HOME FRONT VOICES

Arthur Stevens; Civil Defence

As the war progressed preparations began for D-Day and there was a lot of activity in our local area.

We were being sent fire service reinforcements from London and the Midlands to strengthen our numbers and we then were given an extra vehicle which was housed in a garage next door to the station.

One important job which we did was working at Lepe on the PLUTO pipeline which was being tested under the Solent and we had to pump fresh water through and it would come out at the other end that is on the Isle of Wight.

Mark Talbot; Fireman

That first evening the sirens sounded and immediately little Keith began trembling uncontrollably. I had to hold him in my arms as he was like a jelly and just couldn't keep still.

Audrey Jeffries

I was born in 1920 so by the outbreak of war I was of an age that I was likely to be called up straight away. However, I was working for my fathers business in Bury St Edmunds at the time and was also helping the local Red Cross detachment. That involved duties at the hospital in support of the existing nursing staff and helping on the ambulances as well so I was really making a contribution even from age nineteen.

Thomas Knapp; Civil Servant

In between this work I was occasionally involved in debriefings of returning airmen and also, because I could speak Italian, I spent some time as a 'make believe' Italian POW at one of the POW camps in the Forest. This was interesting, but quite challenging although I was able to pass on some useful information to my bosses. I was also involved in the arrest of a person who was some time later charged with a serious offence.

Keith Campbell; Royal Australian Air Force

On one operational sortie, my aircraft was hit by flak and exploded when we were just outside Stuttgart. We had just set a course for home when I was suddenly blown out through the front of the aircraft. By lucky chance I had my parachute clipped on.

I landed in a wheat field somewhere south west of the city and I began to walk. I was picked up by the Germans four days later, very hungry, very tired and with no hope by then of reaching the Swiss border. After being captured, I was taken to the interrogation centre at Oberusal, Frankfurt. I spent four days in solitary confinement answering questions with my name, rank and number.

I was then transferred to the main compound where I was handed a Red Cross parcel of clothing. Illegal radios in some of the camps were used to receive the information about the Normandy Landings. Later in January '45, the Russians were advancing rapidly and our captors told us to be prepared to evacuate the camp at one hours notice. Within three months we were liberated by the Russian Army.

Noreen Cooper; Women's Land Army

Well we had to get the milking done and then we sat on the fence and watched the convoys passing. We were waving, really high spirited and we shouted out 'Good Luck' to the men. It was an exciting but nevertheless strange time really. Many of those poor chaps of course would be killed before the eventual end of the war but for that moment in time there was so much exuberance and good feeling, almost euphoria after the long slog of the previous years of war and now we knew the end could well be in sight.

Joan Coup; Evacuee

At first it was all very overwhelming, arriving in a strange community with our distinct London accents and the Cornish accent, much stronger than ours, vying to be heard in the confusion and drama that was evacuation. In those days the people who were born and bred in Cornwall, stayed in the area because there was ample work and little reason for travelling far. There were only a few examples then of people leaving the area and returning years later with another accent. We soon adapted with villagers and evacuees alike gradually picking up a little of each others way of speaking.

'When we were in the Wrens'

Peggy WWII veteran 1943-46 - Now a member of the Association of Wrens

I joined the WRNS in September 1943 at Headingley, Leeds, where I first came across my sister-in-law, Jean. I was then drafted to RNAS St Merryn, billeted in the Metropole Hotel at Padstow. After that I worked in the Captain's Office at RNAS Yeovilton before being selected to go overseas. We were kitted out at Cheyne Walk, Chelsea and had some time to visit the Old Bailey, St Paul's. We went to the Royal Hospital, Chelsea for church parades.

We embarked from Liverpool on the SS Duchess of Bedford sailing in a convoy for the Middle East, via the Mediterranean, to our destination, Alexandria. There I served in the Captain's Office at HMS NILE, Ras-el-Tin. Leisure time was enjoyed in Cairo, and Jerusalem where I met my husband, Sid, and Beirut. Visited the El Alamein War cemetery which was very moving. I returned to the UK in March 1946 to be married and demobbed.

NB: The Admiralty offered to evacuate the Wrens from Alexandria, to Malta in the cruiser Aurora, they were all very ill.

© The Wren magazine

Vivian WW2 veteran 1943-47 - Now a member of the Association of Wrens

Three weeks after my eighteenth birthday in June 1943 my parents gave their consent for me to join the WRNS if I could be 'immobile' at Falmouth - HMS FORTE.

I reported to Moorfield, Seymour Avenue, Plymouth which had suffered bomb damage and we were set to, to sweep up plaster, etc. On the first day we leant how to make a bed with hospital corners. The first two weeks basic training covered First Aid, Poison Gas, head inspections, etc. On squad drill we learned to 'line up our thumb nails with our back suspenders'.

