Wearside and the War

National World - Broadcast Video

Sunderland Echo reporter Chris Cordner sheds a light on some firsthand memories of the Second World War.

Transcript

00:00The garden that we had with the house was big. There were five gardens against

00:06ours. It was a corner house and my father, being a watcher or warden

00:15whatever he was, drew my attention. We looked over the back garden towards

00:20the town and that was the King's Theatre going up in flames and you could see it

00:26miles away, the flames shooting up into the sky. People didn't talk about

00:33the war after the war really. I guess they'd all had enough of it and of course

00:36everybody was involved so there wasn't I suppose the same reasons for talking

00:42because everybody knew they were all in it together whether they were at home

00:45being bombed by German planes flying over your house or whether you were at

00:50sea being shot at by German ships you know you were all sort of in it together.

00:55I'm Sunderland Echo reporter Chris Cordner and as the 80th anniversary of D-Day

01:00approached I had the pleasure of speaking to Sunderland resident Ron

01:04Lawson who at the age of almost 91 was one of few people still around with

01:11direct memories of the Second World War. I've also been speaking to Malcolm

01:16Farrow whose father John Farrow served in the Royal Navy during the D-Day

01:22operation as well as Malcolm's daughter Alice. He was on HMS Glasgow. Yes he was

01:28the commander he didn't talk about it it was only quite a lot long time after

01:32when I started doing a family tree probably back in the 60s I started

01:37drawing up a family tree wondering where I came from and discovered all sorts of

01:41unusual things and I said to him one day I really be nice to know sort of who you

01:48are where you came from what you did and he wrote he wrote a few pages for me

01:54and then he wrote a few more pages and it was there that I read what what he'd

01:58done I mean of course I knew he was in HMS Glasgow and I knew he'd been in the

02:02war and he'd been at D-Day and that's all I knew full stop and then he started

02:06to tell a few more things and he so it was it was interesting to read and of

02:12course now as always it's always the same for all generations you wish you'd

02:17asked more earlier before the memory started fading and all of that sort of

02:22thing but you know it is what it is and I've got quite a few pages of his

02:27scribblings about about his life including his wartime service and D-Day

02:32which is nice to have. Here is an excerpt from John Farrell's 1994 letter to his

02:38son more of which can be read on the Royal Navy and Royal Marines charities

02:43website it said our captain had a small French boy on the bridge with him how we

02:52got there I don't know but he knew the part of the French coast we were

02:55attacking backwards and told the captain that the Germans had a forward

03:00observation post in the tower of the church just near our position so sadly

03:06we had to destroy the church with our gunfire and the RAF came over and

03:13destroyed the cliff it was on too. All I can recall of the actual D-Day landing

03:18moment as we lay off the French coast in front of us really was a cheer that went

03:24up from our ship's company when they heard all our soldiers were advancing

03:29on shore what strange days those were. It's the little things that matter

03:35history tells you the big things we all know you know Charles first had his head

03:39cut off but what we don't know is what he had for breakfast and we don't know

03:43what the local whatever it was was talking about that morning as they

03:49wondered what was going to happen next we don't know the little things it's the

03:51little things that make the full picture they add the salt and pepper to the to

03:56the meal don't they the meal is a bit bland with just big bold facts. One of our

04:01play areas was Gunsfield that's the farmer gun G-U-N-N they there were a

04:11couple of anti-aircraft gun emplacements on there and obviously we were manned by

04:19soldiers. We used to play on that area and of course if there was a raid the

04:29anti-aircraft guns were shooting at the planes and what went up had to come down

04:34again it was more dangerous to walk about during a raid because of the

04:39shrapnel from the guns than it was from the bombs. A piece of shrapnel quite a

04:46big one came through the of our roof came through the tiles through the

04:52ceiling and landed on the bathroom floor it was quite a big one. When there was a

04:59raid on or I should I say when a raid had finished the lads of the square the

05:05I lived in was 30 houses we used to go out hunting for the biggest piece of

05:13shrapnel amongst the lads see I always got the biggest piece because there was

05:18some big pieces. Yeah so I mean as a young lad was at a time I suppose it's a

