大象传媒

More Wartime Tales

During my service days I learned how to handle a 鈥渇luid load鈥� 鈥� in my case, sixteen men standing in the back of a 30cwt Commer hanging on to the bars, which held up the canvas cover. At the first left turn, the nearside wheels threatened to take to the air as the men swayed in the back. That was quite enough to frighten me into cornering at walking pace. We were in Cornwall, and I remember trying gingerly to climb out of a steep Cornish cove without throwing them around. I stalled the truck several times before I gathered the courage to accelerate to peak revs and slip the clutch to get enough power to the wheels.

I also learned what it was to drive in convoy, at night, in total darkness, with the headlights masked so as not to present a target for enemy aircraft, whilst all the time fighting to stay awake. This was just before D-Day when transport was being collected from different depots and distributed to various places along the South Coast. A group of us were despatched from London at 4 a.m. one day in a Commer to go to Derby and collect some vehicles. Enjoying the camaraderie, we headed North, passing convoys of tanks and other materiel heading South for the invasion. Once in Derby, we cleaned off our allotted vehicles, filled their tanks and made the routine checks before heading back South to London in convoy. Our progress was severely delayed, however, as one of our drivers kept being taken ill and, as we all had to stay together, we had to keep stopping until she felt fit enough to continue. We had a lot of sympathy for her until we found out that she was pregnant, and should have reported sick. She would never have been allowed on such a long drive if her condition had been known. As a result of the delay, the NAAFI that had been arranged to provide refreshments for us along the way had closed. Hungry and tired, we slogged on into the night, with headlights masked and no road lighting to light our way. All there was to guide me was the tail light of the truck in front, pointing my direction in the black bag ahead. Eventually I actually fell asleep at the wheel. If this has never happened to you, dear reader, I have to tell you that sleep creeps up on you unawares. One moment I was watching the next truck鈥檚 tail light, the next there was a jolt as the wheels hit the grass verge, jerking me awake. Throughout the experience that red tail light remained convincingly real. It was terrifying. Later we exchanged confidences and found that almost all of us had experienced the same thing. Eventually we all discovered ways of conquering the problem. Some sucked on a lucky charm; others sat on something uncomfortable out of the small kit, or sang all the rude songs in the service repertoire. One girl with amazing will power gave herself mathematical problems to work out. One way or another, we all got back unhurt, with all the vehicles in one piece. The camp cooks had thoughtfully left our suppers to keep warm in the oven on a low light. We thrashed our way through the cockroaches which were having the night out, only to find the meals were baked hard to the plates and were inedible. Tired, hungry and disgruntled, we crawled into our beds at 2.30 a.m. almost twenty four hours after leaving them.

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At this period we were feeling the benefit of 鈥淟ease-Lend鈥� from the United States. America had sent lots of equipment to Britain on a loan basis to help with the build up for the big day. On night duty, I was asked to take the ambulance, which I had never driven, to the other side of the airfield. I hopped in to find the steering wheel on the left. The gear stick was on the steering column; I鈥檇 never seen a column change. The handbrake was in a different position as well; but she was a delight to drive 鈥� no austerity there. That was when I really learned the technique of using the palm of the hand on the side of the gear stick for changing gear, since it lay horizontally instead of perpendicular. I found this technique was also very helpful in sorting out the gears on other vehicles, and it鈥檚 something I鈥檝e passed on to my pupils.

I learned a great deal in those times. I remember one day on leave, I was crossing the road for home, when I saw Dad and a cousin of mine working on an old Austin outside the house. Dad had his head under the bonnet, the engine was stopped and the valve cover was off; my cousin was slowly turning the starting handle. Dad said 鈥淚鈥檓 not sure which cylinder is going to fire next.鈥� I looked over his shoulder and quickly calculated that it would be number three. Dad and my cousin were astounded. 鈥淗ow the Dickens did you know that?鈥� 鈥淲e鈥檝e just done it on a course,鈥� I said. 鈥淭he Otto Cycle.鈥� That was the first time I鈥檇 ever been able to tell Dad anything about engines.

