大象传媒

I鈥檓 Madeleine Bradshaw, and I鈥檓 85 years old.
I went to work at the Yorkshire Copper Works, doing war work. That was at Sturton, near Leeds. I was there quite a while. But then I had an accident. A tube flew back, and cut the tendons off my thumb. I had an operation afterwards, to join it, but I haven鈥檛 had the same use in my thumb since.
But I did go on to other work at the copper works.
Initially, I was making tubes for airplanes and ships. Different sizes. And then after the accident, I became what they call a chaser. It鈥檚 like an order seeker. You make sure that orders go on time. I did that for quite a few years. Then I ended up doing office work, and I ended up being a correspondence clerk for most of the copper works, once ICI took over.
During the war though, I was an order seeker. That was quite a job! I used to be helping to pack things, and had to do all sorts to make sure the orders went on time.
I couldn鈥檛 have gone in the forces, because we鈥檇 lost my mother years before, and I had a sister who was ten years old when I was twenty, a brother who was thirteen, and one who was sixteen, and my father. So I looked after all of them. And that鈥檚 why I went to the copper works.
I did become a blood donor, and gave blood quite a few times through the war.
I did have one brother who was evacuated from Dunkirk too. He was the eldest brother, and was married.
The one who was sixteen at the start of the war got called up at 18, so he was part of the second front! There was always something. One brother coming home.. The one in the airforce used to bring about six pairs of socks for me, to be mended!
My father died, when my sister was 12, so I became her guardian then.
We didn鈥檛 despair, you know, we managed to do things.

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