A Bit Too Close To Home
NextBackOne particular air raid that I partially remember occurred on October 2nd 1940. Redditch was the target and it was a daylight raid on the BSA factory lying directly behind our house. The intrepid pilot of this lone Heinkel 111 bomber circled the town two or three times seemingly unfased by the barrage balloons and totally unopposed by the local Ack-Ack guns, one of which was on a tall green gantry in the BSA grounds just over our back garden fence. My fascination with this lone raider was rudely cut short when I was unceremoniously bundled off to the air raid shelter. Subsequently I found out that the enemy bomber had dropped a land mine directly over St. Stephens Church and as these huge devastating bombs were parachute borne, it had drifted slowly on the breeze towards Studley road. Serious damage to our area was avoided but the explosion vaporised many trees and the blast damaged the BSA canteen. After leaving Redditch the German bomber was apparently damaged by anti aircraft fire and crash landed near Skegness. The BSA canteen was only slightly damaged, and fortunately my mother was no longer working there as she had moved to the Food Office in town. This change of occupation was a fortuitous move on two counts, the first being her removal from the main target area and the second one being the nature of her new job. She was responsible for receiving and destroying returned used ration books. During the war everything was rationed, one egg per person per month for instance and as some of these books still contained a few unused coupons of various categories they were of course put to good use by my mother.
