Irene Allen was born in 1928 and grew up in the St John’s area of Worcester. She describes growing up in the 1930s and during WW2. She was 11 years old and at the grammar school when a lone German bomber attacked the MECO factory near her home in Happyland North, just off the Bromyard Road. Her house was damaged, but no one in her family was injured. Seven people died in the bombing and more than 50 were injured. Irene continued to live in the house in Happyland North until she was 23. 

You can listen to Irene’s full interview by clicking on the YouTube video below. You can also download a full summary of her interview via the download button below.

In the recording Irene recalls her early life in St John’s, running errands to local shops, pushing prams round Cripplegate park, playing in fields and streams near the Bromyard Road and going to Sunday School at the Bromyard Road Methodist Church. She remembers being in the voluntary Land Army and going fruit picking at Kinnersley. She passed the 11+ and went to the grammar school and then got a job at Lloyds bank on The Cross in Worcester. Aged 23 Irene moved to a house in Lower Wick where she lived until 2022.