大象传媒

鈥淭his story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a volunteer from Adult and Community Learning, Woodstock, on behalf of Nancy and has been added to the site with his permission. Nancy fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.鈥�

My love of country life began when I was a very small girl. We lived by the sea, so we always spent our holidays in the country, Shropshire and Wales mostly. So for me, the Women鈥檚 Land Army was the obvious choice when war broke out. I didn鈥檛 see myself as a drilling, saluting, cleaning kind of recruit.

I was 17 years old when the war started, and had never been away from home. I lived in Birmingham at the time with my parents and worked as a copy typist in the Head Office of George Mason鈥檚, the grocery shops chain, in the town centre. Our house was about four miles away.

When the town centre had been bombed during the night it was sometimes difficult to get into work the next day. The town would be partly cleared of rubble from bombed buildings for the fire engines to get through. Then the buses couldn鈥檛 get over the fire hoses and we would have to get off and walk the rest of the way. Buildings that had been there yesterday would be gone the next day and you did not know if anyone had been killed. Eventually if became too dangerous in the town and we were evacuated to an office in Kings Heath on the outskirts.

Night after night was spent in an Anderson鈥檚 Air Raid Shelter at the bottom of our garden. The sirens would go as I got home from work and the all clear would not go until morning. The Anderson Shelter was cold and damp with just enough room for three. My father was given a pack of corrugated iron sheets and he followed the instructions to build the shelter in the garden, putting earth over the top to camouflage it.

On one occasion, I collected my things to take into the shelter wrapping them all up in one big sheet and tying it in a big bundle, carrying it over my shoulder. The sirens were howling and we had to dash to the shelter and me and my bundle got stuck in the door of the shelter. In the alarm and panic my mum just pushed me through the door and I fell in.

The house and the ground would shake when the bombs were dropped. We had a bird in a cage hanging on the wall and it fell off during one air raid and my mother gave it a teaspoon of whisky to revive it.

My mother had to prepare food to take down with us. I read
Gone with the Wind there by candlelight, which was very apt, as a lot of places had gone by morning on the way to work!

One day there was a terrible crash. It was really frightening. The thick cable off one of the barrage balloons had snapped and fell across the roof of our house.

We heard the planes droning overhead, when they bombed Coventry, often shaking the ground when they dropped a stray bomb. We knew the difference between the sound of a German plane and a British plane. The German plane made a droning noise that came and went. A British plane made a continuous noise.

When I enlisted in 1941 I was instructed to report to Henley, which I took to be Henley in Arden, which wasn鈥檛 too far from Birmingham but it turned out to be Henley on Thames, which was quite a lot further.

My destination was a model dairy farm where I was taught milking, and was billeted with a young mother and her baby son. Her husband was away in the army. It was quite lonely. There was nothing to do in the evenings, no television then, and no picture houses nearby.

When my training period had finished I was sent to a private farm on the outskirts of Banbury (now demolished to make way for factories), and it was still lonely, two or three fields off the road, and I had no transport. There was no electric light and I had to share a bedroom with the farmer鈥檚 daughter. The toilet was outside so if you had to get up in the night, and lit a candle, as soon as you went outside it blew out! A chamber pot was placed under the bed, but not being used to one, there was no way I could use it in front of a stranger!!!

After a period of time I was transferred to a vet鈥檚 smallholding near Witney. This was slightly better as I could walk into Witney, occasionally, (about 2 miles away). It wasn鈥檛 very nice walking back in the dark. It was a big house and I was given a small attic bedroom right at the top. It was wintertime and freezing cold and we had no heating and only cold linoleum on the floor, and there were still no other Land Girls near.

When I left home to enlist, as a parting gift my Father bought me a very smart white trench coat, which I was very thrilled with. One morning I had to help load some cattle into a lorry to be taken to market. Of course they didn鈥檛 want to go up the ramp so we had to give them a bit of help by pushing them. They didn鈥檛 exactly appreciate this and decided to get their own back by doing what cows do, all down the front of my lovely pristine white mac鈥�. I never did get the stain out!

Once when milking with my head against the cow鈥檚 side, flies were annoying the animal, and she lashed out with her tail 鈥� as cows do - it went right round my forehead 鈥� and I was covered in cow muck! I was not a very pretty sight!

By this time I had decided that I did not like milking, so I put in for a transfer. I was then sent to a hostel in Westcote Barton 鈥� about 11 miles from Banbury. This was better as there were about 30 girls here so it was definitely livelier! It was a lovely old manor house, with a woman over us called a Warden, who looked after our physical needs and a Forewoman who dealt with work and transport. We had two late passes a week, 11pm on Wednesdays and 12 pm on Saturdays, the rest of the week it was 10.30pm

There were buses into Oxford on Saturdays and Sundays, and quite often dances in the Village Hall, which were quite good fun, and got quite crowded as there were lots of servicemen in the area.

I had to share a room with 6 other girls so space was limited. We had a narrow bed each, a narrow wardrobe and a dressing table between two. As I was an only child I found the lack of privacy very difficult at first, but as time went on, we did have lots of fun comparing notes at the end of the evening before going to sleep.

We were taken by jeep or lorry to wherever we were needed (or by bicycle by those who could ride to farms that were nearer) being picked up again at the end of the day, pending on the time of year whether this was early or late.

