ANOTHER tale of a miraculous escape from death in the Meco bombing has been told me in the wake of my recent feature on that fateful day - October 3, 1940.

My last piece threw the spotlight on the only still living victim of the bombing - Margaret Wainwright of Droitwich (maiden name, Charles) who was just three-and-a-half when she lost an eye and the hearing in one ear. She had been sitting in the front window of her parents' home in Happy Land North when the house caught one of the bomb blasts.

Seven people were killed and more than 60 injured when a Luftwaffe pilot aimed three large bombs at the Meco factory around lunchtime on October 3, 1940. One bomb hit its target, another failed to explode, and the third bounced into the Happy Land area.

Since the last article appeared, I have been put in touch with Ron Woodward, of Bromwich Road, Worcester, who has a further dramatic tale to relate about the Meco bombing.

His parents, Harry Woodward, a GWR goods delivery foreman, and wife Annie were living at No 28 Happy Land North, and had two sons, Cyril and, of course, Ron, who now takes up the story:

"On October 3, 1940, I was 16 and working at Heenans, and was cycling home along New Road during the lunch break when I heard the bombs explode.

"I didn't realise what had happened until I turned into Happy Land and saw the scenes of absolute chaos. The house I had expected to arrive home to had been reduced to a pile of rubble.

"Though only 10 minutes had elapsed since I had heard the bombs explode, neighbours and emergency teams had already extricated my mother and a neighbour, Mrs Jordan from No 26, from the debris. Both of them had been buried under the rubble of their homes when these caught the full blast of the third bomb.

"Rescuers placed my mother and Mrs Jordan on wooden boards on a coal delivery lorry which happened to be in the area, and the driver whipped them off to hospital at break-neck speed," explains Ron.

"I later discovered from my mother exactly what had happened. She had been in the kitchen preparing lunch when she heard the first bomb explode on the Meco factory and, in an obvious state of fright, ran out into the garden.

"However, she had only gone a few paces when the third bomb landed right outside our house. Our garden was separated from the roadway by a corrugated iron fence, and this was blasted towards the house, flattening my mother to the ground and ending up on top of her.

"In fact, the corrugated iron saved my mother's life as it afforded her some protection when the rubble of the house all fell on top of her. If it hadn't been there she would surely have been killed.

"She was a very lucky woman and escaped miraculously with only a broken arm, though she was to be black and blue with cuts and bruises, and suffered obvious shock. However, the hospital soon got her on her feet again, and she was discharged after only a fortnight.

"Our neighbour, Mrs Jordan was not so fortunate, suffering more serious injuries and being in hospital for a long time."

Ron Woodward stresses that it was not the first time his mother had experienced a lucky escape in life. Her father, whose name was Cook, emigrated to America in about 1910 and sent for his wife and two daughters - Frances and Annie - to join him there.

As a result, they applied in 1912 to sail to America aboard the Titanic but, in due course, their application was returned with a letter saying the liner was fully booked. They were offered places aboard another ship which left port a few weeks before the Titanic, and this made its alternative Atlantic crossing!

However, the marriage of the parents of the twice-lucky Annie did not work out, and together with her mother and sister, she returned from America to Worcester after a few years and met and married First World War veteran Harry Woodward.

Ron Woodward says his parents were given "war damage" compensation for the loss of their home in the Meco bombing, but it was not enough money to buy a new house. Instead, they were allocated a house at Tolladine, "which did not go down too well with them," and they lived there for about 12 years.

However, in the 1950s, Annie's father died in Los Angeles and left her a substantial cash legacy which she used to buy the large house at No 16 Ombersley Road, where she and husband Harry lived out the rest of their lives.

The Meco bombing also brought a significant change in the life of Ron Woodward. "If it hadn't happened, I would never have volunteered just a few months later to join the Royal Navy at 17. I had been in the St John Ambulance Brigade and had worked at a first aid post in St John's, so I succeeded in becoming a sick bay attendant in the Navy."

It was a post which took him to mobile field hospitals in support of Royal Marine Commando groups. He sailed to Cape Town, India, the Red Sea, and then to the Egyptian desert. In fact, while there he wrote a letter to his brother Cyril, who was serving in the RAF - and was amazed to receive a reply in just 48 hours.

"It was clear to me Cyril wasn't far away, and it transpired from inquiries, that he was then based near the southern end of the Suez Canal - just 40 miles away. I requested and got 48 hours compassionate leave to go and see Cyril, and he had the surprise of his life when I turned up."

Ron Woodward, who finished up as a senior sick berth attendant, went on to serve in a tented "Mash"-style field hospital in Sicily until its Officers Mess was destroyed by German bombers, with many casualties among the surgeons.

In 1944, Ron married Worcester girl Nancy Huckfield but was called back from honeymoon to join HMS Dryad which turned out to be a top secret land-base - a country mansion near Portsmouth being used as a planning base for the D-Day Landings. "Monty" and General Eisenhower were among the "top brass" Ron saw come and go.

After de-mob in 1946, Ron worked for three years for Ray Shaw at Kitsons, the chemists in Broad Street, but then joined the staff of millionaire Isaac Wolfson who had evacuated his furniture business from London to the Tything, Worcester. However, during Ron's lunch break on his first day with Isaac Wolfson, the Tything premises were devastated by fire and the business had to be transferred to a property in St George's Square.

Not long afterwards, Isaac Wolfson acquired Kay's at Worcester and turned the company in a mail-order empire.

Ron joined the staff of Kay's and was to spend the rest of his working life with the company, becoming an office manager until he retired in 1989. Alas, his wife Nancy died the same year after they had been married for 45 years, mostly spent at his present home in Bromwich Road.

There are two children - Alan who lives in Bath Road, Worcester, and Gail (now Mrs Hampshire) whose home is at Cradley.

- I am grateful to Lionel Buswell, of King Arthur's Close, Worcester, for putting me in touch with Ron Woodward. Interestingly, Lionel's father, Len Buswell had a chance escape from death in the Meco bombing. He worked in the Meco time office and usually went along to put clocking off and clocking in cards in racks for the lunchtime break.

"However, on that fateful day, someone else in the office offered to do the task, and that chap, alas, was one of the seven people killed in the bombing!" he said.