大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Deena Campbell from CSV Action Desk on behalf of Mrs Peggy Ducker and has been added to the site with her permission. Mrs Ducker fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

Everybody has one day which in retrospect they know to have been life鈥檚 turning point.

In 1939 I was 18: a protected only child who had never been away from home. My ambition on leaving school had been to become a reporter. After a year at secretarial college to learn necessary skills, however, neither the local nor the national newspapers could be persuaded to show any interest, so I began to hone them in a solicitor鈥檚 office.

The early years of the war 鈥� Dunkirk, The Battle of Britain, two long hot summers, two dark winters of blackout 鈥� are almost like dreamlike memories. No-one very close to me was in the armed forces. Oxford was miraculously free from bombs; it became a renowned centre for the treatment of servicemen with severe head injuries. Convalescents in hospital blue were a familiar site in its streets and cinemas. I began to feel the urge to become part of the war effort. One of my cousins became a VAD and her three brothers joined the Navy. Recruitment posters began to appear; there was one showing a boat crew of uniformed Wrens with the message 鈥楩ree a Man for the Fleet, and it made up his mind.

Despite the posters the WRNS was the most difficult service to enter except in the category of 鈥淪teward鈥� where there were fewer opportunities to serve overseas. So after volunteering to be a 鈥淲riter鈥� and passing the medical examinations I waited more or less patiently not weeks, but months, to be called up; until in 1942 the summons came to present myself at Westfield College in London for a probationary fortnight. This meant that if either party felt itself not to be suited they could agree to part!

If travelling to London and negotiating the underground for the first time, was an adventure it was nothing to the impact of Westfield College 鈥� hundreds of other would-be recruits, all excited and apprehensive鈥 sea of faces. I can remember only two: One whose father was a plastic surgeon 鈥� an occupation which gave enormous prestige for we had all been inspired by the story of Richard Hillary. In peace, as a handsome Oxford undergraduate, he had voted 鈥榥ot to fight for King and Country,鈥� in war he was a Battle of Britain hero who, shot down inflames, underwent months of surgery for terrible burns to face and hands. (He later returned to flying duties and was killed in action.)

The other person I remember was the quite fair- haired girl who shared my 鈥榗abin鈥�. There were just two bunk beds to a room and we were rapidly instructed in the necessity of hospital corners and the importance of placing the blue and white counterpane with its anchor motif the right way up 鈥� upside down brought bad luck and 鈥榮cuttled the ship鈥�. There were other rules to learn. If you met an officer indoors you flattened yourself against the wall to allow her to pass: outdoors she must be saluted. You addressed her as 鈥楳a鈥檃m鈥�.

We ate our first supper, which was lavish by civilian rationing standards 鈥� Wrens had the same rations as able seamen and most of us, had we but known it, were about to start putting on weight. I was one of a group at the end of the meal told that we were to wash up after breakfast the next morning. We looked around the huge dining hall and mentally counted the hundreds of people to wash up after.

Breakfast was also very lavish in quantity and to the chagrin of the washers up consisted of large robust kippers with a very full compliment of bones. The numbers in the dining room didn鈥檛 seem to be diminished either. At the end of the meal. We were conducted to the kitchens, now masquerading as the 鈥榞alleys,鈥� to be confronted by two huge teak sinks and draining boards and hundreds of plates containing the remains of mangled kippers and thousands of their bones. We were issued with overalls and told to set to and to scrub the sinks and draining boards very thoroughly afterwards. As nothing clung so fervidly to the teak as the aroma of kipper (or to us as it transpired). Whether intentional or not, it was good psychology 鈥� in those days many girl shad been in the Girl Guide movement with its camping holidays and weekends. In some ways Westfield perpetuated the holiday atmosphere with its camaraderie of shared discomfort. (Nowadays this is the stuff of so called reality TV designed to engender 鈥榗onflict鈥� 鈥� in war we defined conflict differently and shared these new experiences conscious that many shared worse experiences.)

In the days following we settled down. On the tennis courts of Westfield we were taught to drill and march, although in the years ahead I never met anyone who had ever been on parade. We polished the wooden floor of the huge assembly hall by the simple expedient of forming a line across its width, each with a kneeling pad, a tin of polish and a cloth with which to apply it to areas adjacent to your neighbours. Behind followed a similar line with polishing cloths. And you were quietly assessed, as were the skills you had claimed on your application form. I can鈥檛 remember now if anyone was rejected, or decided not to join but can remember the forms on which we stated our preferences for the kind of work we hoped for and where. I wrote that I should like to work on the naval base in the Orkneys and ultimately go overseas and was then given my posting 鈥� to the typing pool of combined operations Headquarters in Whitehall.

The contrariness of it was somehow pleasing. Newly fledged, we proudly wore our uniforms with starched white collars which excoriated tender necks. We struggled with the cussedness of the back collar stud. For me, the perverse posting proved tremendously exciting, operational. Top secret and eventually leading to being one of the first dozen wrens in India. So why choose to tell you only about that first day? Because it was only then that I began to understand the importance and value of those who do unsavoury work in the service of the rest of us 鈥� not a bad outcome of kippers for breakfast.

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