It is reported that a Hun airman down at Dorking apologised, saying: ‘We had no intention of bombing Dorking. We did not know where we were.’
Friday, 13 September
Ruth F. says she is sure Folkestone will be compulsorily evacuated, and what shall she do about her furniture. They are poor, but I am sure have lovely, carefully collected things. Their house stands near the Links, which has had 100 bombs.
I got hold of May B. on the phone, waiting in the new ATS canteen at Aldershot to give an Inspector lunch. She had time to tell me she had been in London during last Wednesday’s raid and the barrage was terrific. She rejoiced in it, as noise always stimulates her. She was dining out with two men in a fashionable restaurant and nobody was allowed to emerge, such was the danger and the racket. One of her hosts was a General high up in the War Office, so possibly he had to go out among the bursting shells and red gun-flashes.
Sunday, 15 September
Miss B., the shopgirl, yesterday spoke with suppressed and dangerous excitement of her mother’s shattered house in Kensington. ‘Oh, I went up to fetch her, and you wouldn’t believe the damage. Mother was down in the basement with the others. There was a crash. She said, “Now all keep quite calm. We will go next door.” But there was no next door!
‘We saved a little of the silver and came away,’ she said, with a queer, hysterical laugh, as if it were great fun.
Monday, 16 September
A bad night. An enormous explosion. First a plane rushing past low down and near my window, it seemed, and then the bombs. Poor Mrs Burton, who lives about three-quarters of a mile away, and who had felt so unhappy about everything, as if danger threatened, was right in it. It has made her deaf. She still feels ‘as if among horrors’.
Nevertheless, looking very pretty with her forget-me-not blue eyes, she drove off in a Canadian waggon with other ladies tonight at six o’clock, to give the last lesson in English to the men from Montreal. They are moving, to an unknown but heavily bombed neighbourhood.
Four letters this morning. E. writes from Ross-on-Wye, where they have had several raids. When the noise came close, she says, ‘My first thought was, “I must take this seriously.”’ The only damage, however, after a lot of shells had fallen, was to one small pig and two partridges.
Tuesday, 17 September
Harry left the house at 8.15 and reached London at midday. The line still terminates at Wimbledon and there are many, many changes.
Mrs F. came in with some tomato sausages for me. She said that she had heard from her niece in a famous club. The young secretary related that two waiters had phoned through one recent morning, to say they were sorry they would be delayed, as their houses had been demolished! When they eventually arrived, they were smiling.
Thursday, 19 September
The stream of German aeroplanes over us towards London began about nine o’clock last night and there was not so much as five minutes’ silence till, I should say, two a.m., and one woke constantly to noises. Two lots of bombs – one lot disagreeably near us. It seems quite wrong – nay, appalling – that the Germans are masters of the air at night.
Friday, 20 September
May B. on the phone from Aldershot: ‘Walking along Cromwell Road yesterday, I saw a large house on a corner completely wrecked and a big piece of parquet flooring suspended in the air and some beds in the road. I shall never forget Wednesday night in London. The bombs just rained down.’
Last night we had bombs within a quarter of a mile. Pulling aside the heavy curtain of the library window, Robin showed me a fire in the rainy dark.
Said the butcher boy, leaving half a pound of liver this morning, ‘A great many incendiary bombs were dropped right on our farm in the Silverwood. One was on our porch, and burned the creeper. Dad and I went out and beat out the flames.’
Saturday, 21 September
Summer still lingers, the garden gay with tall golden sunflowers and purple Michaelmas daisies. Basil writes, wishing to volunteer for Africa. Many men are going East.
The announcer on the BBC has just told us that a new interceptor Lockheed machine can fly 500 miles an hour and take off the ground at 100 miles an hour.
Sunday, 22 September
Harry is very pleased because a huge plane – an Avro Anson – came rather low over the fields.
Women, it is said in London, choose red frocks, hats, coats and flowers after air raids, a device to keep up the spirits.
