Dog fights and Doodlebugs

Next door had an Air-raid shelter in their garden and my sister and brother and I were passed over the fence when the siren went. I remember, at 3 or 4 years old, seeing their grown-up son,in RAF uniform. smoking a pipe with a button over the bowl. He said it was to prevent the enemy pilots from seeing the glow of burning tobacco.
Years later we found out the reason he was there, at home, was because he had multiple shrapnel stomach wounds and was on recuperation leave.

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