July 19, 2020|

Carol and Susan Robbins – Two Sisters’ Memories

My sister (Carol Hazard) and I were born and brought up on the Winchester Road, just opposite Begs the Vets. Our maternal Grandmother, Mrs Lizzie Isaac May lived in the little black and white cottage in the square which is now the wine bar. In those days it was a beautiful cobbled village. She lived there with her husband who was a master baker and her nephew David Green evacuated from Southampton due to the bombing in the city. He attended the village school.

Carol has clear memories of the American tanks parked in the village by the air raid shelter. She believes the soldiers slept in the back half of tanks at night and drove in the front part. There were
also parked along the Droxford road which I was afraid of going past on my way to school. Like most people we had an air- raid shelter in the garden.

Because we had a spare room we had a land army girl with us. She worked on the land at the back of our house now known as Meon Park Estate. Although I was only small I can clearly remember a day when the sky was full of aeroplanes. I also remember VE Day, both my sister and I are in the photograph taken at the VE day party in 1945. We think the main air- raid siren was on the old tire station in Winchester Road with a smaller one on the grocers shop in the village.

My mother was great friends with Mrs Woodford, Stan and Ernie. They lived in a small cottage just down the road from us.

We cannot remember the Laurence family whose father was the AA patrolman. Our father was the patrolman for the RAC. He joined the service before the_ war and rejoined again alter the war. His patrol was Wickham to Winchester. The first official RAC patrol transport he was given was a bicycle, then he progressed to a motorcycle and sidecar and ended up with to a van until he retired.

Susan Shale née Robbins
Carol Hazard née Robbins