V1 Survivors

Sir: “The Day My Father Raced a V1 Flying Bomb” (“Forget-me-nots”, Autumn 2017) reminded me of a similar story from 1945 when I was 14-years-old. During half term I was playing Monopoly with a friend in north-west London. The air-raid siren had gone off about two hours earlier and we were fed up with staying indoors so we went for a walk.

As we headed down the road we heard the familiar “putt-putt” noise of a doodlebug, but more frightening, the engine then stopped. We lay on the ground close by a house and waited, we might even have prayed!

It landed and exploded just around the corner. The blast lifted us off the ground and dropped us back down again. Very shaken, cut and bruised we ran to the corner and saw that two houses had been demolished and later learned that three people had been killed. The blast took out many windows including those of my house some distance away.

Both of our parents were at work so missed all the excitement, but what a story we had to tell. We lived off it for a long time at school. Some time later, part of the school was destroyed by another flying bomb. Luckily we were not affected by the V2s which fell only a few miles away. I stayed in London throughout the Blitz with life in general much disrupted. I slept in a Morrison shelter right through — caged in! — NORMAN HOLNESS, HAGLEY,

WORCESTERSHIRE.

Sir: In 1944 my mother was living in West London while my father, serving with the RAF, had been shot down over France in 1942 and was a prisoner of war in Germany.

One day when I was out with my mother the air-raid siren sounded followed by the frightening drone of a V1 flying bomb. As its motor cut out and it dived towards the ground, people ran for the air-raid shelters. The dustmen were collecting refuse in the street at the time. As my terrified mother, clutching me tightly, hurried along, a dustman, realising it was too late for her to get to the shelter, stopped her, forcibly grabbed me and hurriedly thrust me inside a partly filled dustbin then loosely placed the lid on top. He then pushed mother down into the kerb and laid his body protectively over her.

The doodlebug caused an enormous explosion and terrible destruction. The dustman and mother were buffeted by the blast, but otherwise unhurt. The dustbin containing me was blown over, with the lid coming off as it careered along the road. Together with the dustman, mother got to her feet and, crying with panic, ran to the bin. The dustman quickly righted it and lifted me out. To my poor mother’s relief, apart from crying with fright, she found me completely unharmed.

All of my life since I have wondered about the identity of that unknown, brave, quick-thinking dustman and his selfless conduct that day. — ANTHONY S. TUCK, DAWLISH,

DEVON.