bomb alley No 20

                                                           Bomb Alley Kid No 20



These doodle bugs as we now call them, are really likly to breakdown peoples  spirits because you never know when they might be comming over, as there are no warnings with these things you only hear that crackling engine,so it pays to listen  day and night very hard to hear them and hope it dosnt stop anywhere near were you are.
            My Dad has some bad news for me and mum,he says that during the night  our house has been hit with a bomb,and is in a mess,also he say that Uncle Jacks wife is lucky not to have been killed,because she was staying over night,luckly she slept in the front bedroom, and it was the rear of our house that cought the worst of it,so she is O K but the bed was covered in plaster board and glass, which also  hit the bead board so she has been very lucky,I ask how my Rabbits are,but Dad say he is sorry to have to say that they were killed in the blast,and the hutches were blown to pieces, this upsets me and I cry,as I loved my pets,anyway Dad says we will have to come back and rescue as mutch as we can from the house,so its into the horse trap, and Aunty Flow takes us over to what was our house,.when we arrive I cant beleive what I see there is rubble everywhere, and big cracks in the walls, and  hardly any roof left,our shelter is O K so we would have been O K had we been sleeping there.Dad says he will burrow one of the works vans so that we can remove as much of the furniture as is O K.Uncle Jack says we can use one of the sheds he has to keep the furniture in,all my toys  that were kept in a big chest are all O K so thats good on my part.although I cant see me playing wtih them for sometime now.once we  have saved as much as is possible, and taken up to the farm, and stored,My Mum is very upset and cryes all the time, so dad puts his armes around her and says everything will be  O K as we are all well, and safe, and everything else can be replaced in the future,the pretty young girl that lived with the old  lady accross the road from us was killed,they had run under the stairs  as they had no time to get to their shelter,but a piece of  shrapnel from the the bomb which damaged our house  had passed though the bricks at the front of her house and then through the starcase and decapitated her, and yet the old lady had survived with no injury,I really cant beleive she is dead,she was such a lovely girl,but as my Dad says unfurtunaly that is what war does, and can be very unfair.but then war isnt fair anyway
           Now we have no house we have nowhere to stay, but my Aunt Flo says we must come and stay with them at their farm, my Mum dosnt really want to but we havnt anyway to go.so have no  option,it also means that I will have to go to a new school,where my cousins go.in Hales Place Nr. Canterbury,I really dont like this as it means I have to leave all my friends back home, and make new ones, but I have to go to school, so Mum has  made an appiontment to see the head teacher at this schoo lto find out what class I will be put into,this means I have to do a little test,and will have to start in a lower class than my other school at home in Sturry.which was class 4 now I will be in Class 3.  I am not shure that I like this school anyway,but it is a pretty little school  if you like that kind of thing so I will start on the monday with Johny and Ceril my cousins  who go there,but after a time I begin to settle in, and make new friends,some of the boys and girls come up to the farm and we play in the woods on uncles farm,there is one  pretty girl that sends me little love notes,and asking me to meet her I have never had a girl friend as such, so we do meet in the woods, or in the meadow, where we kiss and cuddle,I begine to have feelings for this girl that I never had before with any other girl,but I am now 12 years old,and when Jean Butler and I were playing I was only  about 10 or so,My cousins also have girl friends  as well,we also  try smoking, and buy cigerettes to take  to the woods, and smoke we buy these from our pocket money  my cousins  are usualy sick, but I quite like it, and am enjoying them.and want to appear all grown up like my dad, and his friends,I meet with my girl friend at our usual  meeting place in the woods, after school and after tea,but we have been seen by some man who has told my uncle who in turn tells my Dad,this man has also told the girls Dad saying we were up to no good,.and were only partly dressed,there is no way we were like this, but he is lieing,but you cant argue with addults,so we both get a really hard telling off, and are told we must never  meet again except at school,I recon he was a nasty man  just wanting to get us into trouble,but it did put paid to our lovley little romance..pity because I really did love her in a schoolboy way.
         .

Bomb Alley No 19

                                                               Bomb Alley No 19



My Uncle Richard has at last contacted my Mum and Dad to ask if if will be able to help with the harvesting at his farm, we were going to help before but it got postponed,anyway it will be another week off school,which dosnt matter very much as we seem only to play games anyway in the shelters,so not much to lose.My dad is on duty for that week so we may as well stay with Uncle Ritchard,,so we pack suit cases with clothes that we will need ,Uncle Ritchard  is sending his pony and trap over to pick us up,this is something new to me  because I have never ridden in a pony and trap before,the pony is named Daisy and is quite small compared to some horses  but just right for the trap,the trap has two big wheeles and you enter it by a small door at the back it dosnt have a roof or anything like that so is open to the weather, it has small seats inside like bench seats to sit on,My aunt Flow has come over to sturry to pick us up, as Uncle Ritchard is getting  his to big Dray horses ready to harnes up to the hay cart these horses are really big and powerfull,this why they are used to plough the field, and pull the hay carts,once we are all aboard Daisy and her little cart, we set off to go back  to to the farm,Daisy trips along with a clip clop,, clip clop and seems to enjoy  pulling the little cart at a fair pace.so we are soon  at uncles Farm,we are met by my two cousins Johny and Cyril,Johny is the same age as me, born in december, and I was born in January  and Cyril is slightly younger by a year or two.when we arrive at the farm we find sandwiches, and tea for us to eat,when we are out in the filelds,so its like a big picknick because there are other farm hands as well who are there to help gather in the hay,once we have worked the morning,we settle down on the hay bales  to eat our lunch,they make good seats then.once we finnish our lunch we have to start again because there is a lot to get through before nightfall,we manage to clear one of the field  but there is another one to do tommorrow, so My Aunt Flo say we should stay over for the night as planned and we can get a good start in the morning,My Dad is on duty anyway so it will be O K because they get food delivered to them at the station anyway,During the night the sirens sound yet again for another air raid,but it seems this time the bombers seem to concentrate  on Canterbury itsself,from my Uncles farm up on the hill above Canterbury we can hear the bombs decending and the explosions from them,we can see that Canterbury seems to be nothing but fire,we think the bombers have mistaken Canterbury City for the Buffs Barracks just outside the city but they are not on target,,because the Barracks are east of the city by about  two miles,at last the bombing is over and the planes start to return back towards France and their bases, but in the morning all we can see is smoke and flames still burning  in the  city. But we have to be out and  harvesting the hay so we have brakfast consisting of bacon and eggs  with Tomatoes with bread and if you want it milk,but I stick to tea.,I dont like milk eversince my Uncle Jack squirted milk  direct from one of his cows into a glass, and told me to taste it,and  it,tasted terrible to me so never bother with it again.Uncle Jack said it would be good for me,but I felt sick most of the day,we get milk at school but I give mine to anyone who wants it.Now we meet the other farm members who have come to help get the hay in and they say that many people have been killed and injured from the bombing last night in Canterbury,they say that the people who were in in a big shelter in the top end of the city were killed when a bomb exploded on the shelter with a direct hit.they say the Cathedral wasnt touched.but the bomb that hit the shelter passed between the towers of the Cathedral so said a warden that was on the tower.It will take a while to find all the people  that are burried in the rubble and in the shelter that was hit.but work must continue for us, so we start to get on with the harvest.in the early evening we are all finnished so my aunt says she will take us back home in the jogging cart again in the morning.but later on  we hear a strange enging niose in the skyand look up to see what it is,it just looks like a small aircraft being shot at by some of our fighters we  see that it must have been hit because there is flame and moke  comming from the rear of it.and may be this why itsounds like a crackling noise.then the fighters beakaway and the ack ack guns open up on it,you can se the shell burst around it none hit it we  begin to say that the pilot  deserves to to get away this time as he has been through a lot of flack and machine gun fire he must be a very brave pilot,but then the engine stops and the plane just dives toward the grond,and we hear a dull explosion away in the distance,and guess the pilot must be dead, anyway he was German so not to worry,later we hear that the Germans have a new type of bomb that flys on its own with a jet engine, and when it runs out of fuel  it just dives into the ground or City some of our fighters tried to shoot it down over Kent but it is able out run them speed wise.we now know it is what we call a doodle bug..so we wont get an air raid worning so mutch as it flyes  faster than the Radar can pick it up { so they say that is.}they cause a large amount of damage as they are full of explosives. and can wipe out large areas at one go,so if you have to hope that you are not near when the engine stops.

