These sound files are extracts (short edited pieces) from longer oral history interviews preserved by Northumberland Archives. These interviews were made as part of a project to collect the memories of people who lived on the Northumberland coast. 

For each person there is a short extract where they introduce themselves and other extracts where they talk about their experience of the bombing of Blyth during the Second World War.

Belle talks about being born at home in 1914, just before the start of the First World War. Belle was born a twin and had an elder brother and sister. Her family had a live-in maid in their house. Her nurse lived in the family house for a month after she and her twin were born. Belle mentions that her parents were advised to retreat from the coastal area into Morpeth as a precaution during the First World War, but her parents chose not to relocate. She mentions the defences on the beach and a zeppelin flying over the area looking for the iron works and that to her as a child it looked like a long balloon.

Belle describes the damage caused to her father’s chemist shop in the bombings during the Second World War. She also talks about the fact that there were few doctors and that miners paid 1 pence per week so that they could see a doctor. Not many saw a doctor, but that many saved this up.