Recent Land Girls News
Bedfordshire Women's Land Army
Milton Ernest Hostel Land Girls Get-Together
(left to right)
Ann Haynes nee Brodrick,
Kathleen Cox nee
Hopkins, Dawn Filby nee Skeggs,
Mary Smith nee Pakes (cutting cake)
Trixie
Schreiner nee Saunders, Irene Saunders nee Cook,
Peggy Albertson nee Davis,
Hilda Hicks nee Bright
Former land girls who used to work together from Milton Ernest hostel in the 1940s, during the Second World War, decided to have a Get- Together at Thurleigh Airfield Museum on Sunday 15 August 2010. As well as being the official museum for the American 306 Bombardment Group in the UK, it also has a Home Front section including a display on the Women's Land Army (WLA) in north Bedfordshire. Stuart Antrobus, the WLA historian, was unable to be present but sent them good wishes for the day.
92-year
old Mary Smith, who was the first Forewoman at Milton Ernest, the first WLA
hutment hostel to be opened in the county in February 1942, had arranged the
event. She surprised and delighted the former land girls, most now in their mid-
to late-eighties, by reading out a spoof 'work list' notice (but as she would
have done 67 years before) telling them which of them was to report at which
local farms the following day to do what the farmers required that day: "Peg,
you will go to Mr Hope and Dawn, you will go to Mr. Measures you two can cycle
to Thurleigh ". They all had a good laugh and Ralph and Daphne Franklin, the
founders and co-curators of the museum, treated the ladies to a glass of
champagne to celebrate their return.
Cakes
made by 'Cookie' (Irene Saunders nee Cook) and Rebecca, Peggy Davis's cousin,
were another surprise addition to the buffet which Peggy had arranged.
There happened to be a wartime re-enactment group there that day and one of the men, dressed as an American GI, asked if any of the land girls fancied a jitterbug and Dawn Filby rose to the occasion and showed what she could still do, to the music of Glenn Miller. As a young woman she had actually had a date with the lead singer of Miller's band, Johnny Desmond.
Needless to say, they had such a good time that they all said that they wanted another get-together next year!
Remembrance Sunday Service, Bedford
Trixie
Schreiner, Irene Saunders & Pat Roberts (left to right) represent the wartime
land girls at the Remembrance Sunday service at the Embankment, Bedford,
November 2009.
Tea at the Palace for Two Former Land Girls
Following
the award in 2008, by the Government, of a Veterans Badge to surviving former
members of the Women's Land Army of the 1940s, and a Service of Thanksgiving for
Bedfordshire Land Girls on 31 May 2009, two women were chosen to represent
Bedfordshire at a tea party hosted by The Queen on 21 October 2009.
Audrey Thorne (nee Cooper) and Iris Cornell (nee Manning) were the lucky women chosen by the Lord Lieutenant of Bedfordshire (the Queen's representative in the county), Sam Whitbread.
Audrey had joined the Land Army aged 17 and worked at
Manor Farm, Wilstead, near Bedford, for Percy Thorne. During her time
there she met Mr Pat Thorne and they became sweethearts. They later were
to be married for 58 years, before being invited to spend their day in London,
together with ninety former Land Girls, plus their partners, from all over
Britain.
It
was particularly pleasing for the couple because, Audrey having had a recent
major operation, they were unable to attend the St. Pauls Church, Bedford
service in May. Audrey said, "I was delighted to have been chosen to
attend the celebration of a lunch at the Royal Opera House and tea with the
Queen at Buckingham Palace what an honour."
(Audrey and Pat are pictured to the right enjoying lunch at the
Royal Opera House - photo courtesy of DEFRA)
Iris Cornell (nee Manning) joined the Land Army aged 18,
because her friend had already joined and was sent for milking and dairy
training to Toddington Park hostel. Unusually, she was then allowed to live at
home (in order to support her mother) and cycle to her work at Twinwoods Farm,
Clapham. A few years later, after a period at Hulcote Moors Hostel, she got a
job working for the Bedfordshire War Agricultural Committee (the 'War Ag')
driving tractors and other agricultural equipment from their depot in Goldington
to wherever they were needed around the county. She met her husband as a result
of her work and they had been married 59 years when the call came for them to
spend this wonderful day in London together. She said, "I was thrilled to have
been chosen to attend this very special event and represent the Land Girls of
Bedfordshire how exciting!"
