Toms VE Day:  a 101 year old remembers - watch on Shots!TV - video Dailymotion

Sunderland Echo

Sunderland Echo reporter Neil Fatkin speaks to Tom Davidson, who served in the RAF during the Second World War, about his experiences. Watch the full show on Shots!TV - www.shotstv.com, Freeview channel 262.

Transcript

00:00I can tell you smell I'm such a happy man.

00:02Yeah, all right.

00:03No, you're good to smile.

00:06Hi, this is Neil Fatkin, a reporter with The Sun and Echo.

00:08With VE Day upon us, I've come to Holly House Care Home

00:12to meet Tom Davison, who is nearly 102 years old.

00:15He fought in the Second World War in the RAF,

00:18and I've come to find out just what it was like on VE Day

00:20and how it felt to have won the war.

00:22OK then, Tom, so obviously we've got VE Day coming up.

00:25You actually lived it, you were in the RAF at the time.

00:30So do you remember where you were and what you were doing

00:32on the time it was announced that Victory in Europe had been secured?

00:36Yes, I was Flight Sergeant Instructor at RAF Glossymouth,

00:41which was a Free French Air Force Operational Training Unit.

00:45And did it come across on the radio?

00:47Did somebody tell you what happened?

00:49I think it came across on, you know, the communications

00:52was over the air on the RAF station, which started from time to time.

00:57So I told about it then and then there was obviously a great relation on.

01:03And we went, there was about eight of us instructors,

01:11went down to the local village, Elgin.

01:14It was actually, it was a little, well, the mine sweepers used to dock there,

01:19you know, it was all the Navy lads there.

01:22And we just went down there for a couple of hours,

01:25had a little drink, came back.

01:27And then we had, there was no holiday on the day,

01:31but on the, what we call it, VE Plus One, it was a holiday.

01:36And I was off home day and I was on duty at 12 o'clock,

01:40because we're starting to fly in there.

01:42So I had the celebrations during the day,

01:45and there's been doing the soldiers' mess at night time.

01:51And I remember leaving there and going on duty at 12 o'clock.

01:56All right. So you were at the party and then went on duty, were you?

01:59Yes.

02:00There was a lot of singing, a lot of dancing.

02:02Lots of dancing, yes. Celebrating. Yeah, great.

02:06But, of course, we were stuck together, you know,

02:09with just heat of us or something.

02:12But there wasn't all that many celebrations on the day.

02:15I know your wife and family were back up in the North East.

02:18Yes.

02:19When you spoke to them, what I did then was the street parties,

02:21that sort of thing?

02:22Street parties, yes, yes.

02:24So the whole nation was celebrating, basically.

02:26Yeah, the whole nation was celebrating.

02:29I mean, obviously, you played an active role in this,

02:33flying a number of missions and what have you.

02:35So when VA Day was announced, how did you actually fail?

02:40The first great elation, knowing that I had survived,

02:44Britain was free, Europe was free.

02:49But then there was, funny, I don't know how to describe it,

02:53there's sort of...

02:54...to improve.

Toms VE Day: a 101 year old remembers - watch on Shots!TV

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