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DOROTHY HARVEY (nee Hall)
WAAF

Dorothy was brought up in Gainford, with her sister and two brothers. Her father worked for the local builder. After school she worked as a ‘between maid’ ~ between the cook and the parlour maid ~ and hated it. At 16 she became a ‘house parlour maid’ in Bradford, but when the bombing started her parents told her to come home and she worked in the Co-op in Darlington.

When I was 18 I was going to be called up and I knew it would be munitions or farm work, so I volunteered for the WAAF. I did my training at Morecambe and wanted to do balloon operations but instead was sent to RAF Uphaven in Wiltshire, known as The Seven Central Flying School, as a ‘batwoman’. I had various job to do, including polishing buttons and waiting on tables.

I wanted to re-muster and was told I could do so if I went to night school, so was accepted on a course as an equipment assistant at Weston-super-Mare for eight weeks. Two of us passed out of he course with 89% and became LACW’s (Leading Aircraft Women). We had to hand our cap badges in and got WRAF ones in return. Every Wednesday was ‘Domestic Day’. When you finished school in the morning, we were then told that we could either play volley ball, go cycling or go on a route march which I knew led to a café. So I volunteered for the latter and this time it was a ten mile march, so I didn’t volunteer for that again!

Then it was back to Uphaven and kitting the Second TAF (Tactical Air Force) ~ the all volunteer suicide squad who had to secure bases and make sure the landing fields were serviceable behind enemy lines. There were lots of forms to complete, some with three or four copies and I had to know when to send a wire or telegraph off for a certain part, if it wasn’t in stock. Freddie Mills, the boxer, was a Sergeant and I issued him with towels when he won his famous fight, The Longsdale Belt

Eight of us lived in married quarters, which was like a normal house. There was a kitchen with a bath in it and I had an iron bedstead. Three slept upstairs, three down and two in the Corporal’s room. I then was moved into a wooden hut with beds down the side and a room at the end for the Corporal or Sergeant. The tannoy would wake us each day with “Wakey, wakey the time is now” ~ 06.30 hours reveille. Nearby soldiers would invade the camp as practise and we all had to congregate in the Mess Hall.

There were regular dances with the camp band. Sometimes there were famous bands, especially at Christmas and we also had pantomimes. I remember the service people performing Noel Coward’s ‘Blithe Spirit’. When we had time off we would play badminton or go to the gym, in the boxing ring! We went in Devises and at a weekend we would go into Salisbury. We used to hitch hike but never with less than three. If an American convey passed us from Tidmouth, they would throw us oranges and chocolate. The ‘Sally Ann’ (Salvation Army) had a canteen where I would help with the washing up. There were also NAAFI and YMCA canteens. We had a lot of good laughs ~ I remember some good times, good bad times and some horrible!

Every three months I would get a 7-day pass, put together with a 48 hour one. Returning after leave once I remember seeing fields of camouflaged tanks. Then one day I was sitting on a petrol dump, which was a big hump covered with grass, and looking towards Portsmouth. The sky was black with our planes pulling gliders. I went back to the section and listened to the radio and it was the start of ‘the invasion’. All long leaves were stopped for about 11 months, building up to this event.

On VE Day everyone went home on 48 hour passes, but it was too far from Wiltshire ~ you had to go via London and it took 12 hours. So I stayed and did a duty instead. At the end of the War bonfires were lit in the squares and airmen were dragged outside in their beds. The piano was also dragged out of the NAFFI. Men started coming back from overseas to various camps and it was then that I met my husband, who returned from Burma. He had been out there for five years from the age of 18. He had been on a ship waiting to invade Rangoon, when the atom bomb was dropped, so they were sent home. (The only reference he ever made to his time out there was to say “They took my youth away)!

After the War the whole camp was moved to Little Rissington in Gloucestershire, known as The Seven Flying Instructors’ School.
There was a different atmosphere in the camps after the end of the War. They didn’t want the Corporals to mix with the other ranks and they made a ‘Corporals’ Club’, instead of the NAAFI. I didn’t want to be de-mobbed as I enjoyed the great companionship, but my mother wanted me to leave.

Dorothy got married and went to live in Cardiff. There was no chance of a house there so they came back to Gainford where they brought up their family. Her husband became the school caretaker and she was a cleaner there for 23 years. She still regularly keeps in touch with two friends, one in Canada and one in the South.

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