Freud_Burlingham_1943_War_and_Children_k_text

Blitz in September and October 1940, theevents of this night were rather surprising andalarming. There was more gun fire than everbefore, the sound of falling bombs was continuous,the crackling of fires which had beenstarted could be heard in the distance andagain all these sounds were drowned by theincessant droning of air planes which flew overLondon, not in successive waves as in formerraids, but in one uninterrupted stream from9 p.m. until 5 a.m.The elder members of the staff were, ofcourse, awake and patrolled the house, theyounger members went down from their atticbedrooms and joined the children in the shelter.The children themselves, to our astonishment,slept peacefully as usual and never noticedwhat was going on above them.Whether it was due to the fact that theheavy wooden beams of the shelter ceilinglessens all noise, or whether the quiet atmospherein which they had fallen asleep carriedthem through the restlessness of the night outside,—thefacts are that no one took noticeexcept Patrick who satup suddenly and said:"Gun fire."His mother who was on shelter duty answered:"Yes, but gun fire does not hurt anybody",whereupon Patrick lay down and sleptagain.104