fot Women

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 169, 20 July 1942, Page 5

fot Women

VITAL JOBS

DISPATCH RIDERS

WRENS FILL THE BREACH

(By JOAN LITTLEFIELD) LONDON, May 30.

The scope of jobs done by women both in civil life and in the armed services widens every month. They are attempting, and proving expert at, jobs which from time immemorial have been the sole province of men, and they are proving equally efficient at the many modern trades thrown up by the war of mechanisation.

In the Women's Royal Naval Service (the Wrens) girls are now acting as dispatch riders. Mostly they use motor cycles, which they must keep in perfect running order. Sometimes ordinary bicycles are used. The girls already have done gallant work and one of them, Wren McGeorge, was awarded the British Kmpire Medal for bravery during a heavy raid on Plymouth. While carrying urgent messages to the commander-in-chief her motor cycle was wrecked by a bomb. She ran the extra half mile to Admiralty House with bombs falling all around her, and, having delivered her message immediately volunteered to go out again.

\\ rens arc now used as deck hands in motor boats for harbour work. The first woman to become a coxswain in the Royal Navy was 29-year-old "Bubbles" Martin, of Brighton. She had experience with sailing boats and speedboats before the war ai.d after joining the Wrens received a course in seamanship, signalling, navigation and boat handling. Wrens also work as motor transport drivers, radio mechanics and operators, meteorologists, coders and wireless telegraphists.

In the A.T.S., the women's army, girls are now becoming ack-ack gunners, and have already brought down German raiders. They also work as radio mechanics, repairing field receivers and transmitters, and are said to be every bit as good as the men.

Christina Harris, a children's nurse three years ago, is the only pirl in Britain who fits wireless sets into tanks. She can also repair the complicated wiring system if it goes wrong.

One hundred A.T.S. girls are training to be driver-instructors or drivers of army trucks at a school in the South-eastern Command. Psychology tests are applied to disclose their temperament, adaptability and general intelligence.

Orderlies have been introduced into some units of the army, and eventually all officers' manservants, except for fighting troops in active war theatres, will be replaced by women. They will be under strict supervision of their n.c.o.'s and will not be allowed in an officer's rooms before 8 a.m. or after 8 p.m.—Auckland Star and N.A.N.A.