remembering ww2
VILLAGE VOICES
In 2020 the research team began a project 'Village Voices' to collect memories of Kettlestonians who lived through WW2. At some stage it is hoped that their voices can be recorded for a sound archive but at the moment this is not possible because of the COVID pandemic.
ROGER TOWNSIN
A garden Anderson shelter
Old map showing location of public air raid shelters in Peterborough
''I was born in January 1940 and so the war was the backdrop to the first five years of my life. We lived on the northern outskirts of Peterborough where the countryside was only a short walk away and on Saturday mornings cattle would be driven along the road to market near the city centre. My earliest war related memory is being taken from my cot, wrapped in a blanket and under a starlit sky carried down to the Anderson shelter at the bottom of the garden. This had been constructed by my father and our neighbour and the image of the two families sitting together in candle light is still very vivid. I am fairly sure that this must have been in February 1942 when Peterborough suffered its heaviest bombing raid. We also had a Morrison shelter in the house which was allocated to us as I was a new born baby.It was permanently set up with cushions and blankets ready for use but it never was.There was also a public air-raid shelter built on the road just down from us but that was never used either. It was built of brick and had a thick concrete roof.''
The Bombing of Peterborough
The sirens were sounded in the city a total of 650 times during the Second World War. It is strange that Peterborough was chosen as a safe area for the evacuation of children from London because the city was among the first towns to have an air raid, this was on 8th June, 1940, when several small bombs fell on the city centre and some shops and the town swimming pool were damaged.
Anti-aircraft rocket launchers Fulbridge Road Peterborough
The marshalling yard at Peterborough having been hit by a bomb
THE EAST COAST MAIN LINE
''Straight opposite our house was a field of anti-aircraft rocket launchers which were there to protect an important marshalling yard on the East Coast Main Line that was not far away. Behind us and close to the the garden was a mobile anti-aircraft gun and barrage balloon. The rocket launchers were never fired but the gun might have been when a stray German plane flew over our house and came down a few miles away.''
VISITING LONDON
''I had an aunt who lived in Loughton in Essex and on one occasion while staying with her we went into the centre of London and I can remember the trolley buses and Oxford Street being paved with wooden blocks. We visited Selfridges and that was my first experience of using a lift. I can also picture the bomb damage all around with destroyed buildings boarded off from the pavements.''
Oxford Street in WW2
A POLISH GUEST
''For a short time we had a Polish cavalry officer lodged with us and I remember handling his pistol with boyish interest. We had a French bayonet dated 1868 and one evening he picked it up and said it was similar to the sword he had and was his only weapon when facing the German invasion. Sadly we never knew what became of him. He had already experienced traumatic change to his life and I hope he survived the Stalinist purge.''
The station at Burgh le Marsh
LINCOLNSHIRE
''In 1944 my father was posted to Orby in Lincolnshire on air sea rescue duties and we had relatives living in Burgh le Marsh where he was billeted. My mother, sister and I stayed with them for a few days and I clearly recall walking what must have been nearly two miles to the station to catch the train. It was early in the morning and still very dark with absolutely no lighting anywhere.The image of sitting in the compartment looking out onto a gloomy platform with heavily shrouded lights as wafts of steam drifted by is still undiminished.
While at Burgh we visited Skegness and walked down the road to the sea front where the beachwas covered with barbed wire and scaffolding. In spite of it being sunny the town had a strange other worldly feel about it, shut down and deserted, and that is an abiding sense I have of many places during this time.
Where we were staying there was a photo on the grand piano of a very smart RAF officer.Although its significance didn’t fully register with me then it was of the son who had been killed the year before while training to become a fighter pilot ''
TRAGEDY OF WAR
''The only other death that had relevance to our family was of my father’s best friend. They had been called up together by the RAF in June 1939: my father went to Wittering on fighter control and his friend became an engineer navigator in bomber command. On his 30th and last mission in April 1945 the plane was shot down over France and he was killed with the rest of the crew; hearing news of it was the only time I saw my father in tears.''
OTHER MEMORIES
''There are many other memories which were just part of our daily lives. The house windows crisscrossed with anti shatter tape, heavy blackout through out, walking home from school in the dark as it was double daylight saving, lying in bed with the adjacent wardrobe door wide open to protect me from blast my mother said, the sound of aeroplane engines which even now I can identify as a Lancaster bomber or Spitfire without seeing them. And the wail of an air-raid siren takes me back in an instant to those foreboding moments.''
A WW2 black out poster
courtesy of IWM
VE DAY
''When VE day was declared our neighbour burst into the house shouting “The war is over”. A huge bonfire was built in the local recreation ground and in the evening it blazed into a black night sky and cracked as bullets exploded in the intense heat.''
Street party in Peterborough to celebrate VE day 1945