Bomb Alley 18

                                                                      Bomb alley kid No 18


On the news to-day they are saying that we have landed troops on the  French Beaches, and so far have made good progress against the
German Forces,also in the news papers they show a map of France and draw a line on the map to show how much we have advanced inland,so people are now hoping that this time we shall win against the Germans,and the war will soon come to an end., but listning to the radio  it seems things are not going that well, and the Germans seem to be holding us back,and we are taking heavy casualties,we hear from the local people that many are comming in through Dover and Folkestone sea ports.but according to the news we are still doing well,my Dad hears from a lot of the locals that there is a downward trend to the war against  the German troops.and the maps in the papers tend to bear this out with the line now being pushed back.toward the coast again.this is really serious as it shows that we are not containing  the Germans  in France,.and we are being pushed back to-wards the beaches at Dunkirk my Dad says that when he is down at Dover and Folkestone, he can see great clouds of smoke over on the French coast and even hear Gun fire in the distance,also you see a lot of German planes  diving down.Next day when Dad comes home from work dilivering down in Dover and Deal,there are many boats going over to France to try and help get our troops off the beaches in  Dunkirk every  available boat is being used, even some rowing boats,and the old feries boats,he says its really a terrible situation for us  to be in,our Navy is also doing its best to  ward off  the german fighters and bombers who are pounding our troops with bombs and  bullets,unfortunatly the  Navy cant get close enough inshore to allow soldires to swim  to them,but the small boats  can help to get the troops to the Navy Boats that is for those who can be helped, there are even pleasure boats  ferrying soldires home from over there,.and  one pleasure boat has come  all the way  from Scotland, and is called the Waverley { this boat is still running to-day in Scotland },but it appears that we are taking heavy losses over  on the Beaches in France.those who are wounded are brought back and are  being looked after at the big house across from my house,until they can be taken to the hospital,most of the men { or boys } as thats all they seem to be, one day we see a young soldier sitting on the grass outside the big house his hands over his face,and is crying out loud, and sobbing,we approach him  and can also see he is shaking as well,we ask one of the soldiers that we know why he is like that he tells us he is  frightend as he has seen such terrible  things over there on the beaches.and he is suffering from what they call shell shock,we ask the if we might go and try to talk to him,and our friend say we could try if we like,but he will be difficult to approach, so our friend  takes us over to see him,and tells to him that he has some friends  to see him  { meaning us . } and tells us to let him make the first move if he does,  and not to mention  anything about the war at all,.so we are left to sit beside  him  and just wait for him to make the first contact,all we say is hello,I think he must be about the same age as my  friend Raymond who was in the R A F. about 17 or 18. years old.he eventualy does say hello   and wipes some tears  away,I have nevr seen a man cry at all let alone a soldier,we stay for awhile but he dosnt say anything more,so we tell him we will come and see him to-morrow.after school.
              We do manage to get to school in the morning but again the old siren goes yet again so its  into the old shelter at school untill the siren sounds the all clear then we  are allowed to leave and go home.so after tea we go over to see if we can see the soldier that we were with yesterday,and yes he is sitting on the steps of the house,he seems a little  better this time, and even says hello to us, we say he looks a lot better, and  he  says he is going home on sick leave .for two weeks,so thats good news for him,one of the other soldiers say they have never been so scared in their lives,as the bombs and bullets were comming down like rain over there, and thought they were all going  die as many of the others were killed on the beaches and in the sea.this is not  good news for Britain as it looks like the Germans are winning again
and could follow  across the chanel but,for some reason they dont, some people say it is because the Chanel sea  at this time is too rough or  they may be building up for a big push to invade us,so for now we are  O K..I hope, Dad and Mum say not to worry we will be O K

Bomb Aleey No 17

                                                                      Bomb Alley Kid No 17


One day my dad comes home from work,he tells us that the Germans are fireing big shells accrooss the chanel ,and they are landing  in and around Dover one of the troubles with these are there are no warnings just a sudden explosion.so peop[le are a bit on edge,as they dont know when the next one will be or where,we hear that one  landed quite close to Canterbury,they say about  six miles away.but I dont know where.but this means it must have travelled about thirty miles accross the channel to reach that far,I know if you stand on the top cliffs  at Dover you can see  the French coast outline,which we know is only twentyone miles away.One evening when I come home from school,Mrs Rose is in my house  { she is the mother of Raymond } and she is crying her heart out,Mum say I should go out to play  with some of my pals,and will call me to come in later,I wonder what the trouble is  or what can be wrong,but I go and call on Derek and Roger and Jean and Pam butler and we  play at soldiers untill much later when my Mum calls me in for tea,then I ask her why Mrs Rose was so upset and crying its then that Mum tells me that Ramond has been killed,apparently  his squadron where taking off on a night raid to Germany,when they had flown up into an American Squadron  overhead,  and had collided with these other bombers, and had blown up with of some other bombers, American and British all being killed,as they were all loaded with bombs,I am really sad  on hearing this as I really looked on Ramond as a big brother,and rember him saying he coulnt wait to go on a sortie,but he never even made it out of England  or had the chance to go on a raid,or fire his guns in anger at the Germans,This actualy upsets me as well, because I rember him in his uniform, and how pleased he was to get his wings, this also makes me cry, and is not a very good day for anyone who knew him.I am beginning to realise that war is not as exciting as I thought it was,what with the children being killed in Sturry who were friends, and now Raymond,I cant get it into my head that I will never see him again.or anyone of my school friends that were killed in the bombing of Sturry.

