In this extract from the WLHS Oral History archive, we find George Bradley telling the story of his one single failed delivery during World War II.
George Bradley’s Bedford lorry used in his haulage business. Note the masked headlights as used for wartime service
Listen Here
The Transcript
Before and during the war, I was delivering products for the wood-working company and that took me about 100-mile radius around the country, as far as Sheffield, Leeds, Birmingham and London.
At that time of day. That was before the war. Well then, when the war came, this work got more restricted you see and they did a lot of sub-contracting to shopfitters, you see, across here. And I delivered their products to the various shopfitters round the cities, London, Birmingham and the like.
Well that dropped off of course during the war very much and I was delivering some of their products during the war when the aircraft were coming over, when they were bombing London. That was sometime around 1940.
Well then that went on and only on one occasion I had to bring some stuff back. And we put the load on over the weekend. On the Sunday, that was a Sunday when the Germans came over and plastered the Dock area of London.
On one weekend in particular. On the Sunday night that was their one point was to plaster the Dock area of London. Which they did in some order and the Dock area was knocked about bad on that occasion. Including parts of East London, you see, that was where we used to deliver.
One of the places we went to deliver was still on fire. We went in the morning and I never saw such a thing. The road was absolutely covered with hoses. Fire engines and hoses all over the place. That was in Snow Hill just behind the Old Bailey. That was the only delivery I wasn’t able to do and I had to bring that back.
The Full Interview
George and Megan Bradley lived in Station Road, Shipton. George had a haulage business and brother Reg ran a garage business. Originally in Station Road, they then moved to centre of Shipton to new premises used by the Americans during the war. This informal conversation with John Rawlins was recorded on March 17th 1988 . This is a single conversation in two parts, divided simply because of the arrival of Megan Bradley halfway through.
Find the full interview here
Wright family haymaking 1938. George Bradley in white hat
More Extracts
- Cissie Carpenter and the Good Doctor
- Bim Champness and Some Memories of Village Characters
- Dorothy Thomson, Hathaways and Mrs Wiggins
- Dorothy Thomson and the Tale of Mr Samuda’s Model T Ford
- Dulcie Arundell and the Tale of the American Soldier at Shipton Station
- Megan Bradley and the Canadian Soldiers in World War II