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The training we received stood me in good stead on many occasions. On one trip I had to take two of our mechanics to Manchester in a Hillman car, where they were to collect two vehicles and return them to Radlett. The Flight Sergeant had told me to 鈥済et them there 鈥� and fast.鈥� It was an emergency. 鈥淎nd if you鈥檙e speeding 鈥� don鈥檛 get caught.鈥� I certainly did speed, but I wasn鈥檛 caught. We saw very few policemen on the road in those days, there were more important duties for them. I left my passengers to do their work and set off on the return trip. I picked up an RAF lad who was hitching a lift, and further on two American soldiers, all making for Manchester鈥檚 attractions. Climbing a steep hill, suddenly the bonnet became enveloped in clouds of steam. I pulled up, and turned to ask my passengers if they knew anything about cars. They all shrugged non-committally. After all, they were dressed in their best off-duty uniforms. I began to think about possible faults.

I sent the RAF lad to fetch a kettle of water from a nearby house while I opened the tool kit and lifted the bonnet. I found the trouble straight away. The dynamo wasn鈥檛 turning because it had slipped back down its curved bracket, allowing the fan belt to go slack, which, as a result, wasn鈥檛 turning the fan. This had caused the engine to overheat, causing the steam. I was in the process of adjusting the dynamo and tightening the bolt when a Queen Mary pulled up alongside. A Queen Mary was the RAF name for a 60ft long articulated lorry used for carrying aircraft. The corporal driver leaned out and shouted, 鈥淣eed any help?鈥� 鈥淣o thanks, I can manage!鈥� That felt good. The boy came back with the kettle, I filled the radiator and we were on our way.

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Another adventure earned me a strong reprimand. Somewhere near Bishops Stortford, I was driving a Flight Lieutenant and two RAF hitch hikers towards London along a dual carriageway. I was travelling at about 50mph, and moved out to pass a large articulated truck, which was moving very slowly up ahead in the left-hand lane. Then I noticed that he started to turn right, from his position in the left lane, to do a U-turn through a gap in the centre of the carriageway. There were no such things as indicators then; drivers used hand signals, which were not always visible from behind bodywork, and in any case were usually short-lived, as the driver soon needed both hands on the wheel to start his manoeuvre.

I braked. Nothing happened. I braked harder. Still nothing. I began to pump the brake pedal, and quickly realised for certain that the brakes had failed. By this time the front end of the lorry had entered the gap, moving at about 5mph, and it was completely blocking my path. The driver by now was looking at me anxiously. I moved to the left lane, and judged that, with a lot of luck, I just might sneak past behind him as he moved over. Imagine my horror when, as he continued his turn, I realised that the logs he was carrying overhung the end of his trailer by far more than the few feet I was hoping for. Worse still, they were clearing (by a few inches) a huge oak tree growing on the bank at the roadside. My last chance of an escape route had disappeared. I had no choice but to select the line of least resistance, and hurtled unstoppably towards the logs which, as they got closer and closer, seemed ready to smash through the windscreen and take the top of the car off. Miraculously, we sailed right underneath them without a scratch. There was complete silence throughout from my passengers. No doubt they realised what was happening, and were quiet, first with horror, then with relief.

I struggled on with the journey with no brakes. The hitch-hikers in the back made it to London, and the officer and I reached base older and wiser. Naturally, I reported the fault to the MT section, and was duly hauled up before our Flight Sergeant, a ferocious man when roused, and capable of putting the fear of God into anybody. He gave me a good verbal drubbing. 鈥淵ou should have stopped as soon as you could safely do so, and sent for help. You could all have been killed!鈥� He was quite right, of course, but my mind was taken up with the belief that my first duty was to get my passengers home.

Even so, I didn鈥檛 take that lesson to heart. On three occasions after the war I drove other peoples鈥� vehicles home after their brakes had failed. This was before there were laws on tyres, safety belts, and MOTs, I hasten to add. It was achieved by gearing down, creeping towards possible hazards, and always having the handbrake at the ready, as well as keeping an eye out for kerbs as potential aids to braking. I wouldn鈥檛 dream of attempting that on today鈥檚 roads.

