Soldier Girl (47 page)

December 1944

In the past months, the situation in Europe had changed fast. Allied forces had moved across France and into Belgium. Paris, Brussels and Antwerp were wrested from German occupation, but a terrible price had been paid by the Allies at Arnhem. Now, as a bitingly cold winter was setting in, fighting was focused in the Ardennes. Slowly, agonizingly, Europe was being reclaimed.

One morning, made all the more viciously cold by a Siberian wind, Molly and the others were gathered in a requisitioned hall. There was a room full of khaki uniforms, a loud buzz of excitement, and the voices, both male and female, of the gathered ack-ack batteries who were defending the port of Harwich.

Molly leaned round and nudged Jen. ‘Anything from Nora?’

‘No – I’d tell yer if there was, wouldn’t I? She won’t’ve come round yet.’

All of them looked pale from lack of sleep. In the middle of the night, Nora had been overtaken by terrible pains and had been carted off to hospital with appendicitis.

‘Poor thing,’ Cath said. ‘She looked dreadful. And she’s missing all this.’

One of the high-ups at the front banged on the table and all fell quiet. Everyone stood to attention as a tall, slim officer, her blonde hair caught up elegantly under her ATS cap, walked in briskly and took up her position before them.

‘Stand easy – take a seat!’

Everyone watched, awed. She introduced herself as Chief Commander Lucinda Mossfield. As she spoke, greeting them all and praising them for their work in coastal defence, especially for having faced the new menace of V1 and V2 rockets, her severe expression softened a little.

‘As you know, the war is progressing and things are changing. Because of our gains in Europe, we are standing down most ack-ack batteries and transferring personnel to other trades. But we have already sent a number of batteries across to the European mainland. There is still work to be done, and work at which you are now rich in experience.’

She looked round the room. Molly watched her, rapt, in deep admiration. The woman spoke so well, had such command over herself. If only she, Molly, could be like that!

‘We are looking, in the first instance, for volunteers. I would like you to consider offering yourself for service overseas, for what we foresee will be the remainder of the war. You will be a new battery under new leadership. We shall need to know quickly, and you must make your decision firmly. The first port of call will almost certainly be Belgium. After that, who knows quite how things will progress? So – think for a moment among yourselves. You can let your Commanding Officer know your decision.’ Molly turned instantly to Cath. They met each other’s gaze, their eyes shining with such enthusiasm that there was no need to speak. Oh yes, they were keen all right. They would go – and they would go together.

To their surprise, Jen said she wasn’t going to volunteer.

‘I don’t really want to leave the country,’ she said sadly. ‘I’m a home bird really and I’m already far enough away from where I come from. My mam’s got her hands full and – I don’t know. It just doesn’t feel right. I’ll go into the Pay Corps or something boring like that, back up north. But I’ll miss you crazy lassies.’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘You’d damn well better come back and get in touch with me – even if I do live way up there!’

Molly and Cath promised fervently that they would. It was a strange, sad time in some ways, with partings and separations. Nora was not well enough to volunteer, and of the little group of them, Cath was the only person going who Molly knew very well. But Cath was her best friend – so what could be better?

Cath was jubilant. ‘I’ll be nearer to Dirck!’ she said. ‘I mean, I don’t know where he is, but I just feel I’ll be closer. And it’ll be exciting, going somewhere new.’

Molly felt the same; ready for anything the army could offer her. She, little Molly Fox, was going abroad to a foreign country. When in her life had she ever expected that before?

The members of the new battery were given papers and inoculations and instructions in preparation for their departure just before Christmas. There was already snow on the ground when one morning they were gathered outside, huddled in their greatcoats, for an inspection by their new subaltern.

Molly and Cath stood side by side, toes and fingers frozen, eyes watering in the cutting wind. A car drew up, with an ATS driver at the wheel. Molly glanced at it as their sergeant bawled, ‘Attention!’

A second later she was further distracted by it and couldn’t help turning her head to look. From the passenger seat someone emerged in a bulky greatcoat, a sturdy, determined figure.

‘Fox – eyes front!’ The sergeant approached, almost yelling into her face.

But Molly felt excitement and expectation rising in her and had to try to contain a smile that would not stop breaking across her face, however much yelling she came in for. They received the order to be ready for inspection, and their new subaltern proceeded along the rows. She stopped at each of them, looking them over appraisingly. Cath, who had a cough, couldn’t help clearing her throat. ‘Nasty cough, Private,’ she said to her when her turn came. ‘Get that seen to.’ And then Molly was face to face with Phoebe Morrison.

