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This story has been submitted to the People's War site by Christopher
Hall for Kent Libraries and Archives and Canterbury City Council Museums on behalf of Mrs May and Mrs Reed and has been added to the site with their permission. The authors fully understand the site's terms and conditions.
Dorothy May joined the WAAF and travelled to Colchester for her initial training. The recruits were all assembled in a circle and given the option to step forward if they did not want to begin their training. As Dorothy was needed at home to look after her mother who had been ill, she bravely stepped forward and was released. She returned home to Kent and then joined the Women's Land Army. She received her initial training at Brenzett on Romney Marsh and was billeted in a hostel there (the site later became the Brenzett Aeronautical Museum). After she had been trained she was posted to a farm near Herne Bay and was therefore able to live at home and help look after her family.
Her friend Mrs Reed was not called up because she was married with a family. She remembers the rationing of clothing, food and furniture and some people selling their ration coupons on the black market. One interesting aspect of rationing was the choice between receiving powdered egg or chicken feed. Those who kept chickens were therefore able to obtain their own eggs.
German POWs were able to work on local farms and had a great deal of "freedom" compared to what was later discovered about the treatment of British POWs overseas. There was some resentment by British soldiers to the American troops stationed over here.
The thought of a gas attack was one of the most frightening things about the War, and the gas masks for babies looked horrific.
Mrs Reed remembers the anti-British propaganda broadcast by Lord "Haw- Haw" to undermine morale. White feathers were handed to some men who hadn't joined up; unfairly in most cases as they were prevented from joining up because of disabilities.
There were bombs and landmines in Whitstable; the bombs were not usually dropped on purpose but by the German planes jettisoning their bomb loads so they could escape quickly. A landmine in Victoria Street rolled down the street taking everything in its wake, including soldiers queuing outside the chip shop (fish and chips being a luxury in the days of rationing). Mrs Reed remembers air-raid warnings in daytime and also staying with her sister in London during the Blitz. Every time one looked outside the windows, the sky was red from the fires.

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