Childhood memories of WW2

Written by Jean Davies for her granddaughter Kim Davies at Newtown in 1998.

I was only a young girl at the start of the War, and didn’t know what War was until my parents explained it to me.

In the village where I lived, Dolgarrog in the Conwy Valley, there is a large Aluminium Works and also a Hydro-Electric Power Station. I understand that the Germans were aware of this fact, and they intended to bomb them. The Works was therefore camouflaged to disguise it from the views of the German aircraft pilots. Its roof was made to look like fields, and houses were painted on the sides of the buildings to confuse the enemy. Our homes were also camouflaged.

Llanrwst Grammar School had a foreign teacher. I was told that one day, she asked all the children to draw a map of the River Conway, showing where various places were. The river flowed very close to the Dolgarrog Aluminium Works. Shortly after that, the teacher did not appear in school again. Perhaps she was a spy, obtaining information for the Germans!

 

Above: "May Queen" - Betty Roberts, Myfanwy Roberts, Rhiannon Evans, Jean Roberts, Joyce Carpenter, Jean Jones, Margaret Roberts, Glenys Jones, May Queen Gwyn Davies, Mary Jones and Moira (?). Betty and Jean Jones decided to have a May Queen and arranged the event with the girls. It was held in the garden of 26 Gwydr Road, They borrowed the 'crown' for the day from neighbour Mrs Hughes at No 27, whose son had won it. Gwyn Davies was chosen as the May Queen.

When the air raid sirens rang out and we were in school, we all left very quickly to safe houses in the nearby village, for fear that a bomb would fall and destroy the school – and us too! Fortunately this never happened. In the air above some nearby lakes, were air pockets, and if a plane flew through one of them, it would immediately lose altitude, and drop to the ground like a stone. The pilots would die. Many years after the War, the remains of crashed warplanes were discovered.

Soldiers lived in our village in specially made huts, and there were several bunkers throughout the area where armed soldiers stayed. I remember large tanks travelling through Dolgarrog every Thursday, creating large holes in the road as they passed by. We children waved and shouted hooray at the soldiers who were in them and the lorries which accompanied the tanks. One day, our spaniel Jet went barking towards them. The tanks stopped and the soldiers all laughed to let Jet cross the road.

We could see searchlights from as far away as Liverpool at night, trying to pick out German bombers. The sirens sounded most nights and we could hear various places being bombed.

As schoolchildren, we knitted scarves for the army and the school forwarded these on to the soldiers to keep them warm on the battlefront.

 

Above: Dolgarrog Central School c. 1940.

Top L-R Rhiannon Evans, Josephine Watson. Olive Roberts, Gwyn Davies, Drina Scott, Jean Roberts, Bessie Bell, Jinnie Griffiths, Nora Spencer.

Middle L-R Annie Williams, Betty Davies, Joan Williams, Mary Coates, Betty Evans, Mildred Griffiths, Sally Shields, Audrey Baddley, Margaret Roberts.

Bottom L-R Glyn Roberts, Norman Evans, Gordon Jones, Ken Griffiths, Huwie Williams, Ken Carpenter, John Roberts, Jacky Bohanna.

Food such as butter, sugar and tea was scarce as were other items during the War. My father grew several vegetables in his garden and my mother did justice to them with her cooking. The shops were very short of ‘nice things’ and everyone had a Ration Book, which had a personalised number. My number was ZEIH/235. Very few sweets were available.

There were many War posters on display throughout Dolgarrog. The ones which stay in my mind are “Make do and Mend” and “Careless Talk Costs Lives”. I recall mending and re-mending our clothes and my father repaired our shoes. He was in the Local Defence Volunteers, renamed the Home Guard, having fought in the Great War of 1914-18. Each home had dark window curtains to stop lights showing at night. If there was a light, a policeman or a Home Guard soldier would knock on the door and give us a row. My father built an Anderson shelter in our back garden.

Despite all this, we children remained happy, not fully appreciating the situation, but we were extremely happy when the War came to an end.

 

Above: Gwydr Road, Dolgarrog, in days of peace.