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This story has been submitted to the People’s War website by a volunteer from Lincoln CSV Action Desk on behalf of Mrs Eva Feulou and it has been added with her permission. Mrs Feulou fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

I was called up at the age of 20 in 1942 to work in an aircraft factory called AV Roe up at Bracebridge Heath in Lincoln. I wasn’t very strong but they never bothered to give me a medical. We had to do men’s work dismantling crashed aircraft. I was given a hammer and chisel and told to remove all the rivets from the outside fabric of a Lancaster bomber. I was a novice and all I did was cause a lump on the side of my hand. A married woman who worked part-time showed me how to handle the chisel and then I had to use a punch through every hole to release the fabric. We had to work very long hours for so little money. I had to be there from 7.30 until 7 pm and received the princely sum of £3 in the old money. My foreman called Arthur Woods had a word with me and told me I was like 10 men; 9 dead and 1 unconscious. What a compliment. He reckoned I was too slow and must learn to work faster. I hadn’t been used to my manual work and was exhausted, then after a few weeks I was told I had to work nights for a month and I would get a rise in pay - £4 a week. I even had to start work at 8.30pm on Sunday nights until the following Saturday morning. When we had to clean with Trico dope fluid it affected your head and made you feel awful. We had to go out into a field and chop up bomb doors with an axe. I told Arthur I couldn’t use an axe so he showed me and told me to chop them up in 3’ sections and stack them on top of each other in the corner of the field — all jagged edges. I was tired out.

From Waddington they fetched two of us in a 60’ tender to go up and clean an aeroplane out in the filed. Unbeknown to us an airman was testing the engine of a Lancaster. I was approaching and my coat, which was open, flew horizontal from the draught — my hair too, and I couldn’t move. Eventually my mate and I cleaned every corner inside and then an airman came with a torch to see if we had done it properly — he had muddy shoes and spoilt the entire floor so we had it all to do again. After that we had to walk to a hangar to clean another bomber and were instructed to put my foot into the fuel hole so that I wouldn’t fall off onto the concrete floor. They gave me a tin of dope and another tin and a knife to scrape off all the anti freeze from the wings which was very greasy, then after that wash all the exterior of the plane with dope. We returned back to base in another 60’ tender. The only thing I enjoyed was being lifted in and out by an airman - especially if he was handsome.

Another experience was when I lived with my sister down Skellingthorpe Road near the level crossing and we were in the back kitchen and at the back were allotments and we saw this Lancaster bomber No. 1654 HCV plane from Wigsley aerodrome heading our way and in trouble. The pilot tried to avoid the house, turned sideways and the wing tip nearly touched my sister’s fence. We ran into the garden and we could see the crew. He levelled off but could not get any height and flew along the backs of the houses up Skellingthorpe Road, hit a telegraph pole before hitting the roofs of no’s 22 and 24 Highfield Avenue, turned and plunged into No. 25 & 27 across the road at 5.00 pm 11th June, 1943. Margaret Marriot lived at No. 25. The plane burst into flames and we could see them from the garden. She was killed aged 11 years old. At no. 24 Mrs Thacker died and her two little boys aged 3 and 4. The only survivor was the rear gunner whose turret broke away and he was in the next street, Royden Grove. Four civilians and six air-crew died. I was given these details much later but was an eye witness to the incident. The aeroplane was on a training flight.

I turned 21 years old in 1943 and I became ill with a bad chest and three weeks later ended up in a sanatorium at St Georges Hospital until March 1944. I put it down to the fumes we inhaled from the cleaning liquid. In 1945 I had to return for about six months but then left early as there was a shortage of nurses. I was not declared free of disease until 1950.

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