It was a very jolly time, remembers Britain’s Got Talent winner Colin Thackery  

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Happy and glorious! Victory in Europe Day celebrations in London

I’m 89 now but was only nine years old when the war began. At the start, I didn’t really understand what was going on – it was only when the bombings began that I realised we were at war. We were terrified at first but, like all things in life, we soon got used to it. I grew up in Camden Town in London – we used to run around the bomb sites, seeing who could find the biggest piece of shrapnel. Terribly dangerous now you think about it.

When I was ten I was evacuated to Luton with my brothers and sisters. We’d never seen a cow before, so on the way we were rushing to the side of the train shouting, ‘Cor! A cow!’ I got fed up after two weeks in the countryside and decided to make my way back to London to live with my mother (my father was in the army).

I hadn’t the foggiest idea of how to get there but I did it by hitching on the back of lorries. Back in London I became an errand boy for the air raid wardens who were posted above the Carreras Cigarette Factory in Camden. I’d make tea and fetch cigarettes and sandwiches for them.

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