Surviving the bombs was not easy either

4:23pm Tuesday 6th May 2008

Scores of civilians died during heavy bombing raids in Brighton and Hove during the Second World War.

Naturally, most of the attention since then in books on the bombings has concentrated on the loss of life in attacks such as one on the Odeon Cinema in Kemp Town.

But many other people survived, although they were badly injured, and historian David Rowland has come up with a sad story in his latest book on wartime Brighton, Target Brighton (Finsbury Press, £12.99).

He interviewed Peter Twell, who was just ten years old when there was a severe raid directly above his home in Dinapore Street. Peter lived with his parents, Olive and Charles, and his five brothers and sisters.

He said: "My parents worked very hard in bringing us up and now I can appreciate just how hard it must have been. My mother had a wonderful sense of humour and maybe that helped her with bringing up our large family.

"At the time she was 35 years old, my father four years older. We were a very happy family and although rather on the poor side, enjoyed life to the full. The older children helped to keep an eye on the younger ones."

On the day of the raid, September 23 1940, Peter was on his way back from school and reached the bottom of Richmond Street when he heard the whistle of falling bombs.

Unusually, there had been no air raid warning. He ran into a shop and sheltered there until he felt it safe to move. He arrived at Dinapore Street to find it was roped off and patrolled by policemen.

Dodging the officers, he made his way to the family house but said: "I wasn't prepared for what I saw.

It was so terrible and I cannot ever forget it.

"I saw my poor mother sitting on the pavement and propped up against the wall of the house. Her head, face and body were covered with blood which was still oozing from her.

"The blood was mixed with soot and dust and she was in a terrible state. I remember she kept blinking.

It really was a terrible sight and I was very frightened.

"My father was standing by her side and suffering from a large cut down the side of his face with blood pouring out."

Peter discovered his mother had been hanging washing on the outside line. She came back into the house and was close to a window when a bomb exploded at the bottom of the garden. It blew in the window and his mother took the full force of it.

His father, although in the same room, was less badly hurt and managed to get her up what remained of the stairs and into the street. As Peter arrived, they were awaiting help.

He said: "I just stood there looking at them and I was rooted to the spot.

I couldn't move - in fact I didn't know what to do."

Peter's father told him to collect his sisters from the school shelter and as he went to do that, he could still see his mother propped against the wall, not receiving any help.

She had more than 250 wounds to her body but, worst of all, she had been blinded and was never to see again.

An off-duty policeman and a sailor home on leave eventually came to the aid of Mrs Twell and took her to the Royal Sussex County Hospital. She was not expected to last the night but managed to cheat death in a way the medics found incredible.

She was also told she would probably not be able to walk or use her hands. But four months later, she strode out of the hospital, determined to start her new life as a blind person.

Peter said his mother learned Braille, joined a club for blind people and went back to her domestic duties.

He added: "She never complained but just grinned and got on with it.

She loved life and was just grateful still to be with us."

The children were evacuated to Yorkshire after that but Mr and Mrs Twell stayed in Brighton, moving to a home in Moulsecoomb.

That bombing was not the end of trouble for Olive Twell. Her daughter, Hilda, died of TB in 1946 and her husband died a year later from heart trouble.

Peter said: "I am sure my mother often thought about that terrible day in September 1940 when her life changed for ever. She always wanted to meet the policeman who saved her life, PC Dicky Brown.

At the age of 75, she made a determined effort to meet him but by this time he had died."

However, in 1980, 40 years after the raid, she did manage to meet PC Brown's son, Roger, who had also chosen a police career.

Olive Twell fell ill in 1985 and died that year in a nursing home. Peter saw her on the day before she died and reported she never lost her sense of humour.

David Rowland, also a policeman, was brought up near Dinapore Street and had heard of a woman being blinded in a raid without knowing who she was. He served in the force with PC Brown, a good and modest man.

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