March 5

 I try not to watch too much of the nonstop, depressing war news but I get some satisfaction and relief by reliving happier times.

Best of all was when our family and millions of others were reunited in 1945 although without my father who died in 1942.

I remember my mother worrying when Bert, my brother, in the RA F, went overseas at the height of the war when Uboats were a menace.The good news came in a letter from Banff in Canada

She worried again, late in the war, when I was call up for army service.

Until then, as a teenager, I was immersed in war news. I had a huge map on the wall in my bedroom where I followed day by day the battles raging throughout Europe..

Most vivid memories were of the Russian front where Hitler made the fatal mistake of thinking he could defeat not just the biggest army in the world but the most determined civilians, fighting to depend their homes as the Ukranians are doing today.

There were ferocious battles, - for Kiev, now Kiyv - and Stalingrad, where a million citizens died in the five month long battle that thwarted Hitler’s invading army

I marked on my map the Don and Other key rivers in that epic struggle.

And at last, after six years, came peace in Europe and the Far East. A time for celebration, elation and hope that we would never again encounter the madness of major war. 

How tragically wrong we were.