BombAlley Kid No 16

                                                                  Bamb Alley Kid No 16


Next day while we are waiting for my uncle to collect us from home, we hear a terrible screaming sound of an aircraft diving,for a minute we think its a dive bomber because there is one almighty bang, and our house shakes, when we run outside to see what has happened we can see a cloud of smoke riseing from up the road,so me my mum, and  some of my pals run out  to the road  and can see a fire  burning away up near the Convent on the road to Margate and Ramsgate.also we can hear lots of smal cracks going off these are bullets exploding,  what we now know is that a plane  has crashed in the field,the soldiers have already arived at the site,and warn us to keep our distance,as the cracks that we hear are bullets going off in the fire,one soldier has already been hit in his leg we are told, I wonder what kind of plane it was, and are told it was a spitfire,and had just dived straight down into the ground after being shot down by a messersmitt,people say he had hit the ground so fast that the sound of his engine could  still be heard after he hit the ground and blown up.once the fire has been put out we can see a big hole like a bomb creater where it went in,later on in the afternoon they start to dig out whatever they can find,and people are collecting bits  to hand back to the soldiers,one little pld lady that I am near asks one of the soldiers if she can keep a small piece of what she thinks is  a part of the uniform of the pilot,but the soldier says no after looking at it, because it is a piece of skin,and look like a bit of ear.I guess there isnt very much of him left after that explosion,and impact.  We retrn to our house later and find that my Uncle  had not come to collect us anyway,so me and  my mates go to play after dinner in the field. .Next day we go up to see the hole that the plane made and find the soldiers are digging bits and pieces out from the site,I guess they are looking for what ever might be left of the pilot, they seem to have dug down about ten  or fifteen feet but looks like all they can find is twisted metal,this bit of ground is an old roman  field, and they say that there are roman soldiers burried there,if this is true the he has crashed  in a old roman Cementry, how queer that is, as it will be his last resting place.The hole where he crashed has never been filled in,and in the summer months a lot of wild daisies grow all around the edge of the pit as if its a proper grave.{ weird. } and this goes on every year.The bodies from the German plane that we saw crash near broad Oak are burried in the cemetry oppisite my home,and I ask my Mum why they are burried far away in the top right hand corner of the cemetery out of the way,with small little crosses of wood.,and Mum say this is unconsecrated ground,and not blessed by a minster or priest, I ask why, and mums says its becouse they are heathen people. and not Christians,this to my way of thinking is not a very Christian attitude,because after all they are people and rembering the German Pilot that came down in Uncle Jacks  field he was quite a nice man. and someone must love these men. even if they are German.I even ask the Vicar, and he said because they were evil souls they cannot be burried in concentrated gound which has been blessed  by a minister.or priest, as they are not christian.this makes me wonder rabout the saying by Christ when he was hanging on the cross, as the Bible tells us that he was said to have said,{ father forgive them as  they know not what  they do } so can we not say the same about these pilots..this makes me wonder about some of things in the Bible that we are ask to believe.
         

Bomb Alley Kid No 15.

                                                              Bomb Alley kid No 15
 

I am quite supprised that he is a man just like my dadand he seems quite  a nice man, but he appeares to be a little worried when the soldiers start to arive,they have come over from the searchlight company over near the woods.the soldiers throw a ring around the plane,and one of the soldiers climbs  into the cockpit,and the german pilot says to the sargent incharge to tell the man in the cockpit not to touch any of the buttons
because the guns on the plane are fully loaded,and have not been fired,you can see this is true as the covers over the  the guns are still intact,but the sargent seems to  ignore his advice,when suddenly there is a burst of cannon  shot from the plane,we all jump away with fright but luckly no one was in the line of fire from the cannon which fires through the nose cap of the propeller,had it been the wing guns  it would have killed anyone standing in front luckly there were only one or two soldiers in front forming the circle around the plane,and I guess the bullet from the cannon went between them without touching any of them,the German just looked at the seargent as if to say you fool what did I say to you I deresay he also thought I have left one idiot Hitler only to find another fool here in England.perhaps he wondered if all of us  were just as stupid,I must say it made some of us ashamed to be English.He was then taken off in one of the army lorries which had arrived at the field,we are told to leave by the  sargent, so after all that excitement we have to return to the work of collecting the hay,but there is still a dog fight going on above us with the fighters.We have to work untill it is too dark to see very well,but will return to-morrow to carry on with collecting the hay, but once again the
sirens go to say there is another raid imminent,but we  just  have to carry on getting the hay in,whilst we are workin we do hear the sound of heavy aircraft approaching, we look up to see Many German bombers comming over,and we can see the  German fighters weaving in and out between the bombers to proctect them,the grown ups wonder if we should take some kind of cover untill they pass over, but there seems to be many many bombers,mostly Junkers it  seems that there are hundreds of them,as they seem to fill the sky,then we  see other fighters come and these seem to be mostly Hurricans and Spitfires who sweep out from the sun at the back of the Germans, and they start to weave in and out after the Messersmits ,we watch as this fight goes on,and see one or two bombers with smoke comming from them,so they must have been hit.
the German fighters realise they are under attack,so they break away to intecept our chaps,our figher planes are out numbered,I must admit I have not seen so many german planes at one time.we can see little puffs of smoke from ack ack guns  shells exploding among the bombers,some are hit some seem to get through O K.  

