After his fanfare, Mr. Terry ushered me through an unremarkable set of steel doors and into a small foyer with three wooden chairs and a low metal table with copies of The Motor magazine on it. A receptionist sat behind a small hatch with a grille on it, which made the room look rather like a railway station ticket office. Also there, to my great delight, was Anne, who was standing to attention and looking very professional in dark trousers and a brown coat, her hair sensibly tied back and half hidden under a blue knitted snood. She was smiling broadly, and I very much wished I could say hello properly and give her a hug.
Next to her stood a stocky, balding gentleman whose face did not exactly say “Welcoming Committee.” No wonder Anne looked as if she was on parade.
“Aha,” said Mr. Terry. “Mr. Rice. And, um…”
“Mrs. Oliver,” I said before it became too obvious that he either didn’t know or had forgotten Anne’s name.
“How do you do, Mr. Rice?” I said, realising I had just blotted my copybook by saying hello to Anne first. “Miss Emmeline Lake. I’m very pleased to meet you. Launceston Press is most indebted to you for your help.”
“Mmm,” said Mr. Rice. I stretched out my hand, daring him not to shake it. “How’d you do,” he continued, looking cross.
Mr. Terry appeared to have lost interest. He looked over to the receptionist and shouted, “Noreen!” at her, to which she diligently replied, “Good morning, Mr. Terry,” and he seemed to cheer up.
“Miss Lake,” he said, “I will leave you in the capable hands of Mr. Rice and your friend. Good day.”
And without mentioning when I might be able to interview him properly about women recruits, he strode off through a door marked PRIVATE and was gone.
The three of us stood in silence for a moment. Anne surreptitiously raised her eyebrows at me.
“It was very good of Mr. Terry to come to the station,” I said to fill the lull.
“If I had that car and his petrol, so should I,” said Mr. Rice. “Miss Lake, this is a very busy factory. Where are you from, again, and how long will this take?”
Anne frowned, but after Mr. Terry’s nonstop gushing, I found myself preferring Mr. Rice’s straightforward approach.
“I’m from Woman’s Friend magazine,” I said. “I’m here to write an article on women war workers. It’s part of the Government’s recruitment drive.”
“That explains it,” snorted Mr. Rice. “If there isn’t a knighthood handed out here by the end of the war, I’ll watch a pig fly past in a Spitfire.”
Anne stared innocently at the ceiling, for all the world looking as if she didn’t know who he meant. I wondered whether I was supposed to laugh or not. Mr. Rice looked at me.
“I’ve worked at Chandlers most of my adult life,” he said as if it told me everything I needed to know. He turned to the receptionist, his tone less stern. “Mrs. Noakes, I’m assuming you know about Miss Lake’s visit? Thank you. Come on, Miss Lake, I’ll give you a tour. Mrs. Oliver, you know the way.”
As Mrs. Noreen Noakes nodded and gave a friendly smile, Anne opened a door and led us down a long corridor. Even before we left the reception area, I could hear the rumble of machinery.
“This is Shed Twelve,” said Mr. Rice, walking beside me. “It’s one of the biggest. You’ll see that Management are upstairs, and if they care to, they can watch what everyone is doing. It’s not the same for all the sheds, so you can decide for yourself if Mrs. Oliver is lucky or not to be in this one.”
We stopped at a pair of heavy double doors. Mr. Rice looked at me, as if inspecting a machine. “Your shoes are all right, but Mrs. Oliver, can you please give Miss Lake a scarf for her hair? You’ll be fine with those earrings. There’s nothing likely to go bang in here. Watch your step, as it can get greasy. Stay close, and don’t put your hands or face near anything noisy or moving.”
“You don’t really need this,” whispered Anne as she showed me how to twist the scarf into a sort of turban over my hair. “That’s it, tuck in the ends. Don’t worry about the bang thing. He just means there’s no explosives.”
I nodded and tried not to look relieved. Anne mentioned explosives as a casual aside. The last time I saw her, she had been gently handing bread and jam to her daughter. I was very impressed.
As Mr. Rice opened the doors and motioned me to follow, I entered an entirely different world. A small army of women were working at benches or standing at thumping great pieces of machinery, pulling levers, pushing through unidentifiable chunks of metal or deftly changing parts that were being cut or hammered into shape. Kitted out in the same uniform of brown overalls or coats as Anne, they all had their hair tied back in a wide variety of different-coloured scarves, as if to remind you that they were individuals and not just additional cogs in the factory machine.
