大象传媒

I was in the ATS, the year was 1944 and it wasn't a bad life, even if there was a war going on. We were tucked away in a small village in Fifeshire quietly carrying out our military duties during the day and in the evenings we did nothing more exciting than gathering together in Hugh Brodie's flat over the village pub where we cooked food that came from some mysterious source and read poetry to each other until the pub closed and Hugh came upstairs. Hugh was convinced that reading Robbie Burns' poetry was all the education we needed to get by in life. Then we'd listen to stories of his adventurous life working in foreign parts of the world.
My parents had been travellers,too and that was how I had happened to be born in the United States. However, that fact didn't seem to have anything to do with my present life until one day I was called to the office where my C.O. said that she had been contacted by some higher army authority wanting to inform me that I was invited to transfer to the American Woman's Army Corps, if I wished.
I glowed. Fancy that! Out of the millions,I had surfaced, floated to the top. The British had me but the Americans wanted me. Dizzy with a sudden sense of my own importance I accepted immediately. I knew that Robbie Burns wouldn't rush off like that but I was nineteen and I wanted excitement and adventure.
My memory about the details are fuzzy, but laden down with my kit bag,gas mask and oversized army greatcoat I pushed my way onto an over-packed,overnight train to London. Standing and sometimes sitting on my duffel bag I got off the train in a groggy daze in the morning only to be met by two exuberant, smiling, white-toothed American army women who shouldered my gear,put me in a jeep and bounced us along to a house in Harley Street where everyone was very jolly and friendly. An opulent meal of hot dogs, sauerkraut and ice cream followed. I could see immediately why they felt so jolly.
I was assigned to an office on Regent Street to do typing. Everyone in the office exuded importance, their utterances sounded important, their clothes looked important and they all had very grand titles,colonels, majors and captains, not a private among them except for me and several English civilian women. Robbie Burns would have been very caustic but, Robbie, I'll give them their due, they were very helpful and very attentive; opening doors for me, inquiring hourly if the work load was too heavy and occasionally bringing me little presents, such as fresh peaches, chocolates,and other delicacies which we hadn't seen in England for years.
I hadn't been working there more than a month when our office was struck by a buzz bomb. One colonel, one major and I were wounded and carried off to a hospital, but to the Americans, having a woman wounded in battle was an item for the newspapers. I was pampered. My bandaged face appeared in newspapers. I actually even received some fan mail. They gave me a Purple Heart medal. And thus I dumped Robbie Burns, he was behind the times. I was entering the modern American era where everybody gets their moment of fame.
The invasion of France took place shortly afterwards. There were invasion horror stories of the many deaths and maimings being told all around our billets in Harley Street. It was an abyss of destruction and then suddenly we were issued with battle uniforms, tin hats, survival kits and parachutes, followed by information that we were to leave immediately. All the way to the airstrip we speculated about destination, and were convinced that it was to the fighting front. We boarded the plane, feeling jittery but proud of the sacrifice we were about to make, and an hour or so later arrived in Paris. It had just been liberated.
Still dressed in our battle fatigues we arranged our desks, typewriters and chairs in an ancient office on the Place de la Opera. It was like the office in Regent Street all over again but we had enlarged our team with the presence of several American OSS men, some unlabeled agents of varying nationalities and some French civilian security and military officers. The newcomers gave a secretive dramatic tone to our group. The atmosphere among us was now whispered and guarded. We were the guardians of security, looking for the hidden enemies still lurking around Paris. The atmosphere thickened with information that the master spy, Skorzeny, had made his way to Paris. Our agents fanned out through the city for the capture. I sat through most of the drama still slowly typing, wondering about the accuracy of my spelling. My bosses, the American colonels, majors and captains were still as thoughtful as ever. They never once reprimanded me about the grubby erasures on my documents, instead they eased me away from the typewriter by taking me with them to interrogate and bully captured German officers as though I were a special guest just to be entertained.
By the time we had been in Paris for a year and felt we had mopped up the enemy the war ended. Papers were distributed telling us troops that we were going to be redeployed back home to America. I was among the first to go because of my service in the ATS was considered as duty in a fighting zone.
When we were asked for our American home addresses I panicked. I didn't have one. Home was Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire, but it would be very nice, I thought, to go to America. So thinking quickly I pulled my Dad's aunt from my dimmed memory. She had written to us once, years ago, and I had been so impressed at seeing the foreign stamp that I had memorized the whole letter, even the address. True, I had never met her but I knew her address, 607 Tanglewood Trail, Rocky River. I knew I wanted to ramble down Tanglewood Trail.
