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When war broke out I was seventeen and with my parents in the house at Bunsley Bank I still live in. Mother wanted me to be a tailoress, as she was, but I resisted. I worked for a couple of years at Stapeley Manor Farm (then Whittakers) and then I joined the Airforce.
After Cranfield I was posted to N. Ireland. We went over in a troop ship escorted by submarines. I got my wings and a stripe. As a telephonist if there was a warning of a raid at night we had to wake the camp up. We thought this was rather fun! The Signals would send music to our headphones when all was quiet. We were bussed into underground shelters which were a bit eerie so we sang to keep our spirits up. They took us by coach to Belfast for days out but we were warned not even to look down Shankhill Road. The Irish were very friendly and I was invited home to tea by a civilian telephonist. It was the first time I had ever eaten cheese and jam together on bread. They had lovely oatcakes.
We had a week’s leave about every three months and could get home on the civilian ferries. The North Sea was pretty rough at times. When on leave we would walk to Hankelow and get the bus to go to the pictures. It was all blacked out of course. I had lots of cousins locally and we would sit together at the back of the bus.
My brother was only five at the start of the war but he attended the Observer Corps meetings when he was older. Learning to spot the aircraft at night led to him joining the RAF and my daughter still enjoys airshows. My father was a waggoner for Burton’s Mill at Audlem wharf. He was in the ‘Black and White Minstrels’ shows they used to put on. He collected a shell from the plane which crashed near Yarwoods. That was about the only thing that happened in Audlem.

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