From an account written by Brian Gearing and reproduced here with kind permission of Deb Britton. A fuller account of Brian’s war is shown on the wonderful SeaMills100 site along with a number of other resident’s stories.
Brian Gearing was born in Coombe Dale, Sea Mills and had a happy early childhood playing in the woods nearby. As a boy in the early part of the war, Brian and his friends used trees to pretend to be fighters and bombers. He saw the real thing above or heard them from his family Anderson shelter in his back garden with bombs destroying some neighbouring houses.
Rationing had a negative effect on his childhood with a shortage of chocolate, sweets and fresh fruit. This all changed from 1942.
“We had a terrific war when the Yanks arrived. They were billeted in our homes and had a camp on the golf links at the top of Shirehampton Road. The commissioned officers were placed in the “posh” houses in the Dingle and Stoke Bishop, the other ranks had to make do with sharing our Council homes.
These soldiers had their lives plagued by the young locals with cries for chewing gum, sweets and comics, but bearing in mind how these simple things were so scarce to us, we should be forgiven. A popular cry was “Have you any gum, chum?” They were quite pleasant and did pass chocolate and sweets to the kids. Teenage girls were also asking for nylon stockings, which were also very scarce. Many of the yanks were black, but we had no experience as kids of any race barriers.”
These African American soldiers were probably members of the 542nd – 546th Port Company (Transportation Corps) who were camped at Penpole Lane and worked at Avonmouth Docks.
“I remember being awakened early one morning by the sound of shouted orders and the trample of heavy boots in the street. Looking out of my bedroom window, saw rows of our Yanks lined up and then marched away. It would be many years later that I was to grasp that this was part of the mobilisation of the invasion forces, and these Americans had been held here in readiness for D-Day. We were never to see any of these again.”
His mother, however, did receive an evening purse, probably from Paris. As she was widowed, she was ‘courted’ by an American that wanted to marry her and take her back the States. Not keen to attend the medical, Brian’s mother remained in Bristol.
Brian vividly remembered VE Day and the street party they had. What particularly struck him was how previously unfriendly neighbours, who his friends “as young mischievous terrors, had crossed swords with”, uncharacteristically let their hair down by doing a celebratory conga down the street.
Living in Sea Mills his whole life, Brian ran his own insurance broker and was an important and very active member of the local community. He died in March 2015.
Post-script
Most Bristolians accepted the loss of land and recreational space in order to accommodate the Americans. However, this article from August 1946 shows that the people of SHirehampton were fed-up that their golf course hadn’t been returned.
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US Military in WW2 Bristol 