Monday, 23 September
Shere is filling up with Londoners. Two invalidish, very old ladies in a large red brick house have been presented with two platinum blondes and their babies. Old Miss B. offered to take a party of them – she is an exquisitely neat spinster of nearly seventy – and suffered agonies of apprehension as to where the man should smoke and shave.
Tuesday, 24 September
Harry has been to the War Office, trying to arrange to get out to Rhodesia. He is put on half-pay from 9 October.
Six men of the HAC118 arrived begging for baths. Two went next door, two to the doctor’s and we had two. ‘I feel quite human,’ declared one lad, emerging.
Wednesday, 25 September
To Guildford to see Harry’s doctor, who told me St Thomas’s Hospital had been very badly hit, again. They will rebuild.
A dreadful night. Instead of the usual couple of bombs, there were constant thumps and they were all in the neighbourhood – thirty in all. I pity the middle-aged Air Raid Wardens who are darting about here and there in the dark, visiting the cottages, and on the look-out for fires.
Thursday, 26 September
Moving things about in the flat below. It nearly got taken by the military. The rent – all important – would have been much reduced.119
Muriel writes that she had bombs dropped 400 yards away. In a friend’s house a grand piano was blown over a field.
Friday, 27 September
Preparing for the tenant in the flat. Poor old fellow, if he thinks he’s coming into peaceful nights. I hear he brings a nervous niece.
The news seems rather bad. Japan has thrown herself into the arms of Germany and Italy.
Today Mrs Murray said to me: ‘Yesterday we decided to go into our dug-out as an air-battle was on. We looked everywhere for Byng, our Pekinese. No sign. After calling, a pale little face appeared at the dug-out entrance, saying: “Why on earth are you not coming down?” Byng is palest golden colour, but oh, yes, he got paler, and I heard him mutter, as he ran down again, “Let the women look to themselves, it is I that matter!”’
The sharp tang in the air, whispering of winter, usually rouses me to such joy, such plans for work between October and Christmas; but now this poor disjointed diary is almost all I have to write.
Later: I was half asleep when an army waggon drove up with considerable noise. Went to the window, and saw a policeman carrying a small leather case, and a soldier. They rang the bell and asked for Major Miles. I asked what they wanted. Billets. ‘I think I should be able to get four at least into this big house,’ said the NCO. I did not care for his manner. I felt as if they were rather Gestapo-ish.
It might be very pleasant to have one lively officer for the winter to talk to in the long dark evenings.
I have come to a conclusion. We cannot win this war unless America is fully and actually with us.
Sunday, 29 September
Last night there came an appalling crash – I thought a bomb was in our roof and threw myself down.
The murky lane outside was soon full of hurrying footsteps, and our good Head Warden was soon at the side of the household of women only, next door.
Robin dragged down my mattress into the cellar and the bombs continued to fall – it was impossible to count them. I thought the ticking-over of the electric meter was a rat, but felt anything was better than to go back to the life upstairs.
Robin lay in the hall without taking off his clothes. Harry slept unperturbed. The bombs so near us fell on the Men’s Club five minutes away; a gre
at beech tree uprooted.
Monday, 30 September
Spent a very happy, peaceful time in my cellar bedroom, though it was a rough night.
What is going to happen to all these old ladies and old men who are steadily being deprived of sleep? As I write, heavy German planes are going past, and probably the beastly humming will not cease until dawn.
A bomb has just fallen, preventing me from writing much about the approaching partition of poor gallant Switzerland, which is foreshadowed.120
Tuesday, 1 October
Mrs M. Crawford of Hampton has subscribed £5,000 for a Spitfire to be called Mabel. The Dorothy Fund is slowly progressing, and now a George Fund has opened.121
To help at kitchen. Pandemonium. Teacher who simply couldn’t keep order. Suet pudding most popular.
It is expected that within the next few weeks, when we are all drawing closer and closer to the fire, the war will quicken all along the Mediterranean.
At Cannes and Nice, those once spoiled cities of pleasure, there is now a great scarcity of milk, butter and cheese, fats and coffee. Sometimes hotel-keepers refuse guests because they have no soap to wash their sheets.
