Soldier Girl

by Annie Murray

  Despite the hardships of army life, the sometimes foul, freezing weather, the long hours and petty discipline, Molly had never felt better. Getting up in the morning, she loved putting on the tough, masculine clothes that some of the others complained so much about, and striding around in battledress and boots, feeling strong and powerful. The routines were second nature to her now and she knew her job back to front. She was fit and well fed. Some days she felt she could take on anything. There were plenty of men about, in the battery and on the gun parks, and she had learned to be friends with some of them and no more than that. Most of them seemed to sense that she had shut down and did not want to know about love relationships. She told them her fiancé had been killed, that she was not over him, which was no lie. Gradually she was finding a new way of living, not hopping from one man to another without thought for what she might really want. And keeping out of all that made her feel free.

  By the spring of 1943, Molly’s battery had been posted to a gun site outside Reading, one of London’s farthest-flung defences. It was a large site, with each group of four Nissen huts arranged end-on round the ablutions hut – an arrangement known as ‘spiders’. Life was relatively quiet, since the raids were few and far between, but the routines had to go on, the soldiers’ hard-earned skills kept up to date. One of the duties that had to be performed daily concerned the transmitters that were powered by generators which had to be started up; the stand-by team for the first duty shift of the morning had to take down the aerials of the transmitter and receiver, wash and re-grease them, and put them back.

  On a freezing March day, Molly was performing this duty with Ann. They had carried out the routine hundreds of times by now, but on this occasion, Ann mentioned that she didn’t feel well. Later that day she developed a burning fever, and was soon gravely ill, and this developed into double pneumonia. She had to be rushed to hospital.

  ‘I don’t think she’ll be coming back in a hurry,’ their corporal said. ‘We’re going to have to move in a replacement.’

  A few days later, when the weather had cleared and it was frosty and bright, Molly and Jen were crossing the site after a shift on duty, banging their gloved hands together to try and beat some warmth back into their fingers.

  ‘Here, slow down – I’ll do your back,’ Jen said. She walked behind Molly, pounding rhythmically on her back, and then Molly did the same for her. It sometimes helped to get a bit warmer. ‘God – I thought the spring was s’posed to be here! It feels as bad as January today!’

  ‘I’m dying for a cuppa,’ Molly said. ‘Come on – let’s get over there quick.’

  In the distance, a truck had pulled up and there was some activity going on around it. Two ATS emerged from inside and an officer pointed them towards the Nissen huts behind Molly and Jen. The two women started walking towards them. After a few seconds, Molly focused on them, narrowing her eyes. One was a corporal, but it was the other who seemed somehow familiar and became more so as she drew nearer – the way she walked, and the strands of hair escaping from under her cap, vivid in the morning sun.

  ‘It can’t be,’ Molly said.

  ‘What’re you on about?’ Jen said. ‘Who’re they?’

  Molly was only certain when they drew right up close. The red hair, the pink, pretty complexion.

  ‘Cath?’

  The woman turned, recognition turning into an overjoyed grin. ‘Oh! Molly!’

  ‘What’re you . . . ?’ Molly became speechless, realizing that she couldn’t ask Cath such private questions in front of the others. What about your baby. What happened?

  ‘I’ve come to replace someone on the predictor. There’s a girl off sick.’

  ‘Oh yes – Ann. That means you’re in our team!’ Molly cried, delighted.

  ‘Look,’ the corporal said impatiently, ‘just come and get signed in – I’ll show you your quarters, and then you can chinwag all you like.’

  ‘I’ll meet you in the NAAFI,’ Molly called as Cath was marched away. ‘Come and have a cuppa!’

  Molly went with Jen to the NAAFI full of excitement. It was so good to see Cath again! But there were all sorts of questions whirling round in her head. They took their tea to a table, and Jen said, ‘I’ll get this down me and clear off when she comes, so you can have a catch up.’

  ‘You don’t need to go – you’ll get along with her all right.’

  ‘I daresay – but I’ve got a few things to do,’ Jen said. ‘No offence.’

  She downed her tea and was gone even before Cath arrived, leaving Molly to peer at the posters on the NAAFI wall behind her. They were about the Beveridge Report which everyone seemed to be talking about – how they were going to make things better and fairer after the war. Molly sat musing on the few words she could make out, which spelled out the things the powers-that-be proposed to do away with: want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The words made her think of Iris, then she tried not to think about her. Too late for any improvement in Iris.