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One Christmas Eve, a colleague and I were returning to camp in heavy fog. We had collected three hitch hikers, one of whom was an American officer. It was my turn to drive, and I was doing my best, head out of the window, to follow the centre line, my only guide to the line of the road. All of a sudden I was caught in the glare of unmasked headlights. It was a huge lorry, taking up half the road. I pulled away from the centre line, but neither far nor fast enough. The huge projecting side mirror of the lorry hit the side mirror of my van and smashed it to pieces right where my head had been a fraction of a second previously. We both stopped. It was then that I realised it was an American army truck. Their driver got out and came over to me, shining his torch in my face. In a broad American drawl, he exclaimed 鈥淢y God, she鈥檚 got glass in her eye!鈥� A call from the crowded lorry came through the fog 鈥淎w c鈥檓on, let鈥檚 get to the party.鈥� The driver hesitated uncertainly. Then a voice from the back of the van said 鈥淟eave it to me, I鈥檓 a doctor.鈥� Relief all round 鈥� though perhaps not for the doctor, if he was going to a party of his own. I climbed in the back and he examined my eye in torchlight. He removed some glass and advised us to find a local hospital. We had no idea where it was, but following his directions, we left our passengers behind and somehow in the fog we found the sign, the drive, and finally the cottage hospital. The eye was scratched but otherwise undamaged, and after dressing it, they kindly accommodated us for the night. After breakfast we made our way back to camp in time for Christmas dinner, which was very good, even if I did have to squint to cope with a huge dressing that covered much of my face. I wonder what the chances are of having a medical expert on hand at such a time. I hope he made his appointment. It occurred to me later that there was no point in having masked headlights in fog, as there would be no enemy flying. But the masks were permanently fixed as far as I could tell.

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The service could be harsh if we made a mistake. One of our girls skidded her van on black ice. It turned on its side, trapping and breaking her arm under the door. She was unable to drive for some weeks, and in the meantime was put on a charge and fined heavily, her pay being docked for several weeks. I was incensed! I鈥檇 never heard of any other personnel ever being punished for breaking equipment or ruining food or materials through accident. But we knew that the C.O. disliked women drivers; he would post them very quickly when they were sent there in ones or twos. He鈥檇 had no choice when our bunch arrived there; they were desperately short of drivers.

Once I was given an Armaments officer to take on a tour of various sites. The job was to last a couple of weeks, while he checked on weapons and ammunition at the sites. From the first, his approach was unconventional, asking me to use his Christian name. This was unheard of, and I wasn鈥檛 comfortable with it. We got to our first call, and had to spend the night in a local hotel. After I had gone to bed, he knocked and entered my room; he sat chatting at the end of my bed. It was embarrassing, as I was aware that other people in the hotel would hear that I had a man in my room. Before I knew it, he was not only in my room, but in my bed. There was a silent struggle lasting some minutes, and finally I got rid of him. On my return to camp the Flight Sergeant came to me and asked pointedly, 鈥淗ow did you get on with your passenger?鈥� I didn鈥檛 let on, but he was astute and pressed me for more information. In the end he said, 鈥淚 want a full report.鈥� When I got to the rest room I was besieged by four other girls who had driven him. They had all had the same kind of trouble. We all made reports, and the officer was court-martialled.