Worst of all is the apathy which spreads everywhere under the German yoke.
Thus the Norwegians tear up every paper connected with their Trade Unions. They have destroyed their lists of members and burned their documents, and wrecked their whole machinery, a characteristic Norwegian act planned and carried through thoroughly by disciplined and organised labour in a spirit of profound despondency.
Then along the Geneva border of France, shops are almost empty, and the peasants do not want to make the autumn sowings. This means much indeed. Oh God, grant us one good victory at least soon, to turn the tide.
Wednesday, 2 October
Guildford in the morning, dentist, talk entirely of bombs, where and how. When the history of this war is accurately written, there must be stress laid on the fact that the conversation of the English, high and low, rich and poor, was about where and when the bombs fell. We hear so little, and conjecture a lot. Not a word has appeared in the press about, for instance, the great aerial torpedo which fell right into the YMCA hostel in Tottenham Court Road. Jacky Browne,122 aged seventeen, was standing with a cup of coffee in his hand at the entrance to the lounge and escaped, but there were nine young men killed just inside.
Sara J. came to sherry and said she could not possibly sleep in my cellar: she would have an attack of claustrophobia. I love it, and feel perfectly secure.
Thursday, 3 October
Edna tells of a sojourn in a tunnel in Villiers Street during a bad raid. ‘All very murky and like Les Miserables. Tired people unrolling mattresses, newsboys selling newspapers, cockneys going out to the local pub, wardens shouting “Put out that cigarette!” On the whole, a quiet atmosphere of good temper, I thought, but I’m not the stuff that heroes are made of.’
En route homewards Edna bribed a taxi-driver to take her to Croydon. When she paid him largely he thanked her, and smilingly said he was glad of the money, as he had just been bombed out of his house.
Friday, 4 October
From Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, came an anxious letter from my friend Margaret. She says: ‘The days are utterly indescribable to us. What must they be to you! We hang over the radio with our hearts in shreds and tatters, and we can do nothing. The reports make our blood run cold, and the hours are endless, and our hearts are with you.’
Saturday, 5 October
In the Author there are various laments about the plight of writers today. The publishing world is passing through the most critical period in its history, says St John Ervine: ‘Authors are assailed from every direction. The shortage of paper affects us vitally. Our opportunities of earning a livelihood are everywhere curtailed or stopped.’ Don’t I know it – not a single review book comes nowadays.
Tuesday, 8 October
Waited on a hundred at the village hall. I think it would be a good thing if the children were trained to march out quietly table by table instead of running (today knocking over and breaking a tray of tumblers).
Wednesday, 9 October
We hear that Denmark, the placid, the apparently most submissive of all countries, is now in a ferment. Says The Times: ‘The Danes look across the Sound nightly to the lights of Sweden, showing them that Sweden is still intact, and inspiring them with envious gladness.’
Friday, 11 October
It was a ghastly night of aeroplanes up and down. This evening went up in the car to look at some of the craters. It was quite a scene for a war painter. The westering sun shone in a sky all rich gold over a lonely and lovely heath. Down a sandy lane, two humble farm cottages, semi-detached. A shed by the lane had all its tiles knocked about. A lorry in front of the gate, and a young couple with a little child, busy assisting a man who was heaving on the furniture, poor, flimsy stuff. The family had only just returned, as they had had a time-bomb in their field three weeks before.
The shortage of paper was one of the reasons why Connie gave up her journal for almost eight months in 1941.
Photograph © IWM PST14656
One shell was actually only three yards from the other in the field. I dare not ask where they were going.
