contains a memoir and photographs. She served in the WAAF and was stationed at RAF Hospital Matlock and RAF Coningsby.
The collection has been loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Heather Raad and catalogued by Trevor Hardcastle.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2022-08-02
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Dixon, M
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Margaret Dixon's account of her early life and service in the Women's' Auxiliary Air Force
Description
An account of the resource
13 handwritten pages, Margaret describes in some detail her early life and service in the WAAF as a nurse.
This item was sent to the IBCC Digital Archive already in digital form. No better quality copies are available.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Margaret Dixon
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1926-09-26
1945
1946-09-26
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Buckinghamshire
England--Cheshire
England--Derbyshire
England--Devon
England--Lincolnshire
England--Staffordshire
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Memoir
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
13 handwritten pages
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
BDixonMDixonMv1
Conforms To
An established standard to which the described resource conforms.
Pending text-based transcription
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
bombing
childhood in wartime
entertainment
evacuation
Gibson, Guy Penrose (1918-1944)
ground personnel
home front
military living conditions
military service conditions
prisoner of war
RAF Coningsby
RAF Halton
RAF Hednesford
RAF hospital Matlock
RAF Metheringham
RAF Wilmslow
training
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1764/30670/SJenkinsonPR1826262v10077-0001.2.jpg
957f9307fec528b1ff24daac4ff4321f
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1764/30670/SJenkinsonPR1826262v10077-0002.2.jpg
6f41bae7cbc5842d13f3b55e1863dde0
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Jenkinson, Peter and Leslie. Peter Jenkinson
Description
An account of the resource
Fifty-three items concerning Peter Jenkinson who served as a flight engineer on 166 and 153 Squadron Lancaster and was killed with his crew on 28 January 1945. Collection contains official and family correspondence, photographs, biographies, newspaper articles, official documents, roll of honour and records of operations.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-08-24
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Jenkinson, LP-PR
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
R.A.F. STATION,
SCAMPTON,
LINCOLN
20.1.45.
Dear Sanchia,
I was so glad to hear that you enjoyed the panto. I am now waiting to hear all about your party. The drawing is of an aeroplane which I used to fly at Picton in Canada. Mr Jenkinson was very pleased with the letter which he received from you. I don’t expect there has been a chance to sail the boat yet. it is snowing here and very cold.
Lots of love
From Daddy
XXXX
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to Sanchia from father
Description
An account of the resource
Glad she enjoyed panto and explains aeroplane picture he sent. Mentions that Mr Jenkinson was pleased with the letter he received from her. Concludes by saying no chance to sail boat yet.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1945-01-20
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page handwritten letter
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SJenkinsonPR1826262v10077
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Lincolnshire
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1945-01-20
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
David Bloomfield
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
childhood in wartime
RAF Scampton
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19963/EValentineUMValentineJRM420728-0001.1.jpg
d1c39eb892fdf9b457c8ea956ebbb188
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1281/19963/EValentineUMValentineJRM420728-0002.1.jpg
f4fb2bd75716fddc22a40976d4b65cc5
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Valentine, John
John Ross Mckenzie Valentine
J R M Valentine
Description
An account of the resource
674 Items. Collection concerns navigator Warrant Officer J R McKenzie Valentine (1251404 Royal Air Force). The collection contains over 600 letters between JRM Valentine and his wife Ursula. It also contains his log book, family/official documents, a book of violin music studies and other correspondence. Sub-collections contain family photographs, prisoner of war photographs and a scrapbook of newspaper cuttings of events from 1942 to 1945.
He joined 49 Squadron in April 1942 and flew 10 operations on Hampdens. The squadron converted to Manchester in May when he completed two further operations. His aircraft was shot down on the Thousand Bomber raid of 30/31 May 1942. Five crew, including him bailed out successfully and became prisoners of war. The pilot and one air gunner were killed when the aircraft rolled over and crashed.
The collection has been donated to the IBCC Digital Archive by Frances Zagni and catalogued by Nigel Huckins.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018-09-06
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Valentine, JRM
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
To Sergeant J.R.M. Valentine,
1251404, British prisoner of War,
Stammlager Luft III, Germany.
From Mrs. J.R.M. Valentine,
Lido, Tenterden Grove,
Hendon, London, N.W.4.
