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This story was submitted to the People's War site by Jean McLean of Renfrewshire Libraries on behalf of Betty Waples, Emily Brown and Sadie Kilpatrick and has been added to the site with their permission. Betty Waples, Emily Brown and Sadie Kilpatrick fully understand the site's terms and conditions.

Not only did these ladies survive the war but Emily and Betty are also survivors from the Glen Cinema disaster in Paisley in 1929.

We all worked in the Anchor mill, Paisley during the war. Emily started in1938 as a tenter (or flyer as it was known in the Anchor mill). She was 14 years old and her first wage packet was 16 shillings and twopence (roughly 80 pence to-day)

Sadie started in 1939 two days after war was declared. She was also 14 years old, her job was a back piecer and her first wage was One pound, six shillings (拢1.30p)

Betty started in 1940 at the age of 16. She was also a back piecer and remembers her wage as being 拢4.00. This also included a bonus for turning up on time!

At that time you had to get someone to speak for you before you got the chance of working in the mill. Then a doctor examined you to make sure that you were healthy and free of head lice. Betty had bad teeth so was sent to the dentist.

When the air raid siren went all workers had to evacuate mill, complete with gas mask and identity card, to go to the air raid shelter. When the siren went at night everywhere was dark outside because of the blackout. The foreman had a length of rope to which everyone held on in order to follow him in single file so that we could find our way to the shelter. The ground was very uneven with cobbles. Once we reached the shelter he coiled the rope up and counted us in. The mill had 16 flats with 100 workers on each flat so it was quite a task getting us to the shelter.

Some of the cotton went on fire one early morning and Betty was told to get the fire brigade. She ran to the nearest alarm and broke the glass to ring the bell. She didn鈥檛 know that it was connected to the air raid siren so the whole of the east end of Paisley were rushing to the shelters. The fire was out before the firemen arrived!

One day we went to join up and the man in the office spent some time taking our details and filling in forms. He then asked us where we were working just now and when we said the mill he was very annoyed. The mill was a reserved occupation under the The Essential War work act and we could not leave. He told us to go away and stop wasting his time.

After that we volunteered at the YMCA on a Saturday evening serving meals to the forces. If a serviceman wanted a knife and fork he had to leave his hat in exchange, or if he was having a shower and wanted a towel he had to leave his hat. It was easy to mix hats up and Sadie remembers Betty having to help her sort them out one night!

On VE night Emily and Sadie were working on the night shift when word came through about Victory in Europe. They remember walking through the twining department and stealing the flags that the girls there had used to decorate their machines so that they could decorate their machines. They also climbed out over the railings to go and join in the celebrations at the town hall where Will Starr was playing his accordion. They then climbed back in in time to be sent home at the end of the shift!

When we started at the mill we wore skirts and pinnies but then we started wearing boiler suits. We used to go out straight from our shift and would get ready in the toilets beforehand. Because of rationing we used yellow ochre to tan our legs and would also damp our hair in the fire pails

Betty鈥檚 father was in the Home Guard and she remembers that on the night of the Clydebank Blitz he was sent to his post with a machine gun to fire at the planes.

Emily always had parties at her home and would go to the barracks to invite servicemen along. Her parents never objected to the number of people visiting. A lot of the soldiers kept in touch over the years but she wishes that they had kept some kind of visitors book

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