WAR!!!!!!!

70 Years ago today,(it was a Sunday) Britain declared War on Germany. On September 1st Germany invaded Poland and because Britain had a pact with Poland to defend/aid in the event of Germany's attack Britain issued an ultimatum, that if Germany did not withdraw then Britain would go to war. On Sunday September 3rd at 11:00am the time specified, the Prime Minister announced that they had no response from Germany and so a state of war now existed between the two countries. But to this 2 year old politics didn't matter. I didn't know much about the War at that point, but I learned and my life was affected and reality hit many times in the ensuing 6 years. I could write a lot about my childhood and war but......
I am not sure of the exact dates probably 1940, but my brother and I attended a nursery school in Belfast that was evacuated to Donaghmore in County Tyrone,this involved Joe and I being separated from our parents. We were housed in Augharainey House.

This picture was taken in 1983, and shows my sister Jean and my Aunt Margaret outside Augharainey House.

This picture shows Joe and I at play in January 1941. The date on the picture was written by my Mother.







Again the date, March 1941 was written by my Mother.







I think this was the same picnic in March 1941. Us children used to love "dressing up" in Mother's fox fur cape.







My two oldest brothers were evacuated to Ballymoney in County Antrim. My sister stayed in Belfast and worked, as did my Daddy. In 1942 my Mother did rent a house in Dungannon and we were reunited as a family. In December 1941,(two days before Pearl Harbor) my brother Bryan was born there. Belfast was bombed in April and May of 1941.


My Aunt's home in Ballyclare Street did receive a "direct hit" and they were homeless. We didn't stay long in Dungannon as I have memories of being in Belfast when the air-raid sirens went and us leaving the house in the middle of the night to go to the air-raid shelter. My Sister eventually went to work and live in London (scary). There were no further raids on Belfast after 1941.
My Daddy was the Branch President in Belfast and had the branch records, and the branch piano in our home. One night as he was home alone the sirens went and he heard the bombers and went to the back door and saw the bombs falling and called on the Lord for protection. It may have been another night when he got home from work and was laying on the couch when the bombs started falling, he got up headed to the cupboard(closet)under the stairs when a bomb dropped across the street. Our window blew all over the couch where he had been laying, shrapnel came through the front door and through the stairs where he was headed but he was caught between the two. The piano bore shrapnel scars for as long as I remember and the hole in the stairs was there when we moved. He told me many years later as an old man here in Utah about that night and his ensuing flight from danger, it was a funny story (aren't they all when danger is over).
Perhaps it was 1944 my Mother was washing my hair one night as the radio was giving out the latest news and talking about the casualties and I remember saying to my Mother,"that isn't our soldiers?" but she informed me it was and I cried.
I remember VE Night in May 1945. I was not 8 until the August and Joe would be 10 in the coming Sept. but we went into Belfast to celebrate with the thousands of others. We probably went with my sister but got separated in the crowd and we walked home at 2am. Just the two of us.
Belfast had several severe blitzs and although the war was over and the rubble was cleared it was years before the bombed areas were completely rebuilt. Even when we left Belfast in 1962 there were still vacant lots where buildings had been bombed.

P.S. I have a booklet called "Bombs on Belfast" which is a pictorial record of the Blitz.
I also have a BBC video called, "Finest Hour the Battle of Britain" which is a dramatic account of WW11.
If you would like to borrow these let me know.