Rae grew more interested, however, once their combat training began. The girls mastered the basics of unarmed combat, learning how to break a hold and throw an enemy onto the floor. They learned how to shoot a rifle, and how to thrust and lunge at the enemy with a bayonet. They practised getting wounded comrades onto stretchers, and mastered first aid. These unladylike tasks prompted much giggling from some of the girls, but Rae was pleased that she was finally learning to become a fighter. ‘Good, Brewer,’ the sergeant shouted, seeing her enthusiastic attempts to spear an imaginary German.
After a few weeks of training, Rae realised she was beginning to enjoy herself, despite the rigorous discipline. The fresh air and physical exertion suited her, and she had even come to take pride in making her uniform look perfect for the daily inspection, keeping her shirts and tunic pressed by laying them under her mattress every night, and polishing her buttons and shoes until they gleamed.
One day, on the assault course, she was racing as fast as she could when she came up to a rope hung over a ditch. Without slowing down to judge the distance she leaped for it and missed, falling onto the ground below. Her whole weight came down on her left ankle, and she cried out in pain as she felt the joint twist.
Rae was helped to the barracks nurse, who iced the ankle and wrapped it in a tight bandage. ‘Keep it elevated,’ the woman told her. ‘You’ll have to rest up for a couple of weeks.’
While some might have been glad of the rest, Rae was frustrated at not being able to join the others. Once her injury was healed, however, there was even worse news.
‘You’ll have to join the next intake,’ her sergeant told her. ‘You can resume your training – from the beginning.’
Rae watched helplessly as the rest of the girls left Glencorse Barracks without her. She joined the new group of fresh-faced recruits and started the endless process of drill practice all over again.
After completing their training in Scotland, the girls were posted around the country. Rae was sent to Derby to the Royal Army Ordnance Corps, who were responsible for the supply and maintenance of vehicles and weapons. She couldn’t believe it – after all those weeks of army training, she was confined to a clerical role, processing orders.
In Derby, the ATS girls were billeted in a Victorian orphanage, and it was still as grotty and depressing as it had been when its previous inhabitants were there. The work was dull, involving hour upon hour spent memorising the code numbers that corresponded to every piece of equipment and every part from nuts and bolts upwards. The tedious rote-learning was unbearable for Rae, who desperately wanted to be doing something. Many of the other girls felt the same, and they all tried to put in for transfers.
Luckily, after three weeks, Rae got a call to say she was being sent to Chelmsford, Essex, as part of a bold new experiment: training women in the manly art of welding. Just twelve ATS girls had been chosen from across the whole country, and Rae was among their number thanks to her experience working as a drilling operator back in London. Finally, she would be doing something practical for the war effort.
The girls were sent to technical college to learn their new craft. The teacher had never taught women before and it was clear he wasn’t quite sure what to make of the new group of students. He greeted them awkwardly, but was soon demonstrating how to weld two sheets of aluminium together, holding the flame to a welding rod until it melted into the joint between them, sparks flying off in all directions. Rae was transfixed. This was worlds away from the boring codes she had been learning, and she couldn’t wait to get her hands on one of the torches.
Soon he showed each girl to a bench, on which sat a pair of plates to be welded, along with a welding rod. He distributed gloves and safety goggles and showed them how to hook up their torches to the cylinders that stood on little trolleys behind them. ‘All right, you can light your torches now,’ he told them.
Rae was thrilled when the torch came alive in her hand and she felt the powerful heat of the blue flame. She took her rod and gently touched the flame to it, watching it sizzle and spark and the molten metal drip gently onto the plate below. It was extremely satisfying to see the metal transform under her influence.
At the end of the eight-week training period all but two of the candidates passed, including Rae, who had proved an excellent welder even with her bad eye. Now came their real test: being sent off to depots around the country to ply their new trade among their male counterparts.
Rae was sent to a workshop in Mansfield, a town about fifteen miles north of Nottingham, where she was the only female welder. She couldn’t wait to put her training to use, and before long she found her skills were in demand all over the workshop.
Her first task was to help a corporal with re-bending some springs for a car. Rae warmed the metal with her torch and he teased them back into tightly sprung coils. Next, she was sent to the tin-bashers, who were working on damaged fenders. Again, Rae heated the metal, which was then coaxed into shape much more easily. Then, she was sent to the blacksmith to heat up the metal he was pounding with his hammer. She was soon a popular presence throughout the workshop, and to say thank you, the blacksmith toasted a piece of bread for her on his fire.
Although she was the only female welder, Rae was not the only woman at the workshop, and she was billeted in a house full of other ATS girls. The house was run by a Scottish sergeant by the name of Helen, and sharing a room with Rae were Irene, a motorcycle despatch rider from Birmingham, and Eileen, a Liverpudlian who worked as the colonel’s chauffeur. Rae flourished in the company of both girls, glad that she was no longer the only tomboy.
In the ATS, Rae was entitled to a week’s leave every three months, and she generally visited her family in London. On one such trip, she and her sister Mary decided to go out in the West End, but Rae found that London was not quite how she remembered it. ‘You have so many Yanks down here!’ she remarked in horror.
Living in Mansfield, Rae had only encountered US soldiers occasionally, but with two brothers in the Army she had picked up their prejudice against the GIs. Relations between British and American soldiers were often tense, not least because of the Tommies’ belief that the Yanks were stealing their women. When one GI asked for a pint of beer ‘as fast as the British got out of Dunkirk’, a group of Tommies threw him in the nearest river, shouting, ‘Is that how the Yanks swam at Pearl Harbor?’
Before Rae had joined the ATS, her brother Bill had told her, ‘I never want to see you in uniform, or dating a Yank.’ She had already gone against his first decree, but she had no intention of breaking the second.
When Rae and Mary stopped for a drink in a pub, they made sure to choose a table in a quiet corner, where they could talk without being interrupted. But they had not been there long before a couple of GIs sauntered over.
‘Hey, baby,’ said one. ‘Do you want to see my place back home in Florida?’
He took out a photograph of a palatial beach-front property. Rae could tell immediately that it was a hotel.
‘Oh, lovely,’ she replied. ‘I’ve got one just like that myself!’
The men were not discouraged, however, and were soon finding other subjects to brag about, including their country’s claim to be a beacon of democracy.
‘You Brits are stuck with your King, but we can tell our President to kiss our ass if we want to!’ said the second GI.
‘Don’t you dare mess with royalty,’ Rae said angrily.
‘Hey, we came over here to help you win this war, don’t forget,’ the first young man retorted.
‘Just a minute,’ said Rae. ‘We’d been at it for two years before you came along!’
The men could see their charms were not having the desired effect, and made a hasty exit.
Rae was annoyed enough already, but when she and Mary left