- Contributed by听
- bedfordmuseum
- People in story:听
- George and John Hedger
- Location of story:听
- Renhold and Colmworth Bedfordshire
- Background to story:听
- Civilian
- Article ID:听
- A5349620
- Contributed on:听
- 27 August 2005
This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Jenny Ford on behalf of Mr. George Hedger and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.
The following memories of Mr. George Hedger were recorded at the VE/VJ Celebrations event held on 13th August 2005 at the Castle Mound, The Embankment, Bedford.
鈥淚 was nine years old when war was declared. We, that is myself, two brothers and two sisters were evacuated from Rye in Sussex and we went to Renhold, Bedfordshire. We came up by train with the old school, St.Mary鈥檚 Church School from Rye, straight away at the beginning of the war. We had a label, our gas masks and what few belongings we had I suppose. I think we went to the Corn Exchange when we landed in Bedford. We went somewhere and they said where we were going and me and my younger brother went together, my sisters went together and one brother on his own. Some of the teachers came up us. Sadly my mother died in 1939 so I stayed up here. The others went back except one sister.
We got on alright with the two or three families that we stayed with. We went to Renhold School to start with and then moved to Colmworth School when we moved billets and that鈥檚 where I finished up. When we first went there we just went in the mornings one week and in the afternoons the next week, too many children for the school for a little while until some of the evacuees went back to London. We stayed in a place called Beggary just outside of Colmworth. I stayed after the war ended and I when I was 15 I worked on the farms with the Italian and German prisoners. I got on with them alright. One of the Italian prisoners was missing one night when I took them off the farm and a soldier looked over the gate to see where he was and he鈥檇 chopped off his own head with a hedging hook. He wasn鈥檛 well I suppose.
I had 30 years on the land and then finished up working for Bedford Council as a Groundsman.鈥
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