大象传媒

I was a member of the Womens' Land Army for 4 years. I had to have my parents consent to join the Forces becauseI was too young, but not for the WLA, so I joined the WLA and it was a fait accompli. I first worked on a market garden in Colnbrook near Hounslow, Bucks and worked alongside gypsies. I was the only "diddycoy" (what the gypsies called a non-gypsy). I was only there for 2 weeks when Mrs. Clarke (wife of the owner of His Masters Voice), our welfare officer for that area came and told me I should not be working with these people and moved me to a farm in Ditton near Langley. I had quite enjoyed working with the gypsies, who had a camp in one of the farmer's fields. They used to invite me to their encampment in the evenings where they were whittling away at wooden pegs, etc. and some of them had the real gypsy caravans where everything was sparkling clean.

I was placed with Mr. Major a "gentleman farmer" who only walked round his farm with his walking stick every day and never soiled his hands. He owned a large farm with cattle, poultry, hay grain, etc. and I was to work with the poultry. I was put in sole charge of the poultry farm of 2,000 or more chickens which was situated in a large orchard. I had one man to help with the feed in the mornings - he used to get there before me and light the boiler to boil up the potatoes for the mash. I had a boy at the weekends to clean out the hen houses, otherwise I rarely saw anyone else all the time I was there. The different breeds were all in different pens with long runs, and the bantams were not shut up at all. Every so often we had to move the runs to new grass.

I loved the work and learnt quickly what to do although I had come from a town. I bought a book and read up about poultry. I learnt to pluck and draw chickens for Christmas and eventually to wring their necks, which I did not really like doing. When I was shown how it looked easy, but when having to do it with no-one else there the first time the chicken never seemed to die. I panicked, but after the third time of pulling and screwing I thought I had broken its neck it got up and walked a little way. You can imagine my horror, but I was told afterwards that the nerves make it flutter for a while.

I had very little time off, because dealing with birds or animals one had to work at weekends and I rarely went home to Bedfordshire some 50 or 60 miles away. I may have had a long weekend 2 or 3 times a year, but somehow I never minded this. We were very poorly paid and never got overtime or weekend (Sundays) extra pay.

At threshing time I helped in the evenings because the threshing machine was housed in my area where the geese and the duckpond were. It was a filthy job with the dust getting up the nose, in the eyes and mouth making one look ghostly and the eyelashes and what hair was showing were all white. At these times I did meet the other Land Girls, who were billeted in hostels, but they were rare occasions.

We had some Show Breed chickens and I would have to take them to Shows around the area and to Crystal Palace in London. I had to polish their nails and feathers, etc. and we won many prizes. I was always the only female amongst a hall full of men, but they always looked after me very well. The Ministry of Agriculture used to come round occasionally and they tried to persuade me to go to Agricultural College in Shropshire. I had previously been waiting for a place in teachers' training college, but at the end of the war I almost simultaneously got a place from both colleges and was undecided which one to take, but my first love prevailed and I chose the teaching career.

There was an RAF airfield in the village of Langley and we were invited to dances. I became friendly with the New Zealand Commanding Officer and he used to fly low over the farm and orchard on occasions and wave to me. Being near to what is now Heathrow we had many night air raids but very few in the day. We had an air raid shelter in the garden which we used at first, but people got blase after a while and just got under the table when there was an air raid instead of going out into the garden in the dark and cold. Ditton Park was close by and was taken over by the Navy - it was all very "hush-hush" - I was told secret work was going on there, but the Germans obviously didn't know about it because we didn't get many air raids. It was in a thickly wooded area, so maybe could not be seen from the air.

The first billet I had was with the cowman's family. There was no central heating or electric fires and no bathroom. In the winter the water in the washstand jug was freezing and sometimes I had to break the ice on top to wash with it. I was allowed a bath once a week in a tin bath by the fire.

I only realised how well off I was after the war, when I read a book about the Land Army and how badly treated other girls were by the farmers and farm hands and what difficult tasks they were given to do. Their accommodation was often very poor,etc. I also heard many years later that if you were educated and came from a good class family background you were given better postings. That, I think, must have been so in my case, as my father was a dentist and I had a wonderful job dealing with the poultry which I loved doing.

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