How WWII built my confidence

In 1940, aged 26, I - Edie Jones - was living in Hursley, a small village just south of Winchester, with my parents and sister and working in the local village shop. One day, just before Dunkirk, I went into Winchester, as I used to from time to time, with no intention of doing anything different from normal. However, I spotted the Army Recruiting Office and on the spur of the moment went in and joined the ATS. When I got back home and told my mother, she was furious, but I knew that had I not joined up then, I would have been called up before long.

For the first four weeks of my training I was in Ordinance Engineering, when the REME was formed. The unit I was then sent to was the Sixth Gloucester Clerical Company, ATS, which had been formed in Bristol as a territorial unit. I was based at HQ Southern Command at Wilton House in Salisbury, where I remained for three and a half years. I was then based in Tavistock, Devon, for six weeks in 1944 and in October 1945 I was at Larkhill when I was demobbed.

Mary, the Princess Royal, visited us during my time at HQ Southern Command one very cold day. Some people were suffering from hypothermia by the time she completed her inspection! More memorable than this though was the visit by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth one very wet day. They had been to Aldermaston immediately before their visit to us and the car broke down en route. This meant we were standing in the pouring rain for three hours waiting for them to arrive! The King inspected the men and the Queen the women. She took one look at us in our drenched uniforms, turned to her escort and said “I hope these poor girls have got somewhere to dry their clothes!”

Social life was good during this period - we used to go to Toc-H, and I made many friends, several of them civilians, including the wife of a soldier with whom I remained friends until she died in her eighties. At 91 I am outliving most of the friends I made during that time!

On my return home from Larkhill, I found that my mother had got me my old job back at the village shop. However, before I started work I went to London to see some new friends I had made. All my life I had wanted to be a children’s nanny, but my mother would not let me. During the visit to London I went into a well-known nanny agency and signed up. A position was found for me immediately with a Harley Street Specialist’s family which I accepted without hesitation.

I really enjoyed my life in the Army and although I did not experience any direct warfare it gave me the strength and independence to be able to live my life in the way I wished and the confidence to stand up to my mother.

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