“We moved (to Shropshire) in 1940 when I was two...I did see dogfights...we were near Condover airfield which flew Spitfires and Hurricanes...they took off from Condover and they were shooting down all the Stukas. We used to hide in the woods and watch...A Spitfire shot down this plane, it crashed landed in a field. All the farmers with pitch forks captured the German and took him away. We all dived in for bits of aircraft. I was five or six...
“Eric Locke, a V.C. winner, he lived on Lythe Hill at the white house...he shot two down and did victory rolls over the house, for ‘mum and dad’. They moved him to France. He was killed out there, shot down. “I remember the Americans driving by...(we shouted) ‘any gum chum?’ and they’d throw it over the fence. My cousin was evacuated from London. He was what, ten years older than me? So he used to shout...my job was to pick it all up, and sweets, chocolate... “Then we moved to London in time for V.E.day. When I was seven I was up onto my uncle’s shoulders and off to Trafalgar Square for V.J. day...I remember the emence crowds. Coming from the country it was all new and frightening to us...All I knew was a hell of a lot of people were celebrating, but at my age you didn’t know why...” |