It was a farce. The court was full of male officers from various services and various countries, all outranking us, and not a single female. The court guards, clerks and the prosecuting officer were from the camp, so we knew them and would see them every day afterwards. The officer himself was defended by Curtiss Bennett, a brilliant leading KC. We were all very intimidated and made to feel ashamed by the questioning. We couldn鈥檛 answer with any confidence, or bring ourselves to use the words involved, which were just too embarrassing. It was easier to answer 鈥淚 can鈥檛 remember鈥� or 鈥淚 don鈥檛 know鈥�, which the prosecutor had told us to say if we felt we couldn鈥檛 give a full answer. We had absolutely no advice or preparation beforehand, and the top table, with five senior officers, caps laid on the table with their decorated peaks facing the court, was most intimidating. We all felt humiliated, belittled and dirty. Two girls came out of the court in tears, believing they had been thought to be lying. At the end, the officer was found not guilty on five charges, and guilty only of not maintaining discipline between an officer and the ranks. He lost his rank of Temporary Acting Flight Lieutenant, which made him a Pilot Officer. One good thing came of it 鈥� I would never be afraid in court again. I have appeared in court as a witness three times since then, and no overbearing counsel can shake me now.

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Weeks on the road with a male passenger does leave a girl rather vulnerable, but I can honestly say that I never had a problem apart from that one time. Here is an example that is much more typical of the way things were.
In May 1944, I had the pleasure of driving one of our scientists on what amounted to a tour of the South Coast. We left London for Dover and, after an overnight stay there, followed the coast road to Land鈥檚 End and back. The whole trip took three weeks, and involved several diversions to small signalling sites. These usually consisted of just a couple of signal vans in a field. At one of these I sat in their first van to await my passenger who was checking their operation in the second van. There was a young airman in my van who was working a Morse code signalling set, and, in between our chats, he would operate the signalling. He was so good at it, he would refer to a list, rattle off his signal and pick up our conversation where we had left off. This went on for a couple of hours. I had no idea what it was all about, but I knew not to ask questions. I was to learn more, however. Somewhere outside Southampton, in the New Forest, I could glimpse through the trees tentage and vehicles and what looked like piles of ammunition. We stayed that night in a hotel in Swanage. In the morning I brought up the car for my passenger and found him standing at a low wall looking seawards with binoculars trained on the Isle of Wight. He handed them to me, warning me to keep a low profile as we could be taken for spies. To my astonishment, what had looked like a black sea around the Needles was in reality a host of boats, hundreds it seemed. Something was brewing, but the plans for D-Day had been very cleverly hidden. Very few knew that all the build up, to which I had been privy, was in preparation for it. The signaller I had spoken to was doing his part, sending out false movement signals for the Germans鈥� benefit. It seems they were fooled into believing the Allies were planning to invade from further up the coast across a narrower part of the Channel.
The final site was in Sennen Cove near Land鈥檚 End. We had several days here; there was a short warm break in the weather, which allowed us to go swimming in the sea. This was the good life. A few days later, on the 6th of June 1944, the largest seaborne invasion in history was launched against German occupied France.

Two days after the landings, returning to Radlett from a job, I was handed a telegram by the RAF police. It told me that a boyfriend from my civilian days would be at the Cumberland Hotel in London the next day at 7pm. I booked a late pass the next morning, and then to my dismay I was sent to Dover with another officer. We were to return the same day, and all the way back I was hoping against hope that I might still make the date. At some traffic lights in London, I caught sight of a clock 鈥� 7pm! So that was that, then. I gave an involuntary sigh. 鈥淲hat was that for?鈥� asked my officer. I told him all about it as the lights changed and we moved on. 鈥淧ull up at the next Underground station鈥� he announced. I did so. He leapt out and said 鈥淚鈥檓 giving you permission to keep the car. Be back on duty tomorrow morning. I鈥檓 going back to camp on the train.鈥� With that he was gone, before I could thank him.

I got to the Cumberland about fifteen minutes late. I walked into the bar and there sat my friend, resplendent in his naval officer鈥檚 uniform, starting to look a little forlorn. Meetings were hard to keep in those dark days. He had been with his ship in the invasion, and was able to tell me a little of what it was like.

We had dinner and danced 鈥� a lovely evening. He didn鈥檛 seem to mind at all that I was still dressed in my battledress! During such trying times these things are unimportant, even expected. I never saw or heard anything more of him. Did he meet someone and settle down? Or was he one of the many friends and acquaintances who never came back? I鈥檒l never know.

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