IN SPITE OF BOMBS
DOCTOR CARRIES ON
A REVEALING LETTER
A private letter recently received in New Zealand from an eminent London surgeon paints a graphic picture of what bombing means.
"I had to leave my house in Wimpole Street," says the writer, "shattered windows: gas, water, and sewage mains broken by a bomb falling in the road. Took a house at Hampstead Heath. Five of us slept in an uncomfortable shelter for eight weeks, then a terrific explosion by a land mine, great damage all round, and the back of my house rendered uninhabitable.
"Last Sunday week a land mine two streets off Wimpole Street did great damage to my house. Windows, frames, shutters, blinds torn out, banisters damaged, fanlights wrecked, pieces of ceiling down, decorations spoilt, and mahogany doors jammed and lintels torn, front door burst open.
A NARROW ESCAPE
"Just escaped death three weeks ago. A bomb just missed the roof of these offices and demolished a large building in the small street opposite (34 killed and many more injured). Had just time to leave my small office on the top floor after the warning, but got only a few yards when the explosion occurred. On returning lo my office I found it was wrecked and large pieces of glass had blasted across my desk to the wall by the side, so 1 am lucky to have a head on my shoulders.
"I have at last found a (lat at Oxford for my wife. Two days before she left her sister, where she went after Hampstead. a time bomb fell outside the house in the middle of the night and she had to hurry along country lanes to her other sister. I have been sleeping in the shelter of my club on a very uncomfortable box ottoman. I have had a week's holiday since September, 1939, otherwise every day working here or at the Ministry of Health, as the chairman of the C.M.B. on the Nationary Emergency Maternity Service, and as a member of the private advisory committee of the Minister."
Yet. the writer, who is aged 75. still cheerfully carries on, although, as he admits in his letter, he has had just about enough.
Permanent link to this item
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/EP19410326.2.98
Bibliographic details
Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 72, 26 March 1941, Page 10
Word Count
368IN SPITE OF BOMBS Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 72, 26 March 1941, Page 10
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