Bomb alley kid No 14

                                                             Bomb Alley Kid  14

To day is the funeral of one of our school friends killed in the Sturry Bombing,He is to be buried in the little church in Fordwich,so we will walk down to the church for the service, and internment,on our way we have to go through Sturry or what is left of it,I have seen bomb creaters before but they are usualy small maybe 12 -15 ft accross compared. b ut the ones in Sturry must be at least 40 to 50 ft diameterand are now full of water so they look like ponds,there ar many opiples of bricks and wood which used to be houses and shops of the villiage,where once we bought our groceries,  after the service in Fordwich and come home my Mum say that my Uncle Jack is commimg back to help with the farm,he has been driving buses in london during the war,and has married a girl from the west end of London,and thinks it better  and safer to bring her home to help with the farm. her name is Jean and she will live with us I must admit she is really very pretty,she also wears high heel shoes, and nylon stockings,probbaly bought on the black markett as no one we know can get nylon stockings .and  fancy clothes,my Mum says she is really not  a girl to take up farming,, or settle down to country life.
         My Dad has to be on duty most night now with the other men,untill late of night their building where they keep the fire engine  is at  the moment a makeshift mortuary Dad says its weird knowing there are still some of the bodies in the other little room  next to theirs,but there is  a
funnyside to this, as the electric meter is in this room where the bodies are,and during the evening the lights go out,this is because you have to put money into it every so often to keep it going,and the meter is down the other end of the room,so someone will have to pass down betwen the bodies to reach it, and they only have a torch to find the way to the meter between the corpses,this makes it rather ghostly, so they decide to  cut cards to see who goes.to the meter and put the money in it but eventualy the bodies are moved out to be burried and layed to rest.poor souls
 .      Gradualy things are getting back to normal,we can now  get back to going to school as we could not  go owing to all the disruption caused by the bombing.I have been to Canterbury with my Mum a few times on the bus and looked around Barrets the the big  toy shop in Canterbury  near the Westgate Towers,and sometimes Mum buys me a Dinky Toy.one day when we get home Raymond is home on leave,  he look great in his R A F uniformand he has half wings over his top pocket this shows he is a Navigater come Airgunner,this is different for a pilot as he has complete wings over his pocket.Rayomnd say he cant wait to have a go at the German bombers, and fighters should he get the chance, I wish I could join up as well, and fly the big bombers or fighters that we see going over to bomb Germany,Raymond says he will get me a set of wings so that my Mum can sew them onto my jacket, this would be great.
        Uncle Jack has ask Mum and Dad if we can come up to the farm to-morrow, and help to harvest the hay,and corn so next day we cycle up to give a hand,this is good fun, as sometimes I am aloud to drive the tractor that tows the trailer on which we put the hay.I am too small to be able to reach the top of the hay on the trailer with the pitchfork also it pretty heavy to lift for me.altough there ar still a few dog fights going on during the day we have to keep working as the harvest must be brough in and stored in his barn,so we are able to watch the fights in the air between  the German s and our men.One aferrnoon while we are still working up at the farm we are stopped to have something to eat and drink we hear and see a Messersmit we notice that he is getting lower and lower and not going very fast also there is a Spitfire flying very low  as if he is landing on the Messersmit to our amazement the German isnt firing any of his guns,and really he could shoot at us as we would be easy targets out in the field,we can see that he will crash in the next field if he dosnt pull up quick,but he dosnt and does what we call a belly flop landing in the next field to ours,all the men, and us begin to run to see what  has happened to him,by the time we reach him he is getting out of the planes cockpit meanwhile the Spitfire has returned and does his victory roll then come back yet again, and waves to the German pilot,who waves back to him this is something  most unusual.I have never been so close to a plane that is still in the air, and the noise is terrific at that low hight.meanwhile the German Pilot put up his hands  in the serender attitude,He look really grand in his uniform which is a greyish in coulour but blueish,with a peak cap,when one of the men approach him he speaks in perfect English and say he has come to serender to the English as he is finnished with the silly man called Hitler,he thn goes into his cockpit and takes out a siutcase that will do him while he is a prisoner in England,He also cuts with a penknife  the swastiker from the tailplane,and gives it to one of the men,also he hands over his luger pistol to one of the others,warning them that it is loaded and to be carefull.wiith it.I am supprised that he is Just like my Dad not in looks, but is a normal man, and seems very nice.not a monster like I thought all Germans were.

Bomb Alley No 12 & 13.

                                                              Bomb alley No 12


We now have another new thing in one of the field,this is a barrage balloon which they raise and lower,these are suposed to prevent, low flying aircraft, but all they seem to do is present targets for the Messersmits who shoot them down,Dad says in Dover they  have a saying we  put them up you shoot them down,The army have now put  a searchlight in one of my grans fields near to the wood, and the searchlight crew have a brengun  for protection not that its that good as when we are up to collect eggs, and to clean out the chickens houses A German fighter dives down the searchlight beam,and opens fire which puts out the light.that was exciting,and something to be seen,its funny how we seem to forget how dangerous things are, and seem to except life to be like this.luckly no soldiers were hurt because they ran into their bunkers.We boys now have another interest, and this is to go out into the field,down by the railway, and dig out the incendiary  bomb finns that stick up in the mud or soft ground.we  then swap these for old bullet shells or pieces of shrapnel from the bombs, these are put into a bag and saved for a man to collect as these bits are melted down and made into other things for the war effort,some times we find an incendiary bomb that has not gone off,so we unscrew the bottom and take out the powder,and set it alight.if Mum or Dad knew this they would probbaly have a fit.then if you pollish the aluminium case of the bomb it shines really nice.I keep mine in the coal shed attached to our house,on a shelf.

                                                                       bomb alley No 13


          To day is the day of the birthday party down in Sturry,but as some of us are not aloud to go we can only wish her a happy birthday and hope they have a good party that night and all goes well..After the school bell goes we collect our schoolbags and make our way home for tea.after tea we are going over to the big house to see the soldiers, and clean some badges for them,then perhaps we will have a game on the truck,we all hope we shall have a quiet night as we havnt had much sleep of late,Mum and Dad recon we can sleep in the house to-night so that will make a change to sleep in my own bed instead of the one in the shelter,so after cleaning some badges, and playing on the cart that Dad made, its time for bed,anyway its dark now at nigh, so you cant really play outside.We have just finnished tea, when the siren go off again so it looks like another night in the shelter yet again.so its collect the gasmasks, and bedding,and make our way down to the shelter,after awile we can hear the guns again and planes flying over head on their way to London yet again.so we know they will be comming back in about a couple of hours time,so we play cards and do jigsaws, anything to pass the night away.To- day is the18 November1941,and it must have been around eight oclock when we hear a very very low aircraft, and we think it may be crashing, then we hear gunfire which is drowned out by one massive explosion followed by another,we wait to hear anymore because usualy they drop six bombsor  which is called a stick of bombs, but no more come,except for things  falling on the shelters outer door.Dad says he thinks its bricks and things comming down, and that those bombs must have been very close,he hopes it isnt Mr and Mrs Butlers house accross the field.from us, then we can hear something like rain comming down on the shelter door.so Dad lifts the shelter door, to have a look,when he looks down at us again his face is coverd in black spots of soot,he thinks it is further down the road, as he could see fire glowing from that direction,then the air raid warden come to our shelter and tell Dad they need the fire engine, and water tank, and any one who can help,as its Sturry that has been hit by two massive bombs,so Dad has to leave, and just tells us to stay in the shelter for the rest of the night.and he will see us in the morning. now the Greman Bombers are comming back from raiding London,so we are worried that they will see the fires,in the villiage and drop any bombs they have left,I am glad that it was not Derek and Allen house, and that its O K  ,My Dad didnt come home in the morning and we hope he is O K,then  a warden comes and tells us that we cannot go to school to- day,because  of all the work that is going on in Sturry,with fire engines, and ambulances, and military vehicles everything is needed to help in the villiage,and  the roads are closed,eventualy my Dad comes home for a short brake,and a rest,he say its terrible, most of Sturry has been raised to the ground and there are very few  houses still standing,all night he and the others have been helping to recover boddies from the rubble,and are trying to find others who may be burried,alive so he must go back to help,after eating something,Mum say he should rest.but Dad says  he must get back to help find people, everyone is needed. After he has worked for two days in the villiage,he says that they think it was two land mine bombs, which usualy are dropped by parachute, and are exploded above ground on their way down.these boms are really big so this would account for the devistation.one had apperantly dropped on the Canterbury side of the villiage, and the other had dropped on the eastside. so the combined  blast of these two bombs had done damage covering a quarter of a mile and had left two very very large bomb craters,each side of the villiage.My Mum asks dad about the birthday party,he says this was one of the terrible things they had to cope with,as some of the boys and girls, and their parents had all been killed,so far they had removed twelve boddies from that area,and are still searching,not knowing how many were there at the party  was hard to do.but dont know if they were all to do with the party,and could be from other houses.Dad say thank God me and some of my pals  didnt go, but terrble for those children who did, and their  parents,.there will be a few less playmates in school when we eventualy go back.as yet we have no idia when this might be.When most of the boddies have been recovered, Dad says that there is not enough room in the little Mortuary to place them,so some of the dead have bean taken to the little fire station in Westbere,which is really the villiage hall, and where they keep the fire car and trailer,I overheard Dad telling my Mum that  one of the awfull thing that he had to do in some cases was to break arms and legs in some cases to be able to remove the boddies from the wreckage, and some were children.this upset many of the workers, and also my Dad.