No. 9. July 28th 1942
My darling Johnie,
Do you remember the film that was showing at the Odeon in Leicester Square when you were home of leave last, when I scandalised you by saying in a loud voice that the large picture of the man with a moustache must be you? I have just been to see the film at the local cinema, and enjoyed it intensely – almost too intensely sometimes when it brought home too vividly some of the things you have been through. It made me love and admire you more than ever – you would be terribly embarassed[sic] if you knew just how prud I am of you!
I thought I wasn’t going to be able to get to the cinema this week as Barbara is on duty three of the days and busy the other three, but Mrs. Hazard has very nobly come to my rescue and taken Frances off my hands this afternoon. She came round here at 1.30 while I was still giving Frances her lunch (she had slept late) so I handed the spoon-over to her and she finished administering it while I nipped off. I didn’t stay to see the second film, which looked a fool thing and would have spoilt my impression of the first, so here I am back again at 3.30, enjoying my most peaceful afternoon for months, writing to you, while Frances and Mrs. Hazard are presumably out for a walk. On Thursday David is coming round again to play some of his favourite records on the radiogram and also to have a few more photos taken. He is a very photogenic model, Barbara says, and she wants to take some more for her own amusement – and of course the Hazards are glad enough. Also they have managed to get her some rather anonymous film, which she wants to try out before getting larger quantities. There are some more photos of Frances on the film now in her camera, so I hope to be able to keep you supplied for a bit.
No. 8 letter went off to you on Saturday, with a photo enclosed. I have made a note of which photo I enclose with each letter, so if you report any of them missing according to the numbering, I shall know which photo to send a second time. The actual letter won’t be a great loss, since they only contain idle chatter in any case.
Last night we had a short session down in the shelter. Frances took the whole business with great good humour and didn’t seem to object to being hauled out of bed in the early hours of the morning. Bas was on duty, so we too snuggled down together and I think Frances slept off and on – there wasn’t much racket. Every now and then her little soft hand would creep out and touch my face or arm, and then she would say “Bye-bye” in her enchanting way, and sigh and drop off to sleep again. I must say I enjoyed the whole thing – do you remember those other sessions when we read “The Story of San Michele”, and “Esther Waters”, and when Jane would keep dashing out and barking her defiance to the skies? And the trouble we had to pack our feet into the entrance and to keep them warm, and what an upheaval there was if either of us turned over?
On Sunday Sue Eldred, Mrs. Sansome’s sister, came to lunch to bring us half a dozen eggs from her mother in the country. I very
[page break]
nobly put three of them down into my preserving crock – I’ve got nearly two dozen there now, all saved in ones and twos out of our ration except for these.
Yesterday was the day when Padre Johnson said he might be coming up to town and would look us up, so I had to stay in all afternoon which wasn’t such a bore as it sounds because it was raining. Of course he didn’t show up, but I turned the time to good account by cleaning the silver and – believe it or not – turning out my desk, which is now a model of all a desk should be. Frances kept herself blissfully busy with two of three pudding tins and baking tins of various sizes which she arranged all round her and then beat with a wooden spoon, thus constituting a one-baby orchestra. She bashed various dents in the tins, but I thought it worth it to see her so happy and to be able to get on with my jobs.
I have now got your photograph framed in a sober black narrow wooden frame, with a grey mount, and it is standing on the canteen cupboard in the dining-room together with a small vase of roses.
By this afternoon’s post a letter came from Mrs. Cory, [inserted] 6.30 p.m. [/inserted] of the Manor Farm at Notgrove, announcing that Vera Bowack has given birth to a son – three weeks earlier than expected! She had to be rushed into her nursing home in Cheltenham in a hurry, but apparently everything went off alright. I had promised to lend her Frances’s towelling nappies, since they cost one coupon each to buy, so I had to dash down to town at about 5 p.m. to post the parcel, and sent her a telegram as well. Poor girl, she will have hardly any visitors, because nobody has the petrol to spend. There is one lady in Cheltenham who will visit here, and the rest of us will just have to write her letters. She still has no news of Norman, it is beginning to look a bit hopeless. The baby weighs 6 lbs, which isn’t bad considering what a hurry he was in to arrive, but Mrs. Cory says Vera is upset that he is so small. After all, she is not a large one herself.