The visiting "land girls", now in their late eighties or early nineties, were treated by the Governments agricultural department, DEFRA, to a lunch of sausage and mash followed by apple pie and custard, before being coached from the Opera House to Buckingham Palace, where they had afternoon tea with her Majesty the Queen and other members of the Royal family.
All came away with wonderful memories to add to those of their youth, when they and over 200,000 other young women - served the nation on the land, helping feed the nation and win the war.
Veterans Rally at the Cenotaph
For
many years former land girls have taken the opportunity to gather together at
the Cenotaph -in Whitehall, London -for a brief service a month before the
larger Remembrance Sunday ceremony in November, from which (until 2000) they
were excluded. Such a ceremony was held on Saturday 10 October 2009 and seven
Bedfordshire former land girls joined others from around the country but
particularly from Kent.
They were there to remember those land girls who are no longer alive and the sacrifice that they all made in giving up their comfortable homes and moving away to work hard on farms during the war, to enable the nation to be fed.
Later, after the ceremony, they all dined together at nearby Westminster School and enjoyed each other's company for a good reminisce.
 (l to r) Irene Saunders (nee Cook), Olive Gardener (nee Durston), Trixie Schreiner (nee Saunders), Pat Clark (nee Roberts) |
(l to r) Renie Presland (nee Hirst), Vera Barnett (nee Jobling), Zeita Holes (nee Trott) |
Land Girls Get Together
On Sunday 31 May 2009, I was pleased to attend a service of thanksgiving at St.
Pauls Church, Bedford, for former members of the Women's Land Army and Womens
Timber Corps, arranged by the Lord Lieutenant of Bedfordshire, Sam Whitbread.
Over 300 people attended, including over 70 former 'land girls'.
This was followed by a lively reception at the Harpur Suite. The sun shone and
everyone was in their 'Sunday best' clothes.
The service, arranged by the Reverend Canon John Pedlar and Mr. Whitbread,
included both familiar hymns "All people that on earth do dwell", "We plough
the fields and scatter", "All things bright and beautiful" - and a choral
version of The Land Army Song, "Back to the land", for female voices. As the
historian of the Women's Land Army (WLA) in the county I was able to contribute
by suggesting the secular readings an extract from 'Land at War' by Laurie Lee
and a moving poem, 'Remember us', by Hilda Gibson. I read the Laurie Lee passage
which celebrates the contribution that 'land girls' made to wartime agriculture,
enabling the nation to be fed. The poem was read by Faith Baxter, daughter of
Mrs Erica Graham, who chaired the WLA county committee during the war. One of
the highlights of the service was a live 'conversation' between Pam Rhodes (of
BBC's 'Songs of Praise' fame) and three representative former 'land girls' I had
chosen to give their own personal testimonies of service on the land during the
Second World War. This brought alive some of hardship and laughter which these
young women experienced and must have triggered many memories in the minds of
those other, now elderly, ladies (some of them in wheelchairs; others quite
sprightly) in the congregation.
It was fitting that this final great 'get-together' should come in the year
after these former 'land girl' who had given up the comforts of home to
volunteer to take the place of male farm workers drawn into the armed forces for
the duration of the war were finally awarded a Veterans Badge to acknowledge
their sacrifice and contribution to the war effort.
Stuart Antrobus
Author of 'We Wouldn't Have Missed it
for the World'
E-mail: stuartantrobus@btinternet.com
or write to Stuart Antrobus, c/o Bedford Central Library, Harpur Street, Bedford, MK40 1PG
or leave a brief telephone message and your number, for Stuart Antrobus, via
Bedford Central Reference Library: Tel. 01234 718178
Page last updated: 17th October 2013