Eamon Grogan’s Story

I remember well the night of the bombing. I was 5 years old at the time. I awoke to hear my mother calling me to get out of bed. My father grabbed me and carried me to under the stairs into what we called the cubbyhole. My Father, mother, and brother, where all huddled together and me in the middle. We lived in Richmond Ave, Fairview. Even now 69 years later I still remember hearing the whistle of the Bombs and then the explosions. The following morning my mother took me for walk up to Summer Hill Parade, where some of the bombs had fallen. A working party of men were digging on a bomb site, [ie. a rescue party] . I spied some children’s comics in the rubble of a house. The Beano or the Dandy I am not sure which, but I wanted to get them. So I ducked under the ropes surrounding the site to retrieve them, my mother grabbed me and pulled me back. So I did not get the comic cuts, and to add insult to injury, I got a good clip in my ear to remind me never to do that again. Some time after that I do not know how long, months or years, I remember seeing two fighter planes, a German and a RAF spitfire in pursuit of the German. Their markings were very clear. I don’t know how the pursuit ended.