A few men with clipboards were walking around looking over the women’s shoulders and occasionally speaking to them, although I couldn’t imagine how anyone could hear a word. The rumbling I heard before had now become an almost deafening roar from the hundreds of drilling, cutting, and pounding machines.
Mr. Rice gave an unexpected wink. “You’ll get used to it,” he shouted, not unkindly.
“Right you are,” I shouted back. There was no point trying to pretend I had seen anything like this before. The noise was overwhelming, as if every bus in the country had stopped outside your house with its engine running, while people took it in turns to whack them with huge iron bars and scrape nails along their sides.
For a moment I was embarrassed that it was a shock to me, as if I were just on a day out from my little office in London. But after months of the Blitz and night after night of planes and guns and the falling of bombs, I felt I’d earned the right to look Mr. Rice in the eye. I had no need to apologise that being in a factory was new to me.
More than anything, I wanted to understand what the women were working on. I watched as some yelled information at each other, while others pored over their work, deep in concentration. A few were even managing to chat. One or two nodded at Anne. Everyone knew exactly what they were doing and behaved as if they had been working there all their lives. It was one of the most striking things I had ever seen.
“I’m on one of the capstans,” yelled Anne as we went over to a woman deftly switching instruments over to set them drilling like mad. “Watch out, there’s swarf all over the place. I’ll go and find Sally. She’ll clear it up.”
“It’s part of the barrel,” bellowed Mr. Rice. “After here, they go on to Fourteen for the next stage.” He paused for a moment and then fixed me with a stare. “Miss Lake, if you want to know about women workers, I can tell you that this lot are all right. Some of them talk too much…”—he nodded at a group nearby—“but they’re doing good work.”
“Are they all new recruits?” I shouted as we moved on and a fearsome piece of kit smacked down on some metal, squashing it flat and threatening to burst my eardrums.
“Most of them.” Mr. Rice warmed to his subject. “They’re better than a lot of the men I’ve dealt with over the years.” He gave a quick unexpected grin. “That’s surprised you, hasn’t it? I bet you reckoned I think women can’t do the job.”
I denied the thought as we moved away from the production line to where it was very slightly quieter. “Why is it the women make such good workers?” I asked, partly to see if he was just humouring me, and partly because if he had a good answer, it could work perfectly in the article I wanted to write.
“Miss Lake,” said Mr. Rice, “have you a brother or a sweetheart who’s joined up?”
“Yes, both,” I said. “RAF and Artillery.”
“Good lads,” said Mr. Rice. “And the main thing you care about is that they’ll be safe and come home in one piece?”
“Of course. That and winning the war.”
“Well, in my view that’s why the women work well. They’ve a personal interest in knowing full care has gone into every single weapon or piece of metal that comes out of this factory.”
I understood what he was saying. There was a strange comfort in seeing the power of the munitions factory for myself. In peacetime, I would perhaps have felt differently. In the middle of a world war, I wanted to know that Charles or my brother Jack or any other man who was risking his life would have every possible chance to defend themselves.
“Of course, they’re also good at the detail work. It’s the smaller fingers.” He held up a sausagey hand. “They’re better equipped for the fiddly bits. Now, what else do you want to know?”
I wanted to say everything. What guns were the women making? How many hours did they work? What were they paid? And was it as hard as it looked?
Most of all, I wanted to talk to the women themselves, to find out how they felt about their jobs and being part of such an enormous team effort. Politicians said, “We’re in it together,” endlessly, but I wanted to see if Chandlers’ women workers felt the same way. Did they really feel they were doing their bit for their boys, or was Mr. Rice just being fanciful?
“When can I speak with the women?” I shouted as a screeching noise threatened to drown me out.
Mr. Rice looked at his watch as Anne rejoined us. “Not long, now. And Mr. Terry definitely said he was happy about this?” he said, which I thought enigmatic. Then his face changed completely.
“Hold up,” he snapped. “What the hell’s that?”
I followed his stare. To my astonishment, two young children were sitting cross-legged on the floor by the wall. They couldn’t have been more than twenty feet from one of the lathes.
“Take Miss Lake to the canteen,” Mr. Rice barked at Anne. “To the canteen, Mrs. Oliver!” he shouted as Anne made a move towards the children instead.