I hear the Poles are winning great opinions in Scotland. And Scotland has risen to the occasion. Large groups have formed, sometimes a hundred strong, to study the size and work of the countryside around them. Visits were paid to farms of all kinds, to market gardens and large garages. The charm of the Poles broke down the reserve of the Scot. ‘These very men had the hospitality of an old, whitewashed house in which Prince Charles Edward had lived, and no doubt talked of his Polish mother.’123
Ruth F. tells me of her visit to Folkestone. She found the windows blown out of her house, and the curtains wet in the rain. Fetching a tarpaulin, she tried to fix it up in the drawing-room. There were seven warnings while Ruth was there. Everybody in Julian Road has evacuated. Poor Folkestone! It’s almost impossible to find a safe storage room.
Saturday, 12 October
Barbara sends a despairing letter about her boys from London, and heads her letter, ‘Little Hell, Blewbury’. The elder boy wrote home to say that bombs were dropping all round him, and couldn’t he go home? He packed his suitcase and has been bellowing loudly. Barbara thinks the LCC education they have received is very bad. She writes: ‘I wish one could see any end to this war – it seemed to be spreading so violently. And what is going to happen afterwards? How are people going to be housed again? And what of education? The public schools are bound to die, but I hope the public school-masters will be able to leaven the lump of the LCC. It is a deplorable education. One discovers the terrible laziness of it when dealing with these children – no attempt made to show the reason of anything, all parrot, parrot, parrot.’
I should have been at Paddington Registry Office today at 10.30 to see my dear May Browne married, but the danger of air raids being so intense I did not venture.
Sunday, 13 October
The year slips away and the woods are becoming red-gold. Basil arrived this evening for a spot of leave.
Monday, 14 October
Borrowed the book I had sent Basil, The Neuroses in War, edited by Emanuel Miller. ‘All cases of neurosis in wars are not curable,’ says Dr Maurice Wright. ‘Many thousands of broken, frightened men are still drawing pensions as a result. This fact must be faced squarely and honestly.’
Tuesday, 15 October
Walked with Basil to look at the beautiful and death-struck year. It was lovely, walking under the brown beech and green yews. Unfortunately, we were obliged to remember the war, as we came upon a large barricade made of huge logs and a dull green pillbox in the background. I brought back a bough of golden maple. It is such a pity he has to go back tomorrow.
Basil talked of the London air raids and the feeling of anger they provoked, and of the physical processes that go on when the human being is agitated. He sa
id it was a thousand pities that no form of revenge could be taken by the citizens to avenge themselves. He even thought that to hit savagely at medicine ball would be better than nothing, and wished there could be some put up in the tubes. He thinks, contrary to his father, that it will be a long war.
On polishing buttons. I was saying what a pity it was that brass was not abolished, but Basil said: ‘Oh no; what relief women get from knitting, so men get relief and interest and change of thought in cleaning and polishing their kit.’
Robin is feeling very low with the approach of winter. A large bomb was dropped this afternoon, much to the indignation of the tenant below, who was resting to make up for lack of sleep during the wretched loud night.
Olive’s husband, a noted chef, is out of work. I suppose people are not using these rich hotels like the Connaught or the Dorchester so much.
A dark rainy night. Harry has gone to bed with a pain in his shoulder-blade. Miss Scott and I are uneasy, she in her flat below, I upstairs, at the unending loud hum of Hun planes. Old Mr Stevens tells me from his armchair by the fire that he has heard from Hythe, where he lives, that several people he knew in the little town have been killed – a gardener, a tailor’s wife who used to do repairs, and so on.
I must say I feel pleased that the Berlin authorities are evacuating 75,000 children. It must bring it home to them.
Thursday, 17 October
Very much depressed at the news of Jack Bower’s sudden death.124 He had not been ill long. He was a true poet and a true sailor, with an adventurous spirit that never lost its daring. One of the best-informed men I ever knew, deeply versed in history and a vivid good talker. I hate to think of the deep loneliness of his wife.
Friday, 18 October
A horribly bad day for Harry as so foggy and damp. London begins to look rather damaged. The cook has arrived late as ‘a young lady came to the door and begged me to put her up. I said no. She nearly collapsed. I felt sorry and let her in and said I wouldn’t cook for her or anything, but that she could sleep here. She said she came from New Cross.’
Mrs Miles's Diary Page 12
