大象传媒

I was 22 years old when war broke out and I went to work on that Sunday at 11am because I had been called up the year before on 25 August, so I was already in uniform. My number was 8576, the Royal West Kent at Maidstone. My job was to serve the servicemen, giving out boots, plimsolls and laces. They would be queuing up outside, so I would issue them their shoes and tell them to try them on outside and come back if they didn鈥檛 fit. I always used to talk to them.

When I was called up I used to talk to the cook and say, 鈥淒o you think we will have a war?鈥� and they said, 鈥淥h yes鈥�, and it turned out to be only a matter of 8 days. We got used to the idea that we were at war but we never thought it would go on so long.

I was engaged at the time war started and married that year on the 7th October. I was the first ATS wedding in Maidstone. The captain of the ATS let us have her big car, but the lads had to pull it by rope as we weren鈥檛 allowed to use any petrol. The boys held their steel helmets above us as a guard of honour when we left the church.

We had dances every Friday night at the Barracks, curfew was at 9.30pm. Also there were dances on Monday night at Invicta Lines. I was in the harmonica band. There were about 8 or 10 of us ATS playing harmonica, 2 on accordions, 1 base and drums 鈥� and we sounded beautiful. We went to Chatham Dockyard to play for 2,000 sailors and you should have heard them!

The Captain in West Kent was a big name at the Palladium and he would arrange a coach every other Wednesday to go to see Vera Lyn and Ann Shelton.

I was awarded two service medals for defence in 1939/1945.

I loved my time in the ATS. The people were very kind and pleasant. It was a different atmosphere. They didn鈥檛 know what was going to happen tomorrow so we made the most of today. The uniform was most comfortable, but the stockings were very very thick. If we managed to get any silk stockings we were banned from wearing them!

My brother-in-law was Sgt Cook at the Barracks. A man owned the zoo and sent his chauffeur for the swill. He was a magistrate at the local court, but there was always half a pound of butter hidden in the animal food. One of my brother-in-law鈥檚 cooks got stopped in the main street by the redcaps, with half a pound of butter in his pocket and had to go to court and was fined ten shilling by this gentleman. Next time the chauffeur came to collect the animal food he said to my brother-in-law, there was no butter hidden in the swill. 鈥淣o bloody fear鈥�, he said because he didn鈥檛 want to be fined again. The next day the magistrate sent the ten shillings down to the soldier that he had fined, through his Chauffeur!

My cousin was 31 years old and like a brother to me. He was called up for the Air Force and he was a rear gunner wireless operator on a Sunderland Flying Boat. He was one of eight crew. He had been married nineteen months and they told his wife that they thought he had been brought down over the Bay of Biscay. It was very sad because he didn鈥檛 want to go 鈥� it broke his heart to leave his new wife. It was a Monday night, early evening when they came to tell us. It took the stuffing out of my aunt. His widow did eventually get married again but only after seven years waiting for him to come home.

The atmosphere was so warm during the war. For example, at the pub if it was your birthday someone would buy you drink or treat you; they didn鈥檛 look away like now.

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