HERNE BAY
The Little Restaurant on the Prom
A childhood memoir of life before polio, and immediately after, and my magical childhood adventures in and out of a wheelchair
My Grandfather and the Bomb
Croyse had been trying unsuccessfully to retrieve it with a stick. I watched him try and try again. It was bright yellow and had fins. No, not a fish but it was to cause quite a stink, though. Croyse gave up on it. He walked dejectedly up the beach and out of sight. Now it was my turn, my chance to have a go at trying to possess this interesting looking object. At 6-years-old I was nobody's fool and wearing my wellies was able to get that much closer to it than Croyse. I attached a piece of wire that I had found round one of the fins. At last I had it. I dragged it clear of the water and was just about to lift it up when my grandfather, taking a stroll along the beach after a session in the pub, wobbled down the beach to see what I had got. "I'll give you a hand, son, " he slurred. Now my grandfather had been in BOTH world wars, and you may have thought that it might just have occurred to him that, what resembled a bomb, would have sent various alarm bells ringing. "Don't worry Granddad, I can manage." With that I heaved the bomb up in both arms and carried it up the beach. Granddad, slightly unsteadily, followed after me. Now I had to negotiate some very steep steps and CLANG! I rested the bomb on one step whilst I got up. Then CLANG! I rested the bomb on the other step. There were three steps in all. I made my way the short distance to my father's restaurant with my grandfather in tow. As I walked into the restaurant I couldn't understand why people were hurling themselves at the doors and disappearing rather rapidly. I walked into the kitchen. The look of horror on my parents face when I presented my trophy: "Now..er, put it down gently, son," said my father, "NO! not near the gas stoves!" He gave out a sort of strangled cry and had trouble breathing. "Put it down GENTLY on the table AWAY from the ovens!" he urged gently but firmly. At this point I didn't know what all the fuss was about. I soon did, though. "There, that's it. Gently does it." I put my bomb carefully on the table indicated whilst all hell broke loose. The police were called and the bomb squad! A kindly policeman spoke to me about the dangers of 'finding things lying on the beach' and I, in future, was to 'leave them alone'. The bomb turned out to be a 2nd-world-war 'flare'. If it had gone off in that small space…well it doesn't bear thinking about. My grandfather? Grandmother saw to him!
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