大象传媒

I joined the RAF in 1941 at the age of 17. We went to Gloucester to be kitted out before going to Morecombe Bay. I went to a lot of airfields - Bawtrey Bay, Yorkshire; Stamford in Lincolnshire then to Downham Market. I was at Bletchley Park in 1945 until I was demobbed, but not as a de-coder or anything. I was a waitress.
On my 21st birthday I went home for my birthday party at the Epping Village Hall. We had a grand old time, but I was late getting back to base and was made AWOL. I went to the officer, explained about my party and luckily she excused me so I escaped punishment. I did get into trouble when I tried to soften the leather on my newly issued shoes because I had stuffed them with wet newspaper. I had to dry them quickly because I needed to wear them so I put them in the cookhouse oven. I obviously left them in for too long because when I took them out of the oven they fell to pieces! I had to go before the WAF officer who was very displeased and my punishment was peeling a load of potatoes (spud bashing).
I used to sing with Sam Costa at the Town Hall in Downham Market and it was here at Downham that we were visited by Bomber Harris and by the Duke of Kent, sadly just three weeks before he was killed.
After the war ended, some of us went up in a Lancaster Bomber - "Cooks Tours" - and we flew from Downham to Holland and Germany. We went over The Hague, Rotterdam, Tiel, Nijmegen, The Rhuhr, Hamborn, Duisburg, Gelsenkirchen, Dortmund, Essen, Dussledorf, Flushing and then back to base. It was a 4 1/2 hr trip and I sat in the front turret which gave me a very good view. It was very scary, but I wouldn't have missed it for anything.

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