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In 1940 I was nursing at a hospital in Finchley, North London. I started nursing in 1935 and previously worked in Chatham, Maidstone and at Champneys. At the time of the London blitz 6 pm was breakfast time for the night staff, and regularly we ate our breakfast with the drone of German aircraft overhead. Many a bomb whistled over us to fall near the hospital. Late one evening a string of smaller bombs fell on the hospital and the windows of the ward where I was on duty, were blown in. It was a dark, wild night so all the beds had to be pulled into the middle of the ward, one having to be placed in front of a disused fireplace. Unfortunately for the patient, a little man, he ended up looking as if he was wearing a black cloak, with soot loosened from the chimney covering him. Daylight revealed two old trees decorated with items from the contents of the stores. Bars of yellow soap, all shapes of pots and pans, even ropes of sausages dangled from the trees. No one could have decorated them so well! A crate of eggs was also smashed. Hard luck! We were only allowed one per week, so there were no eggs that week.

One night I was on night duty at Chatham Hospital. Now Chatham was notorious for its terrible food; one morning it smelt like pig swill. We took it back to the kitchen and opened the dining room window to get rid of the pong. I decided that something must be done. A letter to the committee was the only way.

This letter I duly wrote, stating that I was in a TB ward and needed good food lest I catch it myself. This did the trick. We thought we were at the Ritz, the food was so good. A member of committee was present at each meal while after that to make sure it was of a reasonable standard.

It was while I was at home in Aston Clinton one weekend, that I met Jozef. It was at the local village ‘hop’ that he asked me if I would like to dance, clicking his heels and bowing. Jozef was from Poland where his family owned a large farm. He was in the Polish army when the Germans invaded Poland. He was taken prisoner and sent to a concentration camp in Romania. He escaped from there when he was allowed to go to the local market to buy chickens and vegetables for the camp. He caught a train at the station and had a narrow escape when he was asked for his papers. As he could speak perfect German he pretended he was a German soldier who had been separated from his unit. He asked how he could get to the German embassy so that we could rejoin his unit. The ruse worked and when he left the train he went instead to the British embassy and eventually reached England, via Palestine. In 1942 he reached this country and joined the RAF. Here he was sent to RAF Halton to train in bomb disposal. One Saturday evening he went to the dance in the nearby village of Aston Clinton, where we met.

Jozef and I were married in 1945. In 1947 Jozef left the RAF and for a time, worked for my father who was a builder. But farming was what Jozef really knew and later my family bought Shepherd’s Farm for us. It was in a poor state by this time but Jozef built up a successful arable and livestock farm. There was electricity laid on but water still had to be drawn from a well. We had a new house built for the family in 1957. The old house has become the cottage in which my daughter Pauline, now lives.

After the war Churchill announced that all Poles who had come to England in the war were welcome to stay. Eventually Jozef became a naturalized British citizen and later changed his surname to Kaye, which he thought would make life easier for our young children when they went to school.

Jozef became Chairman for the local Polish community and we were leaders in the negotiations to buy the church in Victoria Street, Dunstable for them. Three of Jozef’s sisters were nuns and his brother became a priest.

We had 3 children, Edmund (named after Jozef’s brother), Christine, Jeanette, Gabrielle and Pauline. I have 8 grandchildren and 9 great-grandchildren.

After the war we visited Poland but it was very risky, as Jozef could have been called up by the Polish authorities. Security was very strict and there were armed guards at the borders. (It was still part of the Soviet Communist bloc.) It would not have been safe to stay there. What became of the family’s farm we do not know.

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