Bomb Alley Kid No 11

         bomb alley kid No 11

At school next day it was all the talk among the boys and girls,also it was one of the girls  or boys I dont rember who but we were ask if  we would like to come to her birthday party on the Saturday evening,but because me, and some of the other boys and girls lived some way away our parents said it was too risky to let us go,especialy in an evening as we would have to walk home about a mile to get home,One of my school pals called Len,lived down in a villiage called Fordwich,  so I presume he wont be allowed to go either, because his home in Fordwich  is about  one and a half miles away,so no one who lived that distance away would not be going but a few of our class friend who lived in or around Sturry would be going,one of  the boys who lived in Fordwich I beleive was allowed to go,I think he was older than us anyway.
              Once again that night the siren go off again warning of another raid. so again  Mum Dad and me have to move out of our nice cosy beds in the house, and back into the old  shelter down the garden, later that night we her the drone of the  bombers again going to bomb London,so we know that it will be sometime  before they return having been turned back because of the guns at Blackheath, if they are hit or damaged they will return, and drop their bombs  on their way back to Gremany,which means that Kent will get another load of bombs  dropped on it which were meant for London,Mostly they fall in fields around our part,and to-night will be no exception,shure enoughwe hear the bombers  approaching so out come the boufourt  guns on the lorries,and we can hear them fireing away in our road, they sound like  bombs but if you watch them you can see the tracers shells shoot up into the sky sometimes its hard to tell bombs from guns,but there is one bang that is too close for comfort and then another so Dad closes the shelter door,and we hear things  hiting on the shelter door. then we hear a tapping on our shelter door,so dad opens it up when he does this it looks like daylight because all the marshes are on fire,which has been caused by incendery  bombs, and the man who knocked on our shelter door is one of Dads firemen, and they need to use the fire engine that Dad drives to help put out the fires,so Dad has to go, but his face is covered in black soot when he looks back into our shelter,Dad has to go so he leaves me and Mum in the safty of the shelter and goes off with the other man to get their fire engine and trailer.not that they can do very much because there is only a lane down to the marshes, and I dont see the car getting very far on this.When Dad returns home later the next day after fighting the fire all night he is tired out and coverd in mud and wet through,he says that some men have come in from Fordwich but he says how they crossed the River Stour he has no idia.but they have. We dont have a bathroom in our house so Mum has to boil the water in a big copper bowl,on the gas cooker, and get  the big galvanised bath tub which we bathe in when we get a chance.while Dad has a bit of a rest,once Dad has rested, and had his bath he goes for a sleep although we have fire places in every, room we have on big fireplace in the kitchen and  that has to be cleaned with blacklead like a pollish only for fireplaces,then you have to clean out all the ashes from the previous fire before we can light another,but if we can keep the fire going we can usualy just top it up with coal and keep it going all next day.Dad has to go to his work somethime the next day to deliver flour around the villiages in and around Kent.Dereks Dad has also to go to work to deliver the vegtables, and such to grocershops..

Bomb Alley No 10

                                                                              Bomb alley kid No 10

One of my pals  Roger goodman had been over at the soldiers,when the siren sounded, and was  going to go home,he  had seen the aircraft so he had taken shelter behind one of the big trees around the  big house before crossing the road  to get to his home, and he said he had seen the bomb hit the pavement, and bounce before exploding with a big flash of light and a bang,at this point I looked down the lane to see my Mum being supported by my Dad comming up from their allotment down at the railway,and we all think that she has been hurt or hit by a bullet,Dad says she is O K and is just in shock because the bullets from the planes had spayed over the top of them,but my Mum had started to run,and Dad had to push her down onto the  ground and hold her there,because he said if the pilots had seen two figures runing away they would have done their best to shoot them up, he said the worst thing anyone  can do is get up and run,because you are an easy target.I was relieved that my Mum was O K,But the next thing is to go to the house that was blown up,now this house was made  from wood and  brick so it had folded up like a pack of cards but no one had been seriously hurt,but there was a funnyside to this because when my Dad said to the man he could take off his tin helmet he said  no,as he could feel the hot blood running down his head and shoulders and face and said  he thought his helmet was keeping his brain in.his skull, as he had been hit on the head with something heavy and large, granted his helmet had a dent in it but what he thought was blood was  hot water from the water tank in the roof of his house so it had a happy ending in this case.The women stayed behind to help  clear up the mess,and help the women whose house it was to find clothes and toys from the rubble.the men cleared as much rubble as they could but by this time the soldiers from the the big house had also arrived, and ready to help.They said they think  that the planes had seen a train that had just left Sturry station.so this would be why they had opened fire on the railway,and the bomb was meant for the army convoy that had just passed on  the road to Magate  they said that they had tried to assemble their bren guns,but by the time they got to their trenches to do this it was all over.so other than the house everything was O K and no one was really hurt.Dad and the other farthers are on duty to-night,so we decide to sleep in the shelter to-night.                         
                                                                    

