War Rain

Two Rains

Cousin Tony and I were on the floor playing war games with our lead toy soldiers. My troops were defending a fine four-towered fortress made by my father as a present last Christmas. We had already got used to the fact that bought toys were expensive and that Hitler was to blame. I didn't mind, Daddy made very good presents. Tony was attacking. My soldiers wore kilts and had as many bagpipes as guns. Tony had lost at scissor-stone and had the German troops. These were former colonial soldiers that had forcibly been recruited to the Nazi ranks They were suitably identified by swastika labels made from the edging of postage stamp books. We had agreed, of course, that they would lose in the end. 

The battle was at a crucial stage with the besieging Nazi troops having managed to bring down the draw bridge and in danger of entering the castle when here was a loud bang. Not from our battle but from outside. Glass rained over us and our battlefield. We crouched low, looked first sideways at each other and then up at the windows. And then we stood up and reviewed the chaos. The windows had been blown in. Luckily most glass had gone over our heads but not all. 

I had just finished carefully extracting small sharp sherds from Tony's hair, and he was about to return the favour, when Mother rushed in. She first saw the shattered windows and gasped and then immediately looked at us busying with our hair.

            Are you alright? Are you hurt? What are you doing?

No, neither of us was hurt and we were just picking the glass out of our hair. Mother quietly murmured praise to God and thanks to father for insisting on taping the windows, as advised by the government. This had limited the amount of glass that was blasted into the room and rained on our heads. I remembered the debate that they had at the time, with mother arguing it would look ugly and darken the room. I decided then that men usually make the best decisions.

When she realised we were not hurt and not traumatised and were about to continue our game with even greater enthusiasm, she fetched the brush and pan and suggested we sweep up the mess.

            'But be careful, don't cut yourselves!'

Then Aunty Anne rushed in,

            'Where's Nancy?' 

Nancy was Tony's sister. Three years older than us. We told Aunty we did not know but thought she had gone for a walk to Epping Forest with her friend Eileen.

            'Goodness she might have been killed or hurt.'

What a lot of excitement over nothing. No chance of that, we two agreed. Why should the bomb decide to pick on her? 

We were instructed to stay where we were and to tidy up and again warned not cut ourselves. Our two mothers collected the neighbours to help search the roads leading towards the Epping Forest.

As we started to worry where our mothers were and it was getting close to lunch time, my mother returned alone. 

            'Where's Mummy,' Tony asked.

            'She's gone to the hospital with Nancy. She's been hurt. I must go quickly and tell Eileen's mother.'

Tony and I looked at each other.

            'By the bomb?' We asked as one.

            'Yes'

            'Is it serious?"

            'I don't know for sure. Her left leg has been wounded and she was bleeding badly. Luckily one of the searchers knew first aid and bandaged her up. Now I must go quickly and tell Eileen's mother. Behave until I get back.'

            'Mummy what's for lunch?' 

But she was gone.

The living room in which we had been playing on the floor when the explosion occurred, had a curved bay that occupied most of the wall facing the street. All the windows to the left were damaged. The further left the more severe the damage. This gave some idea in which direction the bomb had fallen. It was indeed in the direction of Epping Forest. The top windows in our 1930s house were of coloured leaded glass in the shape of stylised fruit and flowers. The lead allowed these windows to bow, rather than shatter in the blast but a few pieces had fallen out. I picked up a small red disk, that had once represented a cherry. I looked through it at Tony. He turned into a red monster. Tony picked a blue piece. We both retained these souvenirs for a long time.

Nancy was in hospital for only two days. She returned with an impressively big bandage high up on her thigh. Tony explained that this made it difficult for her to get her knickers on and off. His mother had to cut these open to make enough room. Nancy's main worry, once the pain had subsided, was whether she would still be able to wear a bathing costume without showing a horrible scar. Later when she had recovered Tony and I asked to see the wound. She cautiously agreed. She was now a grownup teenager not a little girl playing doctors and nurses. She pulled up her skirt at the side very decorously displaying a long scar going from hip towards the knee. We were suitably impressed. At the same time, we reassured her, as experienced males, that this would be no problem for any boys that she fancied.

Today 80 years on I discover the online map of the V2 strikes on London. I extract my small red glass souvenir from my wallet and place it beside my computer. I see that during the last year of the war, at the scale which covers all of London, the strike markers on the map overlap. There is no space between them. V2 rockets had rained on London in a non-stop deluge. In outer London, where innocent Nancy was wounded and friend Eileen beside her luckily just blown over and bruised, Hitler's V2 still murdered one. In the hail of rockets that rained on the densely populated centre of the city each 'raindrop' will have killed many hundreds. I return my glass keepsake thoughtfully back to my wallet, close my computer, and pray that such terrible times will never return.