大象传媒

I was 18 when war broke out and I was called up for war work in 1940 . I tried to get a job on the buses as a "clippie" - a conductor. During the war all the clippies were women - but I wasn't old enough. I went into the Engineering works making Bofors guns at Patricroft near Eccles in Manchester. I spent the first three months at Salford College. I learnt fitting at the bench - it was very interesting work, very precise. We had to wear boiler suits and a turban and clogs - but I wouldn't wear black clogs - I had to have red ones.

Both men and women worked in the factory - and the men tried to sell us black market clothing coupons - but I didn't need them. I was so small I could still wear children's clothes and you only needed 5 coupons for a child's dress - not 7 which you needed for an adult.

I worked from 8 in the morning till 8 at night on the bench - and being only 18 I didn't get the full wage - I earned less than 拢2.00 per week. I enjoyed the work although it was rather dirty. We used to have lunchtime concerts in the canteen - It was called Workers Playtime. Ted and Brabara Andrews came once and brought a little girl - I always wondered whether it was Julie Andrews. Everyone was so together - helping each other. We had no transport and had to walk home from work - sometimes in the dark at night with a torch. I was terrified once - No one else was walking my way but somebody was following me..however a sailor came to my rescue.

I got married at 11 am on New Year's Day in 1942 - I was twenty and had to get permission from my mum (my father had died in a pit accident). I married Cyril Gregory - he was 25 years old and in the army. We walked to the church. I didn't have the coupons for a white wedding dress so I wore a coat and hat in Air Force blue, navy suede shoes and a Junior Miss dress! Mum held the Reception in the sitting room. Everyone gave us some ingredient for the wedding cake and the grocer saved my mum a whole ham.

I took over the whole family six months later when my mother died. It was an enormous responsibility - there were four of us and my brother was only eight. Various of my uncles wanted to adopt my brother and sisters but they wanted to stay together. So I had a family before I ever started my own - but my husband agreed to it. It was an enormous responsibilty - we had a waterburst upstairs and I can still see us all standing downstairs with an umbrella - we had no idea how to turn it off. The Arp warden came to help us in the end.

I've only one sisiter left and we're very close - we ring each other before Breakfast every day.

I left war work in 1944 when I had my son.I remember a photograph of all the girls at work sitting astride a Bofors gun - but I don't know where it is now. My husband was sent to India with the Airborne Division of the Black Watch and he was there for the next three years. He was being trained to fly gliders and was being prepared to invade Japan - but the Hiroshima bomb meant he never had to go. I used to send him photos of our son every three months so he could see how he was growing but when he came home our little boy was not used to having a man in the house.

We didn't celebrate VE day but we did put flags out for VJ day - but it did take them a long time to disband the army in the Far East.

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