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In 1941 I was called up and attached to the Department of Filling Factories (ENG) in London at the Royal Arsenal Woolwich. This was because I’d attended a technical school and was still attending a Polytechnic. In 1944 our department at the Arsenal was drafted to R.O.F. Risley and we were housed at Little London Hall, Culcheth near Warrington. This Camp consisted of brick main building and 3 wooded huts. The personnel included staff plus Bevan Boys, Munitions Women Workers, The Women’s Land Army and our department. We were very popular with the Navy Lads who were local in 5 Camps HMS Ariel and 5 Camps Gosling — and the Yanks at Burtonwood. At weekends we had a dance floor and a band and other facilities. They had arranged for the camp to have VE ‘arrangements’ - dancing and records every four hours — meals every four hours etc for three whole days. Our little party went to the Pack Horse Inn, the evening of 7th May to celebrate one of our lads wive’s giving birth to a son and we were enjoying this when some Navy Lads burst in the pub. The next day was VE Day so the balloon went up — the landlord was pleading with the Lads not to smash out the front window to get the piano out — so it was carried orderly outside to the waiting crowd. What a night — incidentally I married one of the land girls.

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