“Blast it,” she said, as women at their benches began to look round and I tried to see what was happening. “Come on, Emmy. It’ll make it worse if we stay. He’s going to hit the roof.”
Looking over my shoulder, I saw that one of the men with clipboards had rushed over to Mr. Rice and the two of them were now having a very animated discussion. Mr. Rice had his hands on his hips and looked absolutely livid.
“Anne,” I said as she dragged me out, “what on earth are children doing in a munitions factory?”
“Shhh,” said Anne, even though with the noise of the factory there was no chance we could have been overheard.
She hustled me out a side door and into the damp air, where she finally let go of my arm.
I asked again. “Why would anyone in their right mind bring their children here? This is the last place in the world they should be.”
Anne’s face had been a picture of concern, but now a look of anger flashed across it. “Don’t be so quick to judge,” she said hotly. “Their mum Irene is one of my friends. She hasn’t a choice. They’ve nowhere else to go.”
As Anne and I made our way to the canteen in the building next door, she began to fill me in on what was happening in the factory.
“I’m sorry to shout at you. This is the third time Irene’s been caught since I’ve been here,” she said in a low voice as we walked through an empty corridor. “The chargehands usually turn a blind eye because there’s nothing Irene can do, but now that Mr. Rice has seen them, it’s another matter. Honestly, Emmy,” she stressed, “it’s not her fault.”
She pushed open the door to the canteen. “We’re not supposed to be in here for another ten minutes, but let’s try to bagsie a table. The other girls are due at half past. I hope you don’t mind eating so early. Our shift started at six.”
I wasn’t at all interested in food or drink. I was still shocked at seeing children in such a dangerous place.
“It’s pretty grim, though, isn’t it?” I said after Anne had told one of the dinner ladies we’d been sent by Mr. Rice, so she let us sit at one of the long wooden tables. “What if one of the children gets hurt?”
“Of course it’s grim,” said Anne, who I could see was trying not to be short with me. “But her husband’s in the navy and she hasn’t any family locally. Sheila—she’s seven—is at school mostly, but if a neighbour can’t look after Enid, then she’s up a gum tree. So Irene’s managed to sneak the girls in here. Sheila looks after Enid and stops her from running around.”
A seven-year-old looking after her younger sister in a factory. No wonder Mr. Rice had seen red.
“Sorry to be snappy,” said Anne again. “I was on the same section as Irene when I first started. She was very kind to me, and we’ve become friendly. My mum had the girls once, but Irene lives on the other side of town, and Mum has her hands full with my two as it is.”
Anne leant her elbows on the table. She looked worried and tired.
“What about you, Anne?” I said. “How are you settling in?”
Anne took a deep breath and smiled, immediately changing to a cheerier look. “Oh, I’m fine, thanks,” she said. “The girls are a good lot and I enjoy the work. If I was single, like Betty, I wouldn’t have a care in the world. But it’s a twelve-hour day including the bus, so I go home, help Mum with the kids and the house, and by then, I’m almost dead on my feet.”
She laughed slightly unconvincingly. “Do you know, I can sleep at any time of the day now? Crash, I’m asleep! Although if I’ve been on the night shift, the children think I’m there to play with them all day. I’m not complaining, Emmy. I miss them ever so much when I’m here. But I’m flipping lucky to have my mum.”
“Do you have to work such long hours?” I asked. “Could you share a shift with someone else? And please tell me if I’m being too nosy.”
“It’s all right,” said Anne. She put her head slightly to one side and stared at me for a moment. “I don’t mind telling you. I need to work full time,” she said. “When Anthony was alive, because he was off fighting, I got twenty-eight shillings a week Married Woman’s allowance, and twelve and six for each of the children. With the money he sent out of his wages, it added up nicely if I took care. But if your boy dies, you lose his wages, of course, and they stop the twenty-eight shillings because they say you’re not a Married Woman anymore. So then you have to pay single woman’s tax on your wages and the pension too. It makes a big difference.” She paused. “I’m sorry. I know it’s poor form to talk about money.”
For the first time today, Anne’s face lost its stoicism. She looked utterly defeated. Then her brown eyes narrowed, and she raised her eyes to meet my gaze. “You know, Emmy, you don’t just lose them,” she said quietly. “Even if no one ever wants to talk about it, the fact is, loads of us have lost almost everything.”