Author(s): Mabel Hewitt; Barbara Jones (As told by)

Military

With devastating clarity and gentle humour, Mabel Hewitt relives her extraordinary childhood in the shadow of two world wars. Born in the thirties when the threat of the poorhouse hung over working families, 92-year-old Mabel remembers a chaotic home life dominated by a father traumatised after years in the trenches at Ypres. She was just 10 when war clouds gathered again, as sirens wailed and Mabel took shelter underground with her mother and sisters. Mabel's riveting account of the years that followed, and particularly Coventry's terrible Blitz, bombs whistling down and the cries of pain and fury all around her, mixes with her memories of every-day experiences of a child in wartime. Mabel was growing up fast and, by the end of the war, she was a young woman falling in love. This extraordinary account is an inspiring story of love and hope, following Mabel's journey right up to the present day.