My father settled in London from his native Rome in 1931, teaching Italian and writing verse. He was interned at the outbreak of war and later conscripted to serve in The Pioneer Corps.

He would lead us on tours around his adopted city and on one such Sunday as we walked up Exhibition Road he explained the craters in the stone walls of the museum left by a German plane strafing the doorway of the building.

He also described how if you heard the drone of a ‘doodlebug’ overhead that then fell silent you had 2 minutes to take cover in the nearest basement before it hit the ground destroying everything wherever it fell.