Did any of your family work as an air raid warden?
Amy: O yes my father was a warden; course we lived at Cornhill Royal Mental Hospital; there was 5 killed there in one night – by the way I saw incendiary bombs falling; terrible that was! …Berryden Road…not far away.
Ina: No. I was in the fire watching. I used to watch for the planes coming, for the fires. That’s all I ever did. My Dad was too old you see.
Amy: Used to have uncles in the ARP. If they were a bit older you see, at a certain age they wouldn’t be called up for the army. I think it was in their 30’s.
Have you ever seen Dad’s Army? Well it’s like that sort of thing – some of the older people went in to the ARP – the Air Raid Wardens.

What did it feel like when you heard the sirens go off?
Amy: It was very weird you knew you could be killed.
Ina: Were they coming to you? Or were they going some where else? So you just ran to a shelter.
Amy: They did say that they tried to bomb Balmoral Castle; used to follow the River Dee you see. As soon as they got to the River Dee at the harbour they could get right up there, up Deeside. But they never got it.

Did they get shot down or anything like that before they reached it?
Amy: Oh there was one shot down, it was at the ice rink, 5 on board they were all killed. No planes got Balmoral castle. They never managed, they tried a few times but they never got there.

Was it heavily guarded?
Amy: I should think it must have been. And also you know how there is milestones when you’re out in the country? Well all milestones were taken away so if there were any German spies going around they didn’t know where they were. They maybe had an idea but there were no milestones to tell them how far they were to such and such a place.
Ina: Railings were taken away to make munitions and some of them were put back but very few. This used to be a beautiful town.