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An Interview with the Elderly

By Philip Howard

Culture editor

Gillian Howard was only 7 when the Second World War started; it was a chain of events that didn’t just wreck her childhood but many others. The observer got the chance to interview her as part of our elderly season. 

I came into the warm living room for this interview and my surrounding are of ornaments and glass statues. This is because my grandmother, Gillian, is an antique collector, so to start this interview I nuzzle myself into the infamous black leather sofa ready for the interview. My grandmother entered, I immediately stand up for this is how you treat the elder generation, with respect. I greet her and I sit back down ready to question her.

  I firstly ask her to just say a few interesting points that are important. She says she was born 1932 so was only 7 when the war started; Gillian lived in London at the time. Gillian still lives in London today and that is where we are now. When the blitz started in 1941 Gillian was evacuated from London and went on a train to Bristol. After that brief summary I proceed to ask her of when she felt most sad. Naturally it was when she

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was separated from her parents and evacuated. She was crying and a group of soldiers came up to her and comforted her they were at the station too and were on the train to Bristol to go to the port to go onto a battleship. They sang to her the wartime songs all the way from London to Bristol she learnt them all. “But there is another event that really was sad and it just shows how the war tears families to shreds,” she said. I ask what this event is; she says “It was of course when ...

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