WINIFRED LISLE (ROBERTS)
The army were billeted in some of the larger houses in Grafton Road.
Marden Farm had Italian prisoners of war working there. In those days you could go through farmland all the way to the fire station. The POWs all had large ‘P’ on their backs.
A bomb dropped on John Street My granda and I were at the pictures at the Coliseum. The alarm went off in the pictures. We were told it was John Street – we ran all the way and found all the windows blown out of the house. We couldn’t find my grandfather but he turned up helping with the rescue operation at the hall where sadly a young lad had been killed in the bombing.
DOREEN ROBERTSHAW (FENN)
During the War, I remember the big bomb that fell on John Street, it was a Saturday night. I think the church got bombed.
The school adopted a warship – HMS Cowslip – and we wrote letters to the sailors.