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| Life in RAF Watnall's wooden accommodation huts. Thirty girls shared what was effectively a large garden shed. |
RAF Watnall's resident cartoonist
One of the RAF Watnall girls who served in the camp's secret bunkers had previously been to art school. She did a series of watercolour sketches and poems of life on the camp at Watnall in WW2. Her name was Mary Harrison and she was a farmer's daughter from Derbyshire. She joined the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) in 1940 and was posted to RAF Watnall's Group Operations Room, "B" Watch until 1943.
After Watnall she was posted to another RAF base to make scale models of the French beaches and hinterland for the D-Day landings preparations. Her colourful sketches and poems humorously show what life was really like at Watnall's RAF camp and mention familiar local landmarks like the Royal Oak pub in Watnall and marching to the River Trent...
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| The girl behind the cartoons and poems, Mary Harrison. Special Duties Clerk in the RAF Watnall Ops Room 1940-1943. |
Everyday life at RAF Watnall
RAF Watnall³ was set up just before WW2 as East Midlands Group HQ for RAF Fighter Command. It was a large camp (900 personnel) comprised mostly of wooden huts and two top secret underground bunkers housing early warning radar control centres linked to the rest of the RAF command network by a sophisticated and very expensive telephony network¹. Nearby RAF Hucknall⁴ acted as its airbase.
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| Artist's impression of a typical wartime Ops Room |
With many able-bodied men already called up to fight, it was largely staffed by young girls of the Womens Auxiliary Air Force, known as WAAFs who'd volunteered to do their bit for the war effort⁵. They'd typically arrive by train with a rail warrant at Kimberley Station and walk up Newdigate Road passing in through the camp's Guard House opposite the Royal Oak to report for duty.
They were housed in wooden huts and in winter, conditions would have been extremely spartan.
The WAAF officers were billeted at Watnall Hall where they also had their meals. Conditions at the hall were not much better than in the huts. The roof leaked and an impoverished and elderly Lady Maud Rolleston could not afford repairs. The Air Ministry wouldn't pay for a new roof either. The WAAFs had one wing of the hall and Lady Maud had the other wing.
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| Watnall's WAAFs worked in the two secret bunkers here which provided vital early warning of Luftwaffe air raids |
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| The real-life cartoon girls are pictured here. Mary Harrison is 6th from the left, centre row² |
Come join the glamorous WAAF!
Wartime RAF Watnall was not as glamorous as the colourful WAAF recruiting posters liked to make out. They did not mention anything about scrubbing floors at 4 in the morning! WAAF Mary Harrison's series of watercolour cartoons and comic ditties tell it as it really was.
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Long march to the Trent
The WAAF girls were also encouraged to keep fit and they were taken on long marches. In an interview with Mary Harrison, she says that they marched to the Trent "and back". On Google Maps it's a 2hrs 43 mins 7.5 mile walk to Trent Bridge so you could feasibly do a return trip in a day on a quick march. On top of your stressful shifts in the bunker. Brutal! She did also talk about travelling around in the back of a lorry and the indignity of getting in and out in the WAAF uniform so maybe they got a lift back. Hitch-hiking was also popular with the WAAFs and they never had any bother except in the cab of a lorry "when one of you had to sit in the middle over the hot engine".
Night watches and parties
The girls sometimes managed to get hold of higher-grade uniform material and had more fashionably cut uniforms specially made. Mixing it with more colourful civilian accessories allowed for a little personal expression. Perhaps that's the explanation for this rather curious cartoon...
Meals at RAF Watnall
BBC WW2 People's War Irene White witnessirenee User ID: U1148359
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| A Nottingham lass who joined the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry in 1945 said... "Hitchhiking was practiced everywhere, particularly in Britain. If drivers didn't want to stop, they didn't, but some liked to chat on their journeys. It never entered my head that I might be molested and I never was. I once hitched a ride in a fish lorry to see a friend in Edinburgh. Although I sat in the cab with the driver, I still reeked of fish by the time I arrived". |
A posting to Watnall was not always popular as the shifts were long compared to other bases. Another WAAF, Patricia Elton recalls that before her posting to Watnall in the winter of 1941...
"I must have fallen out with one of the girls in my room for some reason, and she worked in the office with the warrant officer...and I was given the worst thing could happen to anybody, to get posted to group headquarters at Watnall... "You're posted to Watnall tomorrow, pick up your pass" and Watnall was not nice! It was just outside Nottingham. It was a little village called Kimberley. Enormous camp, a very big operations room, which was 80ft below ground. They were awful watches. There were eight [or nine] hour solid watches and the night watches, particularly from midnight to eight in the morning, climbing up these flights of steps after you've finished a watch, was really pretty awful... and after 3 weeks of solid night watches, and in the winter, being in the huts, 30 people in a hut, the ablution block was miles away, you were often ill, and by the time you came off duty it was still dark and then you went to bed and woke up and it was still dark and you never saw daylight."
The long shifts were made worse after a session at the Mess or a party. The WAAFs used to throw parties at the Officer's Mess in their half of Watnall Hall which the young trainee pilot officers from nearby RAF Hucknall⁴ loved to attend. Not sure what Lady Maud thought of it all, living as she did in the other half of the requisitioned hall! Lady Maud liked a nice wedding though and in Feb 1945 one of the WAAF officers, Barbara Mellors, was married at the hall much to Lady Maud's delight.
Off-camp activities
The yellow Permanent Pass or "P.P." was a much-valued item as it allowed you to go off camp for extended periods. Watnall WAAFs often went into Nottingham to the dances as Irene White, a young WAAF from Hull, talks about next. Irene liked doing the night watches as it gave her more time for off-camp shenanigans! She was one of the youngest in her hut and certainly seems to have enjoyed her time at Watnall...