B A page 9

          Part 9
        

As the months go by things get a little more nasty,because now if a German shoots down a British plane, and British pilot is able to bale out of his plane  the Germans are now shooting up the pilot whilst he is comming down on his shute,so now a British plane will circle around him to keep the Germans off,but of course this means there are less of our planes  in the sky,for a few minuts,also it means that the plane protecting the pilot on the parachute is easy prey for a German fighter,My pals and myself look for cartridge cases from the bullets, and  my Dad makes lighters  out of them,we also collect the glass from any crashed planes or bombers,if we can and make rings and things from them.thats if we can get the bits of glass,there are a few wrecked planes that come down, and some of these are  parked at a garage down by the station in Sturry they have a few Spitfires and messersmitts parked there these planes are not too badly damaged,and will be collected  by I suppose a scrap lorry to be used as spare parts for other planes.you can see the bullet holes in them,sometime you can see the blood of whoever was shot up in them and if we ask, some of the soldiers who gaurd them will let us get into the cockpit,this is all very exciting because you can imagion what its like to be a pilot in one of them and see all the instruments and dials.

B A Kid page 8

                                              Part  No 8

There now seems to be more big bombers comming over at night ,to try and get to London to bomb it,so now we spend a lot of  time sleeping in the shelter,My Dad and the other Dads seem to be on fire duty or something now most nights ,also we tend to  take more notice of the air raid warning sirens, but  we never seem to hear an all clear one these days,this is because the Germans seem to come over most nights on there bombing raids to London,Some nights Derek  and Allen and their sisters with  Mrs Butler there Mum come over and stay with us in our shelter,and we tell stories and play games,its good fun for us,,but I dont suppose our parents would say the same.but if they are afraid they dont ever show it, more often now the bombers are met by ack ack guns on Black Heath   which is on the outskirts of London,and although many  manage to get to London,and drop their bombs t many are damaged or shot down,those who think they can get back to Germany, gain hight by  dropping their bombs anywhere on the return,this way they can gain hight, and use less fuel this means that we in Kent get most of the bombs,so we hear bombs being dropped most nights this is why we never seem to hear an all clear siren I guess.
           It now turne out that the army have taken over the big house called Homewood Hall that belongs to the butcher,so now we have real soldiers,with real guns and a real tank,and lorries.my Mum isnt too happy about this as she thinks if the Germans  got to know  they may try to bomb the place and we only live  across the road from this place,also near to Canterbury we have a big army barracks where the Buffs Regiment are stationed,dureing the day the soldiers use the big field where we play to practice using their guns mostly brenguns, and they dig trenches in  which they set up  tipods to hold the guns,they also have Boufour anti air craft Guns on trailers,these are hidden away in the orchard of the house,luckly we can still play in the field,so we get to know many of the soldiers pretty well,and they show us how to load a rifle and if we were able,  fire it.also we get a few cap badges from them, as they like us to clean them,
they teach us how to slope arms,present arms shoulder arms Etc. that they have to do,and how to march,so this is all great fun for us lads.
            Jean Butler has her birthday and has ask me if I would like to come to it.on Saturday
so I am quite looking forward to it,My Mum and Dad are down at their allotment which is alongside  the railway line where they grow potatoes and carrots and greens to help out with the rations.During Jeans party the air raid.siren goes off once again,so we run out to get into the Butlers shelter, but before we can, we see three aircraft comming over the  woods from the south from Dover direction very very low,and we can see sparks comming from their wings,as they approach they wiggle their wings so that they can spray their bullets over a wider area.as they fly over us we can see that they are Focker wolfs,I think they have tried to shoot up a train that was passing on the line,or the house where the army are billeted.I wonder if my Dad and Mum are O K.then there is one great big explosion just up  the road,and a big cloud of smoke.and bits and pieces of wood and bricks from a house comming down.all about us.

                                    Part 7

The war has being going on now for some time,and the siren never seeming to give out the all clear and so we tend to sleep down the shelter more often,and when we go to school we seem to spend more time in the brick shelters than in the clasrooms,we play more games in the shelters, more than doing school work,thats  if we  manage to get to school in the first place without an air raid siren giving out a raid warning,if we are nearer the school we go to the school but it we are nearer to our homes, then we can go home again,we seem to go home more times than school, many of my friends dads have had letters telling them to register for  the forces,so they can be called up at any time,my Dad has to register with the other Dads and I do hope he will not be called up,and have to go away.Raymond the  boy next door has also had to register as well,and he hopes he can get into the R A F,These days we seem to watch a lot of fights between the R A F and the German  air force these are called dog fights,most of these dog fights are between Spitfires and Messersmitts, and if  a spitfire or hurrican pilot shoots down
German he will do a low lever barrel roll over the  fields,  and you can even see the pilot in the cockpit and very often we can wave to him,and sometimes he will come back over and  he will sort of wiggle his wings as if to wave back or at least to say he saw us wave to him,then he will go back up into the fight,but perhaps  this time he will be shot down and killed who knows ? of course to us lads this is all very exciting, and we would all like to up there shooting   down the Germans.

