After nine years of post-war rationing a national treasure is born

For the county’s children who grew up amidst the blackouts and air raid sirens, VE Day marked the start of a strange new world which probably did not make a great deal of sense to them.

What would follow was years of becoming acclimatised to a way of life where a loud bang did not necessarily mean immediate danger.

Rationing continued for another nine years until 1954, a consequence of the conflict which would keep wartime conditions on people’s big bangs and flashing in the sky.

“Nobody ran away. I thought, ‘Why not, when bombs were going off ?’ They all were just dancing and singing. I was glad when it was time to go home.

“For weeks everyone was happy but I was sad. I was told it is safe now and there would be no more war.

“I said I didn’t like the big fire and the man being burnt, or the bombs. I was told don’t be silly it was only a dummy and they were fireworks not bombs.”

People living in Maidstone contributed to the street bonfires and sat around them in deckchairs, singing songs long into the night.

Alongside the scores of Canterbury pubs open until the early hours, hundreds minds for a long time.

Dr Charlie Hall, a lecturer at the University of Kent, believes rationing actually became even more difficult when the war ended.

“Bread was never rationed during the war, but in the aftermath they had to introduce bread rationing,” he said.

“In part this was because Britain became responsible for occupying a part of Germany where people were very close to starving.

“So in order to have enough grain

of people flocked to thanksgiving services at the cathedral, to remember the hardships and people lost throughout the conflict.

Alan Dudney, 85, of Lower Herne Road, Herne Bay, pictured right, was just 10 at the time.

He said: “As children, our contribution towards the festivities was to gather large amounts of wood and other combustible items that made up this huge tack in the middle of our road, which was to be the all-important bonfire.

“It is quite remarkable to me, looking back, that we lit this huge bonfire in a very narrow road so close to gardens and houses. to produce enough bread to keep this part of Germany plus all of Britain going, new rationing had to be introduced.”

As life moved on, people began to understand what they wanted out of a post-war society.

Under Prime Minister Clement Atlee, the NHS was born, providing a public service which would proudly serve and protect every member of the nation.

The push towards a public healthcare service can be charted

“I think it was accepted that during those days we lived dangerously, in dangerous times.”

On the coast, blackout restrictions were still in place, but after Churchill’s speech was broadcast, people ran to the harbour as ships sounded their sirens.

Those in Ramsgate defied the restrictions and lights went on throughout the town.

In London, thousands flocked to Trafalgar Square and Buckingham Palace, where the Royal Family stood with Churchill as they waved at the crowds.

In one of the most famous moments of the day, Princess Margaret and Princess Elizabeth, were allowed to leave the palace and wander among the crowds, a moment our Queen has since described as “one of the most memorable nights of my life”. directly back to the war, when the government had become responsible for healthcare in many parts of Britain

The uncertainty of the world quickly returned, as it was clear America and the Soviet Union were ideologically opposed and trying to bring their own separate influences into post-war life.

And so began the Cold War, a conflict that defined the decades after the end of the Second World War.