Sadly leaving all the lovely colonels,majors,captains and the French officers I was transported to Southampton where I embarked onto the Queen Mary which was now a troop ship. I had had a fancy to go on the Queen Mary ever since she had made her majestic maiden voyage and I had seen all those film stars waving graciously as they boarded.
As I was one of the few women on board and the dignified old queen was jammed with thousands of soldiers I was given first class accommodations up on the boat deck. I lounged in wartime luxury on that grand old ship for the few days that it took to cross the Atlantic. We all rushed onto deck as we passed the
Statue of Liberty and entered New York harbour accompanied by noisy tugs, banners, confetti and cheering crowds. The country had gone all out to welcome me it seemed. Smiling, courteous Red Cross volunteers came and escorted me off the ship and while waiting for the train that would take me across the United States, these ladies gave me what every American would want after "being over there" fighting; steak, French fries, salad, cold milk, apple pie and ice cream.
The train ride to Des Moines, Iowa took two days. The ride was rather tedious but I had a berth in a sleeping car, and my kahki pyjamas were folded elegantly across my bed by some unseen porter. In Des Moines I was discharged from the WAC, given a train ticket and told I could phone home to let my loved ones know I was arriving.
My Dad's Auntie Winnie didn't seem to know who I was when she answered the telephone. I had to shout, and not only that, I had to slowly explain several times that my father was her deceased brother's son. There was a long silence while she tried to dig back in her memory. I could hear her mumbling names. Finally, in a cracked voice, she told me she had forgotten she'd had a brother, and if she'd had a brother that he had had any children.
"Come along though if you have to. You can help out around here." She dropped the receiver. It didn't sound promising.
At least when I arrived and wizened Auntie Winnie opened the door she let me in. "You look like somebody I've seen before so I suppose it's all right." No hugs, smiles or questions about the relatives she'd left behind.
I thought I should get a job but Auntie Winnie wanted me to stay at home with her. She needed her feet massaged, her hair washed and combed. She never moved out of her bedroom after I moved in. She never said it but I know she liked my being there to take care of her.
But everything was wrong. I was lonely. Tanglewood Trail was a narrow,treeless dirt road. Auntie Winnie didn't laugh and make me feel special. I missed my war time American friends, and I wanted to be at home with my Mum and Dad in Burton-on-Trent.
Suddenly poor old Auntie Winnie died. At first I was so sad, desolate and weepy but slowly realized that I now had enough money to go home. Shouting joyfully I sent off for my passport. The forms arrived. I filled them out diligently, answering questions about serving in the British forces, including 'Did you ever swear allegiance to a foreign sovereign or government?' Well, I had sung 'God Save the King' at school, at the cinema and at Girl Guides; in church on Sundays I had joined the prayers for the King's health and all those concerned with running the country; I had agreed to defend the King and country when I joined the ATS. Therefore I scratched a "yes" answer on the application.
A letter in reply from the State Department of the United States informed me that I was not a citizen of the US. That, even though I had been born in the U.S., my actions in swearing allegiance to the sovreign and ministers of Great Britain had, in effect, renounced my U.S. citizenship. I could not have a passport. I read the letter several times, not believing their words, their decision. After all, they had come after me in England, seeking me out, enfolding me in their midst. They had pampered, glamourized, carted me from London to Paris to the United States. I had been wounded and almost died for them and now they were excluding me, pretending I didn't exist, almost. What a cheek!
I wrote back, reminding them that they had taken me out of the ATS, that they must have known about my swearing to defend the king before claiming me as one of their own in the WAC. Could they give me a solution. Their reply was terse. There was no solution.
So here I was with no citizenship. The British had given me to the Americans. The Americans didn't want me. I had visions of
being like the man who spent his life on a ship sailing from one port to another around the world never being able to land because he had no nationality.
In despair I turned my thoughts to Robbie Burns. Maybe he was getting his revenge. Back in Scotland, long ago when we'd been thirsting for a way of life he and Hugh Brodie had said it again and again, 'Dinna place yourselves on the high altar of importance, ye'll fall down'. Well, I'd gone soaring up and now I had suddenly plummeted just as those morose Scotsmen had predicted. I was a nobody, couldn't get out of the United States nor into Britain.
In the midst of this crisis in my life a large brown envelope arrived from the Department of the Army. It contained a medal and a document from the French government. I had been awarded the Croix de Guerre, with Palm for my courage, my bravery and my heroism in the liberation of their country.
My spirits soared. Was it possible....? Would the French give me a passport?

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