  ‘You’re in a nice daydream there!’ Cath was standing in front of her, smiling, having fetched a cup of tea on her way over, and some bread and margarine, already curling at the edges. ‘Did you want another cuppa, Molly?’

  ‘No, I’m all right ta,’ Molly said. ‘Sit down. It’s lovely to see yer. You look ever so well.’ Cath seemed even more vividly pretty than before.

  Cath stared at her. ‘Well, you’ve changed all right,’ she said. ‘I never thought you’d make it, to be honest, the way you were in basic training.’

  Molly gave a wry smile. ‘Yeah, well. I decided I might as well try and fit the bill.’ She didn’t mention Phoebe Morrison’s part in it. ‘I thought they’d throw me out too. I ran off once and got brought back by the redcaps and decided to try and pull myself together.’ Cath was listening sympathetically, sipping her tea. ‘My fella – we were on leave together, down in London, and he was killed by a bomb. UXB. Knocked me aside for a bit.’

  ‘Dear God, well of course it did,’ Cath said, her blue eyes softening. After a moment she picked up a slice of the bread and held it up. ‘God bless the bread.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘My granddad used to say that. His father lived through the famine. Never a crumb was to be wasted.’

  Molly smiled, watching Cath tuck into the bread. But it wasn’t the time for beating about the bush. Both of them had suffered. Despite Cath’s cheerful demeanour, Molly could sense it in her.

  ‘What happened, Cath?’ she asked softly. ‘The babby and everything.’

  ‘Ah, well . . .’ Cath took a sip of tea and cradled the mug up close to her face, staring into the distance. Tears welled in her eyes and she wiped them with the heel of her hand. ‘I had the baby. I was sent to a home in London. They weren’t very nice, but at least it was a roof over my head. I can’t go back, see, to Ireland, not with the disgrace of it, and there’s too many of us. What would my father do with me turning up with a fatherless child? Anyway, I had her, and I gave her up.’ The words came out in a rush. ‘My little Bernadette, that’s what I call her. She’s gone to a new mother, somewhere – I suppose she’ll call her something else.’ Quivering with the effort of holding in her raw emotion, still so near the surface, Cath looked desperately into Molly’s eyes. ‘Don’t think the worst of me, will you? Please don’t! I had no one, and no home to call my own. I just thought, if I can let her go to a better place, a family, and I can get back into the army, well, then maybe I can make something of my life. With her to look after, we’d have both gone under. Sometimes I tell myself I should’ve done anything to keep her and make a home for her. I’ll doubt myself for the rest of my life. But I was frightened, Molly. They said she’d have a good home . . .’

  Molly laid her hand over Cath’s, aching with sorrow for her. ‘I’m sure she will – they’re good like that . . .’ She had no idea if this was true, but she wanted to be comforting. Cath seemed so much older than before, sadness running through her like a crack in a vase.

  ‘When she’d been go
ne just a few days, I reapplied to join up. They sent me for training, on the predictors, and I’ve been round and about ever since. Then a whole lot of things happened – one of our girls fell for a baby as well . . .’ She smiled ironically. ‘They stood our battery down and split us up to fill in gaps around the place – so here I am.’

  ‘It’s ever so nice that you’ve come,’ Molly said. ‘You seen anyone else on your travels?’

  ‘From basic? No, except one of those girls from Nottingham, at my first training camp. The mouthy one.’

  ‘They were all mouthy,’ Molly laughed. ‘Still – so was I, I s’pose.’

  Cath soon settled in and became a regular part of the team. Jen, who made friends easily, got along well with her, as Molly had known she would. Molly and Cath were very happy to be back together, and there was a special bond between them, of past times, and of knowing the deep sadness that each of them carried. It was Molly who knew that Cath often cried herself to sleep at night, and she got up to try and comfort her. And it was to Cath that Molly could let out her feelings about Tony.