Our tomatoes are beginning to look a bit healthier. I have been ruthlessly pinching out all the small shoots and have started to give fertiliser regularly, and each plant now has several fruit set on it, and plenty more coming. I have planted out the few remaining leeks, ‘we must have about 15 dozen now, and the winter greens are looking quite sturdy too’. Since Leslie cut the two lawns, the whole place looks remarkably respectable – pit it won’t remain so! Next year I am not going to bother with broad beans at all, nobody seems keen on them and they invariably get black fly. I think it is much better to concentrate on French beans and peas for the summer, with carrots and onions of course. Let’s hope you will be here to help.
I am reading a history of medieaval [sic] Europe at present, an enormous tome which it will take me months to wade through at my present rate-ile.[sic] 10 minutes before I drop off to sleep at night, but it is very interesting needed, and I was always conscious of a lamentable vagueness about that period of history. I am longing to get your p-o-w number so that I can start sending you books and matter for study. I am hoping for a letter this week as I didn’t get one last, and maybe that will give me the number.
[inserted] I pray constantly that you may be kept healthy in mind & body & be strengthened to get over your special[?] trouble. How is the sense of taste, by the way? Not that you would be missing much, I expect!
With all my love to you, dearest, & a kiss from little Frances. Ursula.
[page break]
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula
Description
An account of the resource
Writes of visits to cinema and of domestic activities. Continues with story of her sister's photographic efforts. Mentions letters she has dispatched with photographs. Writes of spending session in air raid shelter which daughter Frances took in good humour. Continues with news of visitors and catching up with family and friends. Concludes with description of gardening and what she is reading. Hopes to send him books for study.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1942-07-28
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Sue Smith
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page typewritten letter
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EValentineUMValentineJRM420728
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force. Bomber Command
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
Poland
Poland--Żagań
England--London
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1942-07-28
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ursula Valentine
childhood in wartime
prisoner of war
shelter
Stalag Luft 3
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44179/EJohnsGSJohns[GFa]XX1012.jpg
9d5acfaccab12078208f5894879a82e4
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Johns, George Shephard
G S Johns
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-08-01
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Johns, GS
Description
An account of the resource
15 items. The collection concerns (Royal Air Force) and contains correspondence, documents and photographs. He was evacuated during the war.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Hilary Jones and catalogued by Benjamin Turner.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
TELEPHONE No. 58.
Manfield Nursing Home.
Upper Gungate,
Tamworth.
Staffs
Saturday Oct 14th
Dear Grandpa,
Thank you very much for your letter I received this morning and also for the post order for six pence.
Mum was very glad to see me last Sunday.
I arrived quite safely here last Monday morning in a car.
I am doing some practice when I can.
Love from [underlined] George. [/underlined]
[underlined] Love to Billy. [/underlined]
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to George Shephard Johns' grandfather
Description
An account of the resource
A letter to George Shephard Johns' grandfather from George thanking him for his letter and post order. George says his mother was glad to see him.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
George Shephard Johns
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1939-10-14
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1939-10-14
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Staffordshire
England--Tamworth
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Single page hand written letter
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EJohnsGSJohns[GFa]XX1012
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cara Walmsley
childhood in wartime
evacuation
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44171/E[Author]JohnsGS401101-0001.jpg
9da01de2fb20993f76f5844e23d872e2
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44171/E[Author]JohnsGS401101-0002.jpg
adc41285c00d2e949c1511aaa225117a
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44171/E[Author]JohnsGS401101-0003.jpg
7d017bd87d0b37c8d732c35a2d35417a
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Johns, George Shephard
G S Johns
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-08-01
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Johns, GS
Description
An account of the resource
15 items. The collection concerns (Royal Air Force) and contains correspondence, documents and photographs. He was evacuated during the war.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Hilary Jones and catalogued by Benjamin Turner.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
[postmark]
Master Geo: Johns.
21 Barrow Street.
West-Bromwich.
[underlined] Staffs [/underlined]
[page break]
TELEPHONE No. 58.
Manfield Nursing Home
Upper Gungate,
Tamworth.