05:25bit different for an adult back then it would have been worry as a young lad I

05:29think you've said before that you just thought it was a big adventure. It was it

05:34was just so much fun it was something to occupy us. We were never worried about

05:43anything like that not at my age yeah it was it was a great time really yeah. So

05:51when the shrapnel came through the the house were you're all out were you're

05:55all in a shelter or were you in the house? In the shelter the air raids

06:02themselves worsened 1943 and had reached a stage where it was pointless going to

06:11bed we just went straight into the area shelter because you knew very well there

06:17would be a raid. My father had it that was an armless in shelter I should

06:23explain and he had it boarded out there was a double bunk there for my mother

06:30and father and a single one for me and we've just slept in there. Usually the

06:38raids went on for a few hours. So did you get much sleep? Not a lot yeah. What was

06:47the noise like when that was coming down? Tremendous yeah. I was six when the war

06:53started and twelve when I'd finished. I was six year old and my father was drafted to

07:02work at Vickers Armstrong's. He wasn't signed up into the forces. Being a skilled

07:10time-served fitter he was drafted to Vickers Armstrong's making munitions

07:16and he was working all the time. He was also a warden. I don't know

07:29whether he was a warden or a fire watcher but he was issued with his tin

07:33helmet. I'm told that you're Washington born Malcolm? You bet well I'm not

07:38actually Washington born I was born in Jesmond but I lived for my first

07:4330-35 years or so in Fatfield. If you cut through my arm you know like a stick

07:50of rock you would see Wearside or North East or whatever all written around

07:53inside so although I've lived in Hampshire mainly because really of the

07:59Navy which I was in for the last 30-40 years I'm a dyed-in-the-wool

08:05North Easterner. Can I ask do you both have a section of that memoir that is

08:12your favorite? I have two favorite bits the one the one bit where they have to

08:18bring someone back to Portsmouth and the tug that brought them in was crewed by

08:24retired Admiral and my grandfather heard the bowman of the tug cast off forward

08:31and the reply that he's never forgotten was aye aye Sir Jane and just knowing my

08:37grandfather I can just imagine him giggling away when he told that because

08:43he would have been absolutely staggered that that will that that happened I also

08:48love it that the way he described the boy appearing on the bridge and obviously

08:54that will have been planned for a long time and he won't have been involved

08:57because he was keeping the engines going but it was very it was really special

09:03and another part of the war of course was rationing that must have been an

09:09interesting experience I didn't worry maybe my mother kept me well fed yeah

09:17she had the worry of the rationing and the women of the street used to get

09:27together and there was a barter system those that had little or more used to

09:34do a bit of swap around I was at Hilton Road school the only time when we weren't

09:40there was when they were digging up the school playground to put in the area

09:44shelters there was infants juniors and seniors school there infant and juniors

09:52went into the area shelter in their school grounds the seniors had to walk

09:57up to the football ground in Hilton Road and there was no celebration for D-Day

10:02because the war virtually had come to an important point where they invaded

10:09Normandy nothing was done really until we reached VE Day, a victory in Europe but

10:18D-Day wasn't recognized at all really but you do remember VE Day? Oh yes my father

10:26had a big radiogram with lots of records and he took it outside put it in the

10:34front garden and played it loud not the ideal service for dancing concrete but

10:44everybody in the street and in the square should say was out dancing there

10:49was something to celebrate after six years it was worth celebrating he was a

10:56lovely man he was a true Edwardian gentleman solid as a rock not

11:01particularly demonstrative he had a wicked sense of humor he was

11:06surprisingly creative he was quite artistic actually and in his youth he

11:12did a few drawings and he was quite good at it he was very good with his hands he

11:18could make things beautifully and had the patience to do it I haven't got

11:22quite the same patience and so I'm a bit more of a two-pound hammer and a six

11:26inch nail man but he could do it with a he could do the fine-tuning as well he

11:30was a real gentleman he was yes a lovely a lovely man with perfect manners and a

11:36lovely way of going about life. My brother my father and I will be on the

11:41where Omaha Beach was well is on on D-Day when the sun comes up.

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