bomb alley kid page 6

                                                                                                            Bomb Alley Kid No page 6


Whilst  we live in Wales  Mum and I  start to use the local trains to visit other parts of Wales.such as Colwyn Bay,  Llanduno,Porthmadog,sometime we take Gorden and his britherAlunwho are now good mates of mine and of my Mum,I have even had tea with themand they with me, we also go the the pictures { Movies } but  I am not really excepted by the majority  of the other  Welsh kids,but who cares they are not  worth bothering about anyway, or the teacher, who still tends to ignore me, and just speaks in Welsh, so I am not being tought very much,except that the Welsh dont like  the English very much but I think they are ignorant  people and live in the past.My Dad has written to say he may be able to come up and see us in a few days time as he has some leave to come,this good  and I cant wait to see him,then on one Friday evening there is a knock on the door  just as we are getting ready for bed,the lady that we stay with answers it,then  runs up the stairs to tell mum there is a man  who wishes to see her,Mum new  all along that it would be dad, but had not said anything to me so that it would be a lovely supprise,I can hear  someone comming up the stairs and I just think this is Mum returning to our room,but when the door opens to our room its my Dad who comes through,I cant believe it and throw my armes around him and give him a big big hug and start to cry because I am so happy to see him after all this time, also my Dad is nearly crying as well,it is a very emotional time for us all.Dad has two suitcases with him and asks me to start  opening one of them to unpack it,as I start to unpack it I find under some of the clothes there is  a wooden box about eighteen inchs  square,and six inches deep I ask dad what itis  and he says to open,so I take off the lid  and when i do  I find there are lots of  toy soldiers for me to play with,then under a layer of cotton wool there is a scale model of a Sunderland Flyingboat all opainted silver and with the roundels of the R A F on it.that Dad has made for me,and he says it is made  from Bolsawood that they use in the factory when they make a mock up the real piece that they want made for  some part of the plane or to alter  a piece before  moulding it in Aluminium.he has also put the date on it like a registration No.1944.under more cotton wool  there is another model plane this is of a spitfire, and also an American mustang fighter plane, all  the aircraft have ben made to scale from plans.that Dad has,I really cant find words to thank him so very much he  just says it to thank me for looking after Mum, and helping her while we have been apart.thats  tipical of my dad  he would find  something like that to say because thats my dad.he rally is a great dad  and he still found time to make these thing for me  even thogh he must have very busy delivering the parts  for the real planes,I shall always treasure these all of my life { I still have these even now }  I  wont play with these because I may break some parts off them if I do, so will keep them as  display models while Dad is  her with us we go for walks, and play bowles on the local bowling green,which makes the centre of the Square where we stay.at No. fifteenthe square.Bleanau  Ffestinog. We also go to that cinema shed,I tell Dad how they seem to hate the English up here,and that I only have two friends Gorden and Allun,I  tell him that even the teacher only speaks Welsh although she can speak english, so dad says not tolet it bother me because he thinks the war will not last verymuch longer.as the American and British troops are  taking more and more ground in france everyday,so the news  is good and  so just stick it out for a little while longer,and we will be able to come home,also they are re-building our house back home.but dads  leave is  comming to an end  and he will have to return back to Chatham and his job.with Short Brothers.How I wish  Mum and iI could go with him, and leave this place.next day Mum and I help dad to pack the cases again, to be readyto catch the train tomorrow morning and  I hear my Dad say to Mum while we are having our tea,that the Germans have a new kind of bomb which we call a V. I. rocket  which is packed with high explosives and are being fired off towards London,the  trouble with these things  is one nver knows where or when  they are going to come down,so you have now warning they are coming  they are launched up into the air to  agreat hight ,and so cant be detected by radar,and  planes cant catch them because no one knows where they are or when they are on their way.
               In the morning we walk Dad to the station with sadness as we shall miss him so very much it has been great to have him with us again, even if it was a very short visit.Mum and I cant help but to cry as we wave goodbye to Dad as the train pulls out of the station,once the train is out of site we walk slowly back to our room.\mum says that come to-morrow we will take a train to the seaside,and take Gorden an Allun with us.after this day,and ariveing back after our day outI look at my Soldiers and the three planes that dad made for me and again I cant help but start to cry myself to sleep thinking of my dad, and how happy we all were being together again.next morning I ask Gordens Mum if he and Allun can come with Mum and I as we are going to Porthmadog and the sea,she says yes, so we spend the day playing on the beach and walking around the town looking in the shops.and having tea, then we have to catch the train back to Bleanau.On the radio the news is good because we are still pushing the German army back in France,Mum  aranges another train trip for us to-morrow to a town called Colwyn Bay another seaside town Gorden and Allun come with us again and we have a nice day out once again We decide to go fishing in the river near where we stay and catch some little stickle backs and put them into a jarwhich I take back to  our room and put  them next to my planes on the sideboard,tomooow  will try to draw one of the mountains called Moelwyn Mawr { meaning big } and the other one called Moelwyn Bach, { meaning Small }so this i do and draw in my book that I bought in Porthmafog { and I still have these  to-day }

Bomb Alley page 5

                                      continuation of my life NO 5

We now have builders in and around our school,and they are erecting  brick shelters that we shall use if there is an air raid whilst we are at scool,and we have been told that we will be giong to the village hall in sturry to be given gas masks,we have to go in order of where we live so me and my Mum  Derek and Allen Jean and Pam Butler will walk down ours selves to get them together,the parents will also be issued with theirs at the same time.when we ariv e at the hall we take ourplaces on benches around the room,and a man shows us what the gas masks look like,there are ones for the very young babies,others are for profesional people  like Air Raid Wardens and fire men, and of course the police,the one for the little babies are coloured red ,and have  a big clear plasict face so that the mothers will be able to keep watch on them,and so that the babies can see their mums,they also hav a big rubber flat nose so they can breath out easier than ours,because our are the normal grey rubber ones,with a metal filter on the bottom of them,eventualya man come sto me and ask me to my chin into the lower part and pull the rubber straps over my head then he ajusts these to suit me,he then say to breath naturaly,when  I breath out the rubber around my cheeks makes a flaping sound.which makes me laugh,as it sounds like Brrr Brrr Brrr sound,everyone sees this as a something funny and we all laugh,once we are all fitted  with our masks and all are sattisfied with them we are given a cardboard box to keep them in,and this box has a piece of string which we can put over our    shoulders to carry them,we are told that we must carry them everywhere we go.when I get home mum and I show Dad our little masks, he has a supprise to show us the one he has been issued with and its one of the profesional ones his mask is in a canvas bag which is on his chest   his mask has two big round eyes glasses and a  curragated rubber hose which goes into   the bag on his chest for breathing,this is a profesional  mask unlike my Mums and mine. Dad says he  has joined the auxiliary fire service as a driver for the little fire engine car,that will be used for small fire fighting jobs,leaving the profesionals to deal with any large  fires, the car that Dad and his other fellow fire fighters have is  just a private car with a tow ball that can take a trailer with a large barrell of water, this has a motorised pump attached, but they also have a smaller pump which is known as a stirrup pump,this is one which normaly would be used to pump up your tyres on a car,it has two small flaps which you  open out from the bottom of the pump so that you can put your feet on to, to hold it down when you raise the handle to suck up water from a small bucket or something,then as you push the handle down the water is forced out through the hose attached to the little pump.they also have ladders which are carried on the car roof,some of the other  Dads have joined the A R P or the home gaurd known as { Dads Army }so must men have joined something or other to help out in an emergency,
       We are issued with sticky tape which we must put on the glass windows of our houses this should prevent the glass flying about should there be a bomb explodeing near by.causing the window to be broken.also we have  have very heavy curtains  to put up at the windows to help keep any light from being seen from outside.of course there are no street lights now, and cars have very small slits in a mask to stop the light from being too bright and showing up from the air.but no one is allowed to use their cars now anyway except if you are a Doctor or police.
                                                                                                          more  later.at some time.
                                           .  ,

bomb alley kid page 4

,so I think if this is war then its not too bad  so not to worry,and quite exciting.
         When I come home from school one day there are some metal sheet in the garden,all the houses seem to have them,my Dad say they are Anderson shelters, and we will have to bolt them together and put them in the garden,Dad say we will dig a big hole and put them into that, and cover them with the soil we have dug out,so that it will be under ground,as this will give us more protection should  a bomb land near by, other people assemble them in their back gardens and  cover them with sand bags,but these are above ground,My Dad has dug steps out so that we can go down into the shelter,and open the door into the shelter,,also he has made bunk beds for us to sleep on should we have to stay in the shelter over night.Mum also has blankets which  we can take down,Dad also makes a door that we lift up to gain access to the steps, and which will help to stop any light  being seen,from above. we have tilly lanterns for light in the shelter  so its quite cosy down there,so we kids  use the shelter as a headquarters when we play at soldiers,I guess this is a rouse that Mum and Dad use to get us all used to staying in the shelter,

bomb alley kid: update on Bomb alley kid.

