大象传媒

I was born in Norton on Tees and was seventeen when the war broke out. I was working in the local Co-op at the time I was called up, which was in February 1942 (the same month as the fall of Singapore.)

I was sent for training to Glencorse Barracks in Edinburgh. There, after being inoculated and kitted out with the usual ill-fitting Army uniform, I spent three weeks marching, attending lectures and learning how to get along with the other recruits. We lived in huts with no hot water. It was quite a challenge for a girl who had never been further than Darlington in her life, and who had never so much as heard anyone using bad language!

The worst aspect of my time at Glencorse was鈥he Sergeant Major. What a horrible man he was! I can hear him now, bellowing at us: 鈥淵OU BROKE YOUR MOTHER鈥橲 HEART 鈥� BUT YOU鈥橰E NOT BREAKING MINE!鈥� We all swore we鈥檇 get him after the war, but of course we never did. After that came the test for resistance to gas attack. Like all the rest, I had to enter a hut with my gas mask on and run to the other end. Once inside, three types of gas were released, tear gas, mustard gas, and the worst of all, choking gas. I had to take my mask off and expose myself to them. Once outside in the fresh air I had to run the length of the perimeter to expel the gas from my lungs. I managed it but some just collapsed.

I was tested for various jobs. I had been very keen on sports at school and hoped to be a PT instructor or driver, but these jobs had already been snapped up. I had come late to the ATS; most of the early volunteers i.e. those who had joined between 鈥�38 and 鈥�40 were officers by then. The types of jobs they were trying to fill when I trained fell broadly into two categories 1. Gun-Crew 2. Cooks. I was told that I could be a part-time PT instructor as a member of a gun crew, so I decided to give that a try.

My next posting was to Devizes in Wiltshire, where I did four weeks鈥� hard training on gun instruments. I also learned to cope with fatigues i.e. the mundane tasks like potato peeling. And believe me, they were piled HIGH.

I then went to Crownhill Barracks in Plymouth, where I joined 480 (Mixed) Battery. I did further training, firstly on a predictor and then a plotter, which determined the height and bearing of aircraft in relation to the guns.

I was on 24-hour training shifts, which included drill and PT. The rota was changed each day so that everyone got his or her share of fatigues. As well as peeling potatoes (鈥渟pud-bashing鈥�) there was emptying the Elsan toilets (which were nothing more than glorified buckets) and making coal briquets for use in our pot-bellied stove. That was a very dirty job indeed. They had to be made in between deliveries of coke. Once the coke had been used up, the dust was collected and mixed with sand, cement and water. The mixture was then put into empty tins to set. Once hardened up, we could throw them in the stove and keep warm. I remember that empty Carnation milk tins were best for that job. We used to get them from the NAAFI. Corned (or Bully) beef tins were not so good, but we used them if we had nothing else.

After London, Plymouth was the most bombed place in Britain during the war. Consequently I saw action day and night. But, there was fun too. Along with the other girls, I used to go to Plymouth Ho for some dancing and a drink. There were a lot of American troops in that area. We girls had received lectures on fraternising with the black troops among them. It was actively discouraged.

I guessed something big was brewing when all leave was stopped in the spring of 1944. Plymouth became a hive of activity. D-Day was looming! In preparation, I went on refresher courses to what were called Firing Camps in Bude, Cornwall and the Isle of Anglesey.

On the day itself I was staying in Plymouth YWCA on a 24 hr pass. I was in the breakfast room when the news came over the radio that our troops had landed in France. On hearing this, a great cheer went up. I looked out over Plymouth Sound. The scene I shall always remember is one of amphibious 鈥渄ucks鈥� [the DUKW 2.5 ton trucks] and huge Sunderland Flying Boats on the water.

About one week later Hitler sent the first of the V1 rockets, the dreaded 鈥渂uzz-bombs鈥�, against London. To provide extra cover, my battery was moved to Hyde Park, where it remained for a few weeks. That was an uninviting place. The huts were cold, and, if you were out of camp after dark, then more often than not you had to get a policeman to escort you back. If you didn鈥檛 then there was the ever-present possibility of ending up in the Serpentine. (And I believe that one or two did drown in it.)

From Hyde Park we went to Buckhurst Hill in Essex. The enemy kept us very busy there until virtually the end of the war. At first we shared night guard duty with the men, but one day a very nice officer, a Captain Gardner, announced that only the men would do it from then on.

Before going on duty we had to stand in front of a big mirror, which had a sign on it: 鈥淎RE YOU A CREDIT TO YOUR UNIT?鈥� We had to stand there while the sergeant inspected us up and down.

On VE Day I went to London with a few others. It was heaving with crowds. In order to ease the congestion, the authorities temporarily closed the exits to the underground (鈥渢ube鈥�) stations. This meant that people getting off the underground trains, including myself, were trapped inside. I remember being very frightened and indeed several people panicked and tried every way to get out.

Between the end of the war and being demobbed I underwent further training. Among other things this involved giving cooking demonstrations at the Gas Board, serving meals at a boys school and lending a hand at a day nursery. It was all designed, of course, to ease me back into civilian life. The Army finally gave me my 鈥渃ivvy鈥� clothes at York in February 1946.

If there is one thing I treasure from those days it is the comradeship; I made friendships then, which endure to this day.

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