  Spring passed into summer as they worked and socialized together, while the world outside vibrated to them from the wireless and newspapers. Much of the news was sad and awesomely frightening during those spring months. Calamitous numbers of Allied ships were sunk in the Atlantic, the uprising of the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto was violently suppressed in April, and the desert war against Rommel spread across that time. And one day in May, Molly’s battery was told that soon it was on the move once again itself. Prepare for transit in two days, the soldiers were told. You’re going for practice training – this time at Clacton-on-Sea.

  Thirty-Four

  As far as the eye could see along the straight east coastline, the artillery had taken over. All day long, from Jaywick to Holland-on-Sea, the bristling rows of guns were at work. There were heavy anti-aircraft guns up to the pier and light Bofors beyond, through Clac-ton’s Butlin’s camp. At the end, beyond a small minefield, were the Americans with Browning machine guns, pumping out ammunition at the plane which droned dutifully up and down the coastline dragging its target sleeve behind it. Behind, barrage balloons swayed in the coastal winds, tethered on any available piece of land. The army had commandeered Butlin’s, and the town and surrounding area was heaving with army personnel, who had taken over many of the boarding houses and hotels. Some of these old establishments stood forlornly looking out to sea as if hoping for better times.

  The ATS were housed in a row of boarding houses in a street guarded by a sentry at one end. When Molly and the others arrived, they all rushed into the house, bagging rooms. Molly and Cath ended up sharing a medium-sized room looking out over the street, with a wrought-iron balcony outside. The house had extraordinarily temperamental plumbing, the pipes coughing and groaning and occasionally, on some apparent whim of their own, producing a gush of hot water. The rest of the time,when the system was less accommodating, they had to boil kettles to wash.

  Soon after they arrived, their corporal, a fresh-faced blonde, put her head round the door.

  ‘Settling all right?’ she asked. ‘Marvellous! Right – tomorrow morning the transport will be here at eight forty-five sharp. Be at the front door on time.’

  The weather was set fair and the work began. The old hands in Clacton kept telling them how lucky they were not to have been there during winter, with the biting cold and the east wind scorching their faces. During these balmy months they could get by in much lighter clothing and only one pair of socks. Molly and her team were sent to heavy artillery with a Vickers Predictor, the guns boom-booming in their turn as the plane passed across the sky.

  One rather blustery morning as they were all heading for work on the gun park, an ATS came toiling along on a bicycle in the face of the wind, a scarf tied over her hair.

  After she’d parked the bicycle, she strode confidently over to them. From a distance, Molly found herself recognizing another familiar face.

  ‘I’ve been sent to be your spotter today.’ It was Ruth’s unmistakable, strangulated voice.

  Molly turned away, heading for her post. The generators were already running; it was time to get started and she wasn’t exactly keen to see Ruth.

  The under-occupied Kinnys were being used to help out in the batteries, and Ruth had been allocated to the spotter’s chair. This was a canvas swivel chair with movable arms and a headrest. Her job was to sit back in it with a pair of binoculars and record the success rate or otherwise of the gunfire. In the summer this was quite a pleasant job, sitting back in the sun. In the winter it was enough almost to freeze you solid.

  They passed the morning working hard, and Molly, conscious of Ruth’s presence, worked especially carefully and accurately. The hit rate was high and she was pleased with her morning’s work. When it was time to stop for a break, she stepped down, stretching her limbs. Two hours was as much concentration as they could manage at any one time. Ruth was talking to one of the gunners and Molly had set off for a cuppa with Jen and Cath. But a few minutes later, Ruth caught them up on her bike.

  ‘I say – thought I’d say hallo properly,’ she called. As they all turned, Molly saw the shock register on Ruth’s face. She stopped her bike with a squeak of brakes.

  ‘I say – it’s . . .’ She searched her mind for Molly’s name and clearly could not recall it. ‘It’s you, isn’t it? And . . .’ Cath’s name was even more embarrassing for her to recall.

  ‘Yes,’ Molly said with more than a touch of sarcasm. ‘It’s me all right. Molly. The mouthy one.’

  ‘And I’m Cath. The Irish one,’ Cath added, with mischief in her eyes.

  Ruth perched half on her bike, the gritty wind teasing at her hair. They could see her mind working . . . But weren’t you the one . . . ? Everyone in the hut had known Cath was expecting a baby when she left. She looked mortified.

  ‘And this is Jen,’ Molly said.

