The social research organisation Mass Observation was a fascinating idea – the aim was to record everyday life in Britain through the diaries of a panel of untrained volunteers, who were encouraged to talk about their daily lives as well as writing down details of conversations with other people, and even just stuff they had overheard. There is, of course, no scientific basis in such research – it’s not an opinion poll, and the nature of it means that the participants are not necessarily a cross-section of society. But the depth you get from the diaries, the numerous little details you pick up, the insights in to daily life, makes them a unique and wonderful source that are not afflicted by the tricks that people’s memories play on them. Our Longest Days is a collection of the best bits of MO diaries spanning the entire course of the Second World War, and it’s a real gem of social history. It was edited by Sandra Koa Wing, who died before publication at the shockingly young age of 28, and it also seems to be a fitting testimony to her work with the MO archives.

More than any other piece of WWII history, this gives you a sense of what people really felt at the time – reading a history of the early days of the war, it might not occur to you that people felt a great sense of anticlimax when the air-raid sirens sounded and nothing happened, that they almost yearned for something to happen, however peverse that might be; you see the effect of the sudden changes in lifestyle brought about by rationing, as well as the changes on society brought about the call-up of so many young men to serve; you are reminded that despite the apparent suspension of party politics at national level, people’s perceptions of the conduct of the war and the running of the country were still very much coloured by their political views; and most importantly, that for some people, in some ways, the war years were often very happy times, as well as being extremely demanding.

This is a great book, proving that there is no better way to understand attitudes and experiences than to go straight to the source, and that for every Winston Churchill or General Montgomery, there are tens of thousands of people whose stories we don’t normally get to hear. Our Longest Days goes some way to redressing the balance.

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