Carl Booth
I was not born until 1944, however, I consider myself a victim of war.
The story I have grown up with is my parents Harry and Nellie Booth were both born inside Coventry city walls in 1898 and 1900 so had already endured the horrors and grief of the First World War.
On the night of the raid they gave their shelter to a family with a newborn. Harry was talking to a neighbour over a fence - after all the activity was miles away. When out of the blue an enemy bomber appeared. Harry shouted and hit the deck at the same time Nellie had just come out of the house. As the bomb exploded, Nellie charged into the outside toilet.
Their neighbour was killed instantly. Harry was unhurt, but the explosive went through the toilet door and hit Nellie. She was taken to hospital, then onto Kineton village to die in the make-shift hospice there, but she was made of sterner stuff she survived gangrene and lived the rest of her life with one leg three inches shorter and several holes all over her body. The neighbour’s son Alan, who is still alive today, has shrapnel in his stomach.
I remember having one mum who spent lots of time as a patient in Stoney Stanton Road hospital and a much younger mum – my sister. Like most adolescent youth I recall thinking I loved my dad, but what has he seen of life. Later on in my early 60s I then realised he was more of a man than I will ever be. He was in the occupation forces of the First World War, worked in the brutal regime of the ‘20s and ‘30s; he lost all his possessions to looters; he had a wife not expected to live; and he had no home and three children. He is my hero, shame it took me 60 years to realise.
I salute all the unsung heroes.