No words were exchanged, but looking directly into Subaltern Morrison’s brown eyes, Molly saw a glimmer first of surprise, then of warmth. And then the senior officer moved on. The smile on Molly’s face escaped and spread. Luckily no one was looking.

‘Come in – stand easy.’

Subaltern Morrison sent for her the next day, in her office in a graceful requisitioned house. The room looked over the sea, though today it was a murky grey, and the view could not be admired by Molly, who was standing with her back to it. She waited while Phoebe Morrison walked ponderously round behind her desk, then stopped, positioned herself squarely and looked across at her. Her expression was neutral at first, seeming to be weighing things up with professional detachment. She made a small, involuntary movement with her right hand, as if to bring a cigarette up to her lips, but she controlled it. Then she smiled. Molly was startled. She had never seen the woman smile wholeheartedly before: it lit up her face with kindly energy. The smile warmed Molly to the core.

‘So, Fox. Here we are again.’

‘Yes, Ma’am, so it seems,’ Molly said, smiling back.

‘I’m glad to see you’re still here. The army appears to have suited you.’

‘Oh yes!’ Molly said enthusiastically. ‘It has.’

‘Good. I’m glad. It was dashed hard to tell at the beginning how things might turn out.’

They both laughed a little, Molly blushing at the memory of her first ATS weeks.

‘It seems that changing trade was a good idea.’

‘Yes. Very, thanks.’

‘You’re an intelligent girl and it appears you have been well able to take responsibility. I have good reports.’

Molly blushed again. ‘Thank you.’

‘Well I haven’t asked you here just for idle chit-chat. I want to give you another fresh start as we go across the water. I’m promoting you, Fox. To Lance Corporal. If that goes well – onwards and upwards! We’ll see.’

‘
Me?
’ Molly burst out, laughing incredulously. ‘Why me? Why not . . . ?’

‘Because I think you are fit for the job,’ Phoebe Morrison said briskly. ‘If you have no other questions, that will be all.’

But she was unable to suppress her amusement at Molly’s astonished reaction, and with a twinkle in her eyes she held out her hand. Even more amazed, Molly took it, for a handshake over the desk.

‘Welcome aboard, Lance Corporal Fox.’

Molly walked back in such a daze that she scarcely noticed the cold wind whipping her cheeks. She stopped, looking out over the steely sea, reflecting equally heavy cloud, but her own spirits could not have been lighter. Soon they would be crossing that stretch of water, she and Cath and her other companions, in the big family that the army had become for her. She could leave home far away, Mom drunk in her bed, Bert rotting in his condemned cell, the past with all its pain and shame. She was becoming someone new, capable, trustworthy, she, little Molly Fox, from the back streets of Birmingham, and she knew there was so much more she could do. She was a soldier girl, that’s what she was. She was being given a chance, such a chance.
Onwards and upwards! We’ll see.

Soldier Girl

A
NNIE
M
URRAY
was born in Berkshire and read English at St John’s College, Oxford. Her first ‘Birmingham’ novel,
Birmingham Rose
, hit
The Times
bestseller list when it was published in 1995. She has subsequently written thirteen other successful novels, including, most recently,
A Hopscotch Summer
. Annie Murray has four children and lives in Reading.

A
LSO BY
A
NNIE
M
URRAY

Birmingham Rose

Birmingham Friends

Birmingham Blitz

Orphan of Angel Street

Poppy Day

The Narrowboat Girl

Chocolate Girls

Water Gypsies

Miss Purdy’s Class

Family of Women

Where Earth Meets Sky

The Bells of Bournville Green

A Hopscotch Summer

Acknowledgements

This is the sort of story that requires a very large number of small pieces of information, so my sources have been varied. But I owe some particular thanks. First to Dorothy Brewer Kerr for her memoir
The Girls Behind the Guns
, to Margaret Dady for
A Woman’s War
, and once again to Eric Taylor for
Women Who Went to War, 1938–1946
. Angus Calder’s social history of the Second World War,
The People’s War
, was of assistance, as was Donald Thomas’s
An Underworld at War
. The BBC’s large online archive of oral testimonies on World War II has also been invaluable.

My special thanks also to Eric Hill and the other lovely members of the Heartlands Local History Society, based at Nechells Green Community Centre in Birmingham.

For Alice Louise Roberts

First published 2010 by Macmillan

This electronic edition published 2010 by Macmillan
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ISBN 978-0-330-52568-8 PDF
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Copyright © Annie Murray 2010

The right of Annie Murray to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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