bomb alley kid: update on Bomb alley kid.: " page 2 continueing with my story...."

bomb alley kid: update on Bomb alley kid.

bomb alley kid: update on Bomb alley kid.: " page 2 continueing with my story...."

bomb alley kid: bomb alley kid page 3

bomb alley kid: bomb alley kid page 3: " continuation of Story page 3 so far the..."

bomb alley kid page 3

                                                                                                    continuation of  Story page 3
so far the war has been very quiet,but one Saturday afternoon when we are out playing in the field,we hear the engine of a plane,looking up  we see the plane  so I run into the house to tell my mum to come out and see it,while we watch it we see a black object fall from the plane, and it goes into a very steep dive with  a high pitched screening noise,so we think it is going to crash,my mum thinks the black object is the pilot who has baled out,but the plane begins to pull out of it dive and banks back to the way it had come from,then we hear a dull bang somewhere over in the distance then the airaid siren goes on, warning us of an air raid,a little late I think, when my Dad come home we tell him about it,  he says it was a German stucker dive bomber, and it was a bomb that exploded some where near St.Stephens or  Tyler Hill,this is near  where my other Uncle Richard and my Aunt Flow and my two cousins  John and Cyril have a farm,as far as Dad knows the bomb didnt do any  harm and just fell into a field.

                                                                                                            will add more  later

update on Bomb alley kid.

                                                                  page 2


                                       continueing with my story.No 2

 Rogers Brothers Friend is another big boy who lives nextdoor  to me,I like Raymond because he lets me go with him when he goe out to fly his model airoplane,in the field next to  our house,this field belong to the man in the big house over the other side of the road from ours and he owns the bucher shop in the village,but he lets us play in the field.he is called Mr Young but  we mustnt play in the field when its time to collect the hay,because we would flatten the grass, and the mower  woulnt be able to get every piece.I know this because my Gran and Grandad have a farm about  a mile and a half from where I live my Mum and dad have a chicken Farm on some of their ground my Mum tends to look after this as my Dad has to deliver flower to the bakers around Kent,so works all day.
         My Mum and I have to go up to collect the eggs in the evenings and to feed the chickens so we take our  dog with us  for a walk,she is called Rita.and is my best pal,sometime we go on our cycles up to the farm,but this evning we decide to walk so we take Rita  with us because she like to go into the woods and find Rabbits  to chase.this day she goes into the wood and on her way back to us she jumps into the rad just as a motorcyclist come by and she is hit by him but he dosnt stop  to say sorry but continues on his way but Rita is reall hurt and lays there  kicking and yelping,we dont know what we can do to ease her pain so I run back to our house and get my Dad but he must be still working so is not at home,I run back to Mum and Rita but Mum says there is nothing anyone can do as she has died  When Dad comes in from work he is upset as well, but says he will go and collect Rita, and bring her back home Dad puts her into her basket and bed,I had hoped she would wake up and  still be alive  in the morning but no such luck. so dad  and Me  dig a big hole in the morning and wrap her in her blanket so that we can bury her in our garden just where she used to lay in the sun.Dad says I should go out and meet my friends and play,and he will fill in the hole while I am playing.this is a big and very sad day for us all, as she was part of our family,it takes a very long time  to get over this very sad time.for all of us.but at that time  little do I know what I will see and hear in the future years.
                                            Back again another time

bomb alley kid 1

                                      Memiors of a bomb alley Kid.

As a young boy of 7 years old I live with my Mum and  Dad in an end terrace house my name is Leonard Douglas Pankhurst,also my Dad is exactly the same name,  I am named after him, my Mothers name is Edith may Pankhurst, My Dad was born in Dartford Kent west of the river Medway, so he is known as a Kentish man,because I was born in Sturry I am east of the medway so I am known as a Man of kent,my Mother was born in London  within the sounds of the Bow bells so she is a London Cockney,
           We live in kent which is called the Garden of England,owing to there being many orchards of fruit trees such as Apple Pear Cherry and Plumb,so we do eat plenty of fruit,which we steal from the orchards this is known as scrumping,but should we ever  be unlucky enough to get court by the man who ownes the orchard he would hit us with a stick or hand us over to the local Policeman,who in turn would prentend that we were going to prison, but take us home to our mums and dads where we would probbaly get another good  telling off,but so far we have never been court.We are also  very lucky that we have plenty of places to play in the fields around us,and we can climb and hide in the orchard trees,
           We have  been listning to the radio a lot, because  we hear that  we may be going to war with the German Nazis, and to-day we hear on the Radio that as from this day the 11 of September 1939 we are now at war with Germany, this scares me as I think that as from to-morrow I may die.and I dont want to,I ask Mum and Dad if this will happen, and they say no, because we have many soldiers, and plenty of guns and tanks  also .Mum and dad say we have God on our side.who will look after us.so Dad say I should go and call on my pals Derek Allen and Roger  and go out to play with them as usual,Rogers Dad has a market garden just down the lane that runs between the field next to my home, and my pals home,at the bottom of this lane there is also a pig farm and the main railway line to Ramsgate,and sometimes the trains have to wait at the signal here so we  talk to the train drivers, and we also put pennies  on the rails to get it flattened by the wheels of the engine,but we have to be carefull as sometime the penny will spin out at high speed in any direction,and this could be really serius should it hit you,Roger has a big brother who if he finds us in his dads goosberry and fruit  bushes pinching gooseberries he will throw stones at us,.so again we have to be very warey that he dosnt see us.
                                             will add more  at a later date.

bomb alley kid: bomb alley kid page 1

bomb alley kid: bomb alley kid page 1: "file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/len/Desktop/New%20Folder%20B%20A%20kid%203/Bomb%20A%2024.rtf"

bomb alley kid page 1

file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/len/Desktop/New%20Folder%20B%20A%20kid%203/Bomb%20A%2024.rtf

bomb alley kid.

I am just starting my story as a kid of 8 years during the ww 2 living in the county of kent.and will send blogs telling my story now and again. if anyone is interested.in following it.