Jobs varied and included potato picking, potato planting, hoeing, muck spreading, mangold pulling, threshing, haymaking, harvesting. A lot of them very back aching and often exceedingly dirty 鈥� especially threshing, which was incredibly dusty and riddled with rats and mice. But the worst job was sprout picking in icy weather! You started off cold in the morning, and as the frost wore off, your gloves became sodden and at the end of the day you couldn鈥檛 feel your fingers.

Farmers (and their wives) varied. Most were friendly and were glad to see you, and welcomed you. Some were jealous because we were young, and lots of girls were pretty and full of life. Some took advantage of our ignorance of country life, and gave us the worst jobs while what remaining staff there was laughed at us. But mostly we worked along side the men and proved ourselves quite capable!

It was at Barton that I volunteered for tractor driving 鈥� which changed my life completely- I loved it! For six weeks during November and December, along with 2 other girls, I learned to plough on a Fordson tractor in Blenheim Park. You couldn鈥檛 see your opening markers at the other end of the field because of fog!

I remember how bitterly cold and frosty it was. At lunchtime we used to boil potatoes, just as they were, in a Lister engine of boiling water, just to warm ourselves up. They always tasted of paraffin!

I was billeted in a part of Glympton Park House 鈥� which was beautiful 鈥� silk on the walls instead of wallpaper, and lovely grounds.

There were RAF stationed at Starveall Farm, within walking distance, which was very convenient! We thought nothing of walking to Woodstock to catch trains when going on home leave.

After tractor training I was sent to Slough for two weeks to a factory to learn how to service a tractor engine, so that I could hopefully get myself out of trouble if I broke down in the middle of a field, miles from anywhere, - if only temporarily!

I stayed at Glympton Park for 6 weeks and while there I met a young airman who was to become a big part of my life for the next 4 years. Although it was wartime we were very happy. Everyone lived for the day then, never knowing what the next day would bring, just making the most of each day, enjoying life to the full as much as we could, never knowing how soon we could be parted, as eventually we were.

He was always a perfect gentleman to me, and everyone else. We were always so happy in each other鈥檚 company. We never quarrelled. His parents came especially to meet me from Derbyshire when they realised how much we loved each other. But they wanted their son to have a business education before settling down. They also didn鈥檛 think I was the right girl for him. I am afraid my pride was very hurt by this and we had our first, (and only) quarrel. I was ashamed afterwards as he was just being sent overseas, and though I was heartbroken, I just didn鈥檛 see any future for us.

Of course time is a great healer 鈥� if a very slow one. Life wasn鈥檛 the same for a long time. I was lucky that the farm I regularly worked at were wonderful people to me. They had no children of their own, and really and truly spoiled me, and I thought the world of them. Some of the happiest days of my working life were spent with them.
I continued doing tractor work for another six years, stationed at Westcote Barton Manor, near Middle Barton, finally working at Great Tew, where I met my husband. He was sent to work on the farm where I was working. The male equivalent of the W.L.A were called the War Agricultural Workers. These were men unable to be called up for the services for one reason or another, and were sent out to various farms, when and where needed just like us girls, living in hostels just as we did.

German and Italian prisoners were doing the same sort of thing. We were rarely sent to work with Germans who worked in gangs and always had guards with them. We did work with Italians who were friendlier and tried to speak English and tried to flirts with us. Only trusted ones were allowed to work in pairs.

My husband seemed quite shy, and was nice looking, and seemed to take an interest in me. We gradually got talking and made a date. He eventually took me home to meet his parents, which I was very nervous about after my past experience but we took to each other immediately, which was wonderful for me! I was one of the family forever after.

My husbands talents also included thatching, hedge laying and stonewalling 鈥� all, very specialized skills, needing unique qualifications. He was very green fingered, and was expert in market gardening, mostly tomatoes and chrysanthemums, which he loved.

He and I were forever arguing and making up, when we were courting, but eventually decided to marry and started life in a tiny cottage where we were very happy. I never wanted to go back to living in a town. We have now been married for 56 years, and have 3 lovely daughters and 5 wonderful grandchildren and my husband spoils me so I have a lot to thank the Land Army for. I still keep in touch with old Land Girls who came from all parts of Britain- Liverpool, London, and Newcastle etc. After 60 years my former boyfriend and I have also been in touch 鈥� encouraged by my husband, who thought I was very cruel to him 鈥� and its lovely to think we still have fond memories of each other 鈥� and no hard feelings. He has made a successful career and happy marriage and also as 3 children, so perhaps his mother was right after all!

A year ago I had an operation for throat cancer at the old John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, but thanks to the wonderful attention of all the doctors and nurses, I am now fit and well. I cannot think highly enough of them all. And maybe country living had something to do with it also.

PS.------ Years later when Westcote Barton Manor became a private residence again, as ie
any land girls as they could find (there had been about 30 of us) 鈥� and local farmers, who had employed us, were invited back for a reunion, and to see what the house was like as a family home again, which was very much appreciated by one and all!
Altogether very happy years.

As I married a local boy and loved the area anyway, we married in Westcote Barton Church and settled in a tiny village in 1949, called
Sandford St Martin for the first four years, where our first daughter was born. We had no electricity or water laid on, just oil lamps and candles, and water had to be collected from a well a hundred yards away, which was quite a job on washing day, especially when there were lots of nappies鈥�.no disposables then. There was also the problem of a toilet bucket, which had to be emptied once a week.
We then upgraded to a very old cottage (thirteenth century), which had been slightly more modernised, in a lovely village called Church Enstone, not very far away, where we still live today.

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