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JOYCE SMITH (nee McIntyre)
WOMEN’S LAND ARMY

Joyce was brought up in Gateshead. She had a sister and a half-brother as her mother had died and her father re-married. For the last year at school she spent her time making night dresses for evacuees. After leaving school she worked in a bakers shop.

As my sister had joined-up, I volunteered and wanted to go into the WAAF but was too young. So at 17 I joined the Land Army and became a tractor and van driver. I spent six weeks training and was then sent to Ingleton, to a camp just out of the village where we lived in lines of huts on the top of a bank. There was a dining room just for the Land Army girls but I took sandwiches to eat on the farm. I was sent to work at Sadberge, but didn’t like it there so walked out and remember walking down a long road to get away and was sent back to Ingleton.

The farming was mixed. There was field work ~ hay time, hoe-ing, spreading seeds, potato picking, ‘scruffling’ with a horse, feeding animals, machine milking, mucking out, dipping sheep, working with the cart horses. The farmer’s wife looked after the poultry, but otherwise we did all jobs and was ‘jiggered’ by the end of the day.

I wore breeches, long woollen socks to the knees, shirts, dungarees, jumpers, an overcoat and a hat with a brim all round, all in brown and green. I got 5s.a week extra for driving girls to and from work. I also got mileage, so had to keep a log book. One night a week I took the laundry to Darlington and all the girls jumped in as it was a chance to go to the pictures. One day there was a sailor on the road and the girls said ‘Pick him up’ ~ it took a while to stop and do so and a car ran into the back of us. It was an old fellow and he had to be laid on the grass in shock by which time the sailor had gone. I got a summons for driving dangerously and was fined 30s. but went round the farm with a begging hat and ended up with £2 ~ 10s. profit!

I drove tractors on the farm and also big army wagons. In winter there were robberies around the area ~ one day the van wouldn’t start so I asked the girls to push me down the bank. It started and they got in and I stopped at Merrybent to drop them off at the nursery, but kept the engine going. Then when I arrived in the farmyard the engine stalled and the boys looked under the bonnet to find there was no battery ~ it had been stolen!!. We let them know at Houghall, the Durham HQ, and they said it was a million to one chance that the wires had touched and started it.

I got weekends off and took the bus home to Gateshead. I was allowed to take my ration book with me once every six weeks. Otherwise when we had time off we used to go to dances in Barnard Castle and would enjoy a sing song round a piano. I enjoyed the Land Army. I eventually got engaged to the farmer’s son and married him in Heighington Church with a reception at the farm. I wore a short blue dress and big hat with a veil.

Since then Joyce has been a farmer’s wife, bringing up her family ~ firstly at Walworth, then near Hamsterley. They retired to Barnard Castle in 1984.

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