“Messerschmitt war plan-es overhead, hearing the explosion of bombs being dropped around you and wondering if this is the day one will fall on your house.”

This is something that many of us can only ever imagine, but now a book containing the personal diaries of a woman living in Romford during the Second World War has been published.

Called World War II London Blitz Diaries, they were written throughout the war from 1939 to 1945 by Ruby Side Thompson who lived in Western Road and have now been published by her great granddaughter Vicki Washuk.

Vicki said: “Ruby’s diaries are just very interesting. I learned more about the war from her diaries than I ever learned in school.”

Frustrations

The diary contains information about day-to-day life during the war and Ruby’s worries as the mother of two sons (she had seven sons in all) who were both in the RAF.

Ruby also discusses her frustrations with being trapped in an unhappy marriage and a male orientated world.

One entry reads: “So this morning I feel I can’t worry about the war. I don’t care a hoot about Hitler, Goring, Ribbentrop and co. I can’t even care about the invasion of Finland, earthquake in Turkey. I just can’t worry myself, that’s what I feel.

“The war is a man’s doing: the earthquake’s natures and I can’t do anything about either.” In another entry she writes: “Ted left a few minutes ago for his evening of cards. I am furious with him, feeling downrightly that I hate him.”

Vicki, who lives in America, was passed the diaries by her grandmother Ruth Thompson in 1991.

A year ago she created a blog where she would regularly upload daily entries from Ruby’s diaries.

She decided to publish them due to the response she was getting from people all over the world.

Vicki added: “I feel great about sharing this information with people that may have no idea about what happened during the London Blitz and how it affected so many ordinary citizens every day.

“It is incomprehensible to me the stress so many had to live under.

“Ruby was outspoken and an early feminist, she could only speak in private about things that she could not speak about to anyone.”