  ‘So – what’re you doing here?’ Ruth said to Molly, after a nod at Jen. ‘Weren’t you on general duties at that last camp?’

  ‘I changed,’ Molly said. ‘I’m a gun layer.’ She stood tall, knowing that she looked strong and competent. ‘Been doing it a while.’

  Gratifyingly, Ruth looked really surprised by this information. ‘I say – jolly good,’ she said, then looked at Cath. ‘And you?’

  ‘I’m on a predictor. You’ve just been working with us.’

  ‘So I have,’ Ruth said heartily. ‘Well, well done all of you.’

  ‘You coming for a cuppa?’ Molly asked.

  ‘Oh – no thank you. We Kinnys have a hut of our own for making tea. But thank you anyway. See you soon!’

  She climbed onto the bike and hurried away.

  ‘I feel as if I ought to bow with gratitude,’ Cath said.

  Molly snorted with laughter.

  ‘Who the hell was that?’ Jen asked.

  Molly grinned. ‘We were on basic together. She daint half look down her nose at me. Looks as if she’s had to think again.’

  Jen rolled her eyes. ‘I’ve met a few like that, I can tell you.’

  The girls had a lot of fun at Clacton. Although they worked hard, they were not under immense pressure, and the work was repetitive. There was still the normal ATS discipline, like the morning and evening roll call and attempts at PT, but things were quite relaxed. In their breaks, there were plenty of good times to be had around the town, and plenty of people to have them with.

  Since Cath’s arrival at the camp, Jen, without any offence, had paired up more with another girl called Nora from east London, and the four of them had a great many laughs together. Sometimes, during their time off they managed to get hold of enough bicycles and pedalled off along the coast. They explored the holiday camp, the dried-up swimming pool with its peeling paint, the chalets and mess halls, sand piling against their walls. The golf course was scattered with guns and predictors. They explored the long, straight coast, so unlike the high cliffs and coves they had bee
n used to in Wales. And there were dances and games in the old Viennese Ballroom, which was now the gunners’ NAAFI.

  One day, once work had finished, Molly and Cath were in their room in the boarding house unwinding. That afternoon they had watched huge clouds massing which had then dumped their fast-falling contents on Clacton, and even though it was summer, they had got very cold, as well as wet. All they wanted to do was relax in the room’s warmth, but then Jen came in, combing out her long black hair and bouncing with enthusiasm.

  ‘There’s a do over at the NAAFI – we’re all invited!’

  Cath groaned, curling up tighter on the bed. ‘God no! I’m all in, and I want a bath, and the blasted boiler’s having one of its turns again.’

  ‘Oh don’t say you’re not coming!’ Jen said. She was always full of life. ‘Molly, what about you?’

  Molly was lolling on her bed, boots off, with a nice hot cup of tea. ‘Oh, I dunno . . .’

  ‘God, you two are a couple of old maids,’ Jen fumed. ‘D’you not want to get out and have a bit of a giggle?’

  ‘I would if I could be bothered to move,’ Molly said sleepily.

  Jen came and plonked herself on the edge of Molly’s bed, bouncing so that the springs shrieked.

  ‘Come . . .’ bounce, bounce ‘. . . on!’ Bounce, bounce. ‘Yer can’t just stay in here all night every night! Yer’ll go mad and turn grey and all your teeth’ll drop out!’

  ‘Oh all right, all right, stop it!’ Molly sat up, laughing, on the vibrating bed. ‘You coming, Cath?’

  ‘I suppose . . .’

  ‘Right – that’s settled,’ Jen said, leaping up and going triumphantly to the door. ‘Be ready in ten minutes.’

  Cath groaned. ‘Where does she get all her energy?’

  Molly leaned up on one elbow. Half seriously she said, ‘It’s ’cause you and me are old before our time.’

  The Viennese Ballroom was a huge, stately affair, with wooden balustrades supporting balconies above the dance floor. Two of its adjoining walls were fitted with floor-to-ceiling mirrors which made it look even bigger. Even though the place was already well filled when they arrived, with a band playing at the far end and smoke and chatter and dancing, the four girls still made a splash when they walked in. Molly and Cath both had striking hair and looks; Jen, though not pretty, gave off a vigorous energy; and Nora was small and sweet-looking with dark hair waving gently round her cheeks.