Friday Nov. / 21 / 40
My dear [underlined] George [/underlined]
I was pleased to get your letter today, but so sorry to hear the news. We send your father [symbol] all of you our deepest sympathy; Roy is very sad about it; [symbol] he wishes you were coming here for your half term holiday, perhaps you [symbol] Brian could have managed it if we had known earlier in the week, by the time you receive this I expect your holiday will be over. I am very pleased your father has a housekeeper who will be kind to you [symbol] Billy, you had an excellent mother [symbol] I’m sure you will all miss her very much. My mother died when I was 18 months old [symbol] when I was young I always envied boys [symbol] girls who had a mother’s love. We were hoping during the summer your father [symbol] mother would have a trip to Tamworth, but this awful war has altered everything for everybody. Tamworth has 500 children evacuated here [symbol] last- Saturday came the same number of mothers
[page break]
[symbol] their children from London who have been bombed out of their homes. The outskirts have had bombs but nearly all of them fell in fields, but Tamworth itself has suffered no damage whatever up to now we get the sirens [symbol] we can hear the A. A. Guns going off at B-Ham [symbol] Coventry. We have 4 beds made up in the cellar [symbol] 2 girls [symbol] my daughters 2 children from London sleep down there it is much better than having to get them up every time the siren goes. Well, now about Roy, he left school last-term (July) [symbol] passed his final Exam, also in his Spanish he gained a Scholarship which has admitted him to B-Ham University; he comes home every night. He has been told by me of the big Professors in Language, that he can take his degree, so now he is an undergraduate studying for French Honours. He will be at the University 3 years I expect, [symbol] when he has passed his Exams he will take a post-in a Secondary School as a Master of Languages. When you see Rhona [symbol] Pauline give them my love [symbol] the news about Roy’s success [symbol] please tell them I will write to them one day; you will be sorry to know Mr Upton died Sept 29th he was 85 years old. he had a good life but we miss him very much.
Mr Tildesley is now an Inspector in a Government Factory about 10 miles from Stafford, he comes home week ends when he can get away we are hoping to see him tomorrow.
Now remember we shall be pleased to have you [symbol] Brian when you can come.
[indecipherable] love to you all.
Yours sincerely nurse
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to George Shephard Johns
Description
An account of the resource
A hand written letter sent to George Shephard Johns from a relative. The letter concerns sending sympathies to George on the death of his mother. The letter also provides general family updates concerning George's relatives.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1940-11-01
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1940-11-01
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Staffordshire
England--Tamworth
England--West Bromwich
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Two page hand written letter with envelope
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
E[Author]JohnsGS401101-0001, E[Author]JohnsGS401101-0002, E[Author]JohnsGS401101-0003
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cara Walmsley
childhood in wartime
evacuation
-
https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/files/original/1916/44178/EFieldFRJohns390906.2.jpg
e3fe64d695fcd123387c3a2ac2ba7133
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Johns, George Shephard
G S Johns
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-08-01
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Johns, GS
Description
An account of the resource
15 items. The collection concerns (Royal Air Force) and contains correspondence, documents and photographs. He was evacuated during the war.
The collection was loaned to the IBCC Digital Archive for digitisation by Hilary Jones and catalogued by Benjamin Turner.
Transcribed document
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading.
Transcription
Text transcribed from audio recording or document
TELEPHONE No. 58.
Manfield Nursing Home,
Upper Gungate,
Tamworth
Wednesday Sept – 6 – [indecipherable] / 39
Dear Mrs [underlined] Johns [/underlined]
Just to say George has arrived safely [symbol] is now with me.
We shall take great care of him so try not to worry about him.
My boy is Head-boy at the Grammar School [symbol] is very pleased to have him.
We are not 5 minutes walk from school. We also have another boy from W. Bromwich Grammar School [symbol] is the same age as George, so I’ve no doubt they will be great chums.
I expect you will be allowed to visit here, if so, we shall be pleased to see you any time.
I think George will be quite happy with us.
Yours sincerely
Florence. R. Field
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Letter to George Shephard John's mother
Description
An account of the resource
Letter to George Shephard John's mother from Florence R Field. The letter informs Mrs Johns that George has arrived and reassures George's mother to not worry.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Florence R Field
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1939-09-06
Temporal Coverage
Temporal characteristics of the resource.
1939-09-06
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Great Britain
England--Staffordshire
England--Tamworth
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Civilian
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Text. Correspondence
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Single page hand written letter
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
EFieldFRJohns390906
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
IBCC Digital Archive
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Cara Walmsley
childhood in wartime
evacuation