Memories of Peter Reginald Conway
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My film in 2020 - I went to Falmouth University and made a stop-motion film set to the story of my stepfather.
In 2006 I asked him to make a recording and so I wanted to ask him about the war. When he made the recording, they were from when he was 14 from when he signed up to go in the army. It was nothing about fighting. It was really about him being a boy in North London in Harrow and daily life. 1940s and when the Blitz started.
He tells about the bombing and how he was blown from the front of his house and a bomb dropped on the house opposite and it blew back. He came through the whole war without a scratch. He was part of the liberating troops who liberated Bergen Belsen. At the end of the war, he went on to Palestine and saw that the British army were tasked to look after the Jewish people who wanted to go there.
Peter Reginald Conway. Two photos of him.
Short film - 'A New Life Tomorrow' - Vimeo.com/770292456
A New Life Tomorrow on Vimeo. This features his picture and his voice telling his story.
He was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, which means he repeated the stories which actually helped me. He recorded it on a Dictaphone and it had been put in a drawer and when he passed away in 2015 (he was 91) I just wanted to hear his voice. Everyone sat when I played the video because he had that sergeant major voice. He was a character!
I felt it was really important that he was recorded.
I think from what I've heard they were told to tell their troops not to share. Not to tell families. Because the families might find it upsetting. They had to do some terrible things. War is not nice. That's why a lot of soldiers didn't talk about it. To me, he told me quite a few things. One of the things he said - he arrived at D-Day and he never drank. His father was so proud that his father sent him cigarettes and a bottle of whisky. They had to go to Caen. This first battle he got blind drunk and said he cannot remember a thing about it!
Why couldn't he remember? The whisky? Or it was so awful?