At the end of the two weeks we were issued with uniform - great coat, rain coat, suit, white shirts, stiff collars, wool stockings, (good for curing stiff necks and sore throats) Directoire navy blue knickers (black-outs). We learned the right and the wrong way to lace shoes. I have recently found my uniform in the 'dressing-up' box in the loft!.

My first draft was to Falmouth where I served as a Steward in the Seamens' Mess - washing dishes, peeling potatoes, scrubbing the Galley floor, and writing letters for the men. In the build-up to D Day it was as if the whole area was one enormous camp. When the Landing craft suddenly disappeared we knew that it was immanent.

An accident when I fell and cracked my elbow meant that I could no longer work in the Galley and I was recommended for the writer's course at Headingley Leeds.

My second draft was to Portsmouth dockyard to the Provost Marshall's Office at the top of the semaphore tower opposite HMS VICTORY. We had a good view of the RN Ships bringing back POW's from the Far East.
My third draft was to HMS DRAKE, Plymouth to the Drafting Office. I was quartered in Penlee Gardens and when Duty Wren had to check everyone was in by 2300, for lights out. I remember in the winter of 1947 trying to keep warm in bed with half one's clothes still on. Also summer walks on Dartmoor and swimming at Jenny Cliff Bay.

© The Wren magazine

June WW2 veteran 1940-1945. Now a member of the Association of Wrens

I joined in December 1940, our Quarters being in Windsor Villas in the road leading up to the Hoe. It was very cold, we had iron bedsteads and wore no uniforms, just WRNS armbands.

At that time there was no Basic Training and I went straight to the Signal Office in EBK (Egg Buckland Keep) where we were watch-keeping, typing signals with an elderly (probably about 40 years) CPO Wren in charge
Early in 1941 the whole Command (Western approaches) was moved to Liverpool. We travelled by train through the middle of England, seeing Air raids on towns at either side of the track but arrived in Liverpool unscathed.

The new office was in the basement of Derby House where there was a Plot, Code and Cipher Offices, teleprinters, etc. I typed signals, then moved to coding and for a short time, when his Writer was away, worked for the Commander Signals. He offered me a job and I went to Greenwich but I had just heard that I was on the next Overseas Draft and when I told him he said "You go Overseas- it'll be more fun!"

I was on the 3rd draft of Wrens going to the Middle East in March 1942, it was supposed to be very 'Hush-hush' but we all had sun helmets strapped to our gas masks! We boarded the Arundel Castle, a very old Union Castle ship in Liverpool and joined a convoy. Two to three days out we woke to silence, we'd broken down and were in no sight of the other ships. Just one little Corvette and an RAF plane circling overhead. Those of us who had worked on convoys had visions of U-boats but fortunately the engineers got the ship going before the U-Boats found us.

We stopped in Freetown Harbour for several days but couldn't go ashore as they had Yellow Fever and we hadn't been inoculated. The fast ships left first and one of them was torpedoed - we were lucky. We arrived in Cape Town leading the convoy in as Arundel Castle had her own berth. We spent three weeks in Muizenberg and had a wonderful time. No black-out, masses of fruit, things we hadn't seen for years. Local people would have taken us up-country but we were always on about 24 hours stand-by so couldn't travel far.

Finally we boarded the Nieuw Amsterdam, one of the 'Monsters', the others being the Queen Mary and the Queen Elizabeth , they were considered fast enough to travel alone. We travelled up the African coast, past Mozambique (in enemy hands) and eventually arrived in Port Tewfik. Then on to Alexandria where we lived in a Convent and walked to Ras-el-Tin (RAL) for about six weeks until Rommel came down the desert, FAST!. We spent a couple of days destroying signals and signal books then left in a train of cattle trucks at night. We could hear the guns and had no idea where we were going.

Eventually at about 0500hrs we were turned out of the trucks outside Ismalia and were taken to the house which was run by the YWCA for Tejh QARNNS Nursing Sisters. We were all divided into three groups - one to go to Port Said, one to stay in Ismalia and one to got to South Africa. I was lucky, I stayed in Ismalia - the group for South Africa only got as far as Suez where they stayed on the Princess Kathleen (known as the Aviary). We worked hard in Ismalia, most of the time in three watches but had a lovely summer sailing on the lake, etc. But all good things came to an end and in October we went to Suez.

I caught Infective Hepatitis (Jaundice) and spent some time in an Eight Army Hospital after which I went to Palestine on leave (which I wouldn't have managed without Hepatitis) That Christmas there was Bubonic Plague in Suez. We were all injected against it - very painful!

I was sent on an OTC in 1943 and then worked in the Cypher Office in Alexandria until returning to the UK through the Mediterranean in Spring 1944. After leave I worked in Falmouth and finally back to Plymouth where eventually, after V.E. Day I worked for Naval Control. I was demobbed in December 1944.

© The Wren magazine

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