by P. Bellamy, Form IIIa
The warm Autumn sun shone through the windows of our building and lit up the features of boys who possessed an outlook of sheer unhappiness. A certain one, who afterwards was referred to as a profound bore, was in the schoolboy point of view, to blame. Suddenly the raucous voice of the master-in-charge was interrupted by a wailing tone from the throat of the local air-raid siren. The effect was electrical; the glum faces were simultaneously transformed into a wreath of broad, ear-to-ear smiles, which even a stony glance from "The Terror" failed to subdue.
At a word from him all collected their books and gas masks and descended to the ground floor, a portion of which is fortified as a shelter of no mean strength and stability. On the way down cheery words were exchanged. Lost, amid a host of feet are specs., books, gas masks and often a concealed twopenny blood, which is smuggled down "to pass the time".
The usual scramble for seats ensues, which usually results in a few boys landing on the stone floor. Work continues, although not half as enthusiastically, if it can be called so, as in the class-room. To all intents and purposes the pupils seem to be studying hard, but behind this screen, jokes are told, thrillers are scanned, until perhaps a gowned figure looms up. No freedom of arm movement, crushed postures, make it impossible to write well.
Subsequently the occupants of the shelter, when the period that most of them despised had passed over, began to wish that the "All Clear" would go. Periodically Forms are allowed a stroll around the big hall. When at last the "All Clear" goes more than half the boys in the School are very pleased to hear it.
Source: Gaytonian, April 1941