War Work and a Wedding Day

My mother's family lived in London, and in 1941, she was allocated to war work. She went to Paddington Technical College to train as a metalworker, then was assigned to what had been the NCR cash register factory, now producing munitions. She continued working there during the day and fire-watching one or two nights a week until the end of the war.

In 1942, she got married. It was impossible to get fabric for a wedding outfit. There was a bridesmaid's dress that others had worn over the previous two years, but she didn't want to borrow that. Her sister got a pile of dusters, bleached them, then dyed them and turned them into a suit.

She saw her husband a few more times over the course of the war, but sadly, he was killed in Italy six days before VE Day.