I was most interested to see the photograph of bombed-out Cromwell Road; as I was in the house (No 49 with the hedge) at the time, but have no recollection.

Prior to her marriage my mother lived there with her two siblings and widowed mother. On her marriage to my father she moved to his home town of Croydon.

Croydon was badly bombed during the war and with my father on Active Service he, ironically persuaded my mother to come back to Grays and stay with my grandmother.

I don’t know exactly when the bombing happened, but I was born in May 1942 and was upstairs in my cot at the time.

The ceiling collapsed on the cot which also collapsed and I was underneath it all.

Somehow, my mother managed to extricate me, basically uninjured.

I believe we were “evacuated” to a flat in Clarence Road and subsequently moved back to No 49.

My father having been killed on Active Service on December 31 1942, my mother stayed living at 49 where I was brought up.

ANNETTE SMITH Harvey, Grays