Nancy Jenkinson Wartime Recollections

After a chat to Nancy it became clear that Filey was not just a fishing town on the edge of the war, but that in many senses it was just as much on the front line as the rest of the country was. She clearly remembers an air raid that happened when she was at a dance one night at Southdene, when as the sirens began and her and her friends were attempting to find their way back to their homes in the pitch black (due to the curfew) incendiary bombs began to drop and explode around them, but luckily they all made it safely home without any mishaps*. Southdene seems to have been a popular place to go during wartime for dances and other things, and apparently it was also where some Free French men were stationed who were always happy to mix with the locals and frequently gave them gifts and presents.

It seems that the Free French were not the only foreigners to be stationed in Filey though, as Nancy recollects that Canadians were stationed up at R.A.F. Hunmanby Moor, as well as Poles, Jamaicans and many different nationalities up on the same base. Polish men and women apparently also worked on the farms surrounding areas to Filey, which may provide perhaps some clue as to why the three Polish men are buried in St. Oswalds. However, there was also many members of the British Army stationed in Filey, along in the Royal Crescent Hotel and also in the older parts of Filey, off Queen St..

Nancy’s home during the war was on Queen St. itself and as the house was fairly large they had enough space to have an indoor air-raid shelter in their front room which must have proved to be very convenient during air-raids! She remembers looking out of one of the windows of her house just after a raid and seeing the sky glowing from the flames over at Hull, the target for the night. Another night, she recollects, she looked out over Filey Bay and saw the tracer fire blinking in the blackness over the clifftops as the local defences opened fire on an enemy plane on its way home. More than anything she recalls that at times it was a period where life was enjoyed and lived for the moment by many people, and although overshadowed by fear at many points, on the whole it brought the town, if not the nation, closer together.

* N.B. This must be either on the nights of 16^th Aug. 1940 or 20^th Aug. 1940, as these are the only recorded raids on Filey, and also three shops on West Ave. (Numbers 5,11 and 17) placed requests to have windows and shop fronts replaced after being destroyed by bomb damage on 16^th Aug. The only other known bomb damage in Filey was a massive bomb crater left on the same night at a farm at Muston Crossing.