"I was seventeen when I joined the Waafs. I certainly didn't ask to be a plotter - no one had heard of them at that time. I was enrolled as Clerk special duties and went to Gloucester and Compton Bassett first for training and then spent the rest of my time at Watnall Nr Nottingham. We worked 3 "watches", mornings afternoon and nights. I seem to remember liking nights best because we could have an hour or two to sleep, sneak out of camp, go for morning coffee, afternoon tea dance and then on to the evening dance at the Palais. We would then get back to camp, wash and maybe shut our eyes for half an hour ready for the night shift again. Where DID we get the energy? There were (I think) about twenty of us in Raf hut 9. Is it possible we got by without any arguments? I don't remember any. Great Memories!"
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| The P.P. or Permanent Pass allowed you to go off camp for extended periods |
Quieter times and alternative activities
Watnall's watches were not always super busy especially after the Battle of Britain. So when there was no enemy activity to plot, other pastimes had do be resorted to. Patricia Elton recalls people knitting to pass the time...
"I had a fairly quiet time, I think, then, because we were in the middle of England, and I can remember people sitting around knitting and making felt toys, and one of the controllers used to do lovely tapestry work."
An uneventful watch could also lead to daydreams of other places you wished to be as one of Mary Harrison's poems below shows...
There was also a cinema on the camp called the Astral where films, serials (such as the original 1936 Flash Gordon) and variety shows were put on. The RAF motto is "Per Ardua Ad Astra" (Through Adversity to the Stars), so I'm sure some camp wit would have changed it to "Per Ardua Ad Astral" (Through Adversity to the Cinema)!
Dressing Correctly
Flicking through the notepad of WAAF Mary Harrison reveals that reporting for duty dressed incorrectly (such as missing a collar stud) could land a young WAAF in trouble so it was vital everything was kept in its place. To say nothing about the challenges of wearing suspenders on parade!..
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| Civvy cloth |
Winter in the wooden accommodation huts
What was life like living in the wooden accommodation huts especially during winter? They were nothing more than garden sheds really but the WAAF girls did their best to cosy them up.
One rather posh girl from London whose father was a Harley Street consultant got a few tips before she arrived...
"I have to tell you before I actually got my call-up I had a great piece of luck because I got to know a very nice WAAF who was getting on the bus with me every morning to go into town. She was working at Baker Street and I approached her and said, I'm going into the WAAFs quite soon.
She said, I'll give you a few tips what to take. She said, get yourself a baby pillow because she said the pillows aren't really pillows, they're bolster strips sort of stuffed with straw. She said, you'll be very popular if you get an electric iron with a bayonet plug that you can plug into the light. Do you remember the thing that you hang off the light? And she said an alarm clock and of course a hot water bottle she said. So I'd equipped myself with all these things and I was quite popular in our hut. And I always remember that first night, there we all were up, getting into our various nightgowns, pajamas and you know, even dressing gowns, realizing that the ablutions were miles from the hut...
And it really was rather awful because, you see, it was back to huts, 30 people in a hut, the ablutions were miles away, it was winter, we had to go to the coal, erm, coke heap, it was a long way from our hut, and we had to go with these great baths, you know, with a handle at each end, and we'd fill it up with coke and stagger back, and then we had these stoves each end of the hut, you see, trying to keep the place warm.
And during that time, I must have got some leave, and Ralph asked me down to Clevedon for the weekend, and I found later my mother-in-law's diary where she put "Ralph bought a WAAF girl down for the weekend. Amazing that such a refined girl should have to live in a hut with 30 other women. That was the only comment about me."
The WAAF officers had their meals at the canteen or "Mess" (to use the military term) up at Watnall Hall. The girls had their "Airwomen's Mess" on the main site. The male officers and men had their accommodation and Messes at the main camp too where there was also a cinema. It didn't stop the occasional man showing up at the women's Mess though. WAAF officers would sometimes patrol to check for interlopers and check the food was ok. Sausages and baked beans seem to have been on the menu quite a lot though!..
Losses to "Friendly Fire"
Most of Mary Harrison's ditties are humorous and light-hearted but one takes a sad turn when it talks about a particularly fraught plotting session...
You can read more about RAF Watnall's secret bunkers here...
and here...
Notes and Sources:
Imperial War Museum - https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/search?query=watnall&pageSize=30&media-records=records-with-media&style=list
BBC WW2 People's War Irene White witnessirenee User ID: U1148359
WW2 People's War is an online archive of wartime memories contributed by members of the public and gathered by the BBC. The archive can be found at bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar
1 - The Telephony network - I've recently seen a very interesting letter from a Mr. Long who served as the Unit Signals Warrant Officer at RAF Watnall on three separate tours of duty during WW2. He explains how it all worked...
"The underground operations block itself was indeed sixty feet below ground, and housed the Group Operations Room complete with a mammoth plotting table, operational and administrative teleprinters which were a vital main link in the Defence Teleprinter Network, and a very large telephone exchange, in addition to hundreds of thousands of pounds’ worth of GPO equipment. The GPO also manned the place for twenty-four hours a day."
"This [Filter] Block housed equally costly and secret equipment, and was designed to act as a point where all the classified information received from the various Radar and Ground Control Interception stations could be ‘filtered’ before being passed on to the Operations Room. Both blocks were manned throughout the twenty-four hours, and it was a common sight to see the night watch marching down the main road at Watnall on their way to the Filter Block with an airman or airwoman walking in front and at the rear of the column with a lantern."
Mr. Long also got the phone bill for RAF Watnall...
"Perhaps it will give you some idea of the vast cable and telephone network when I relate that whilst serving at Watnall after the war, I had to certify the half-yearly Telephone and Cable account, and it was never less than £500,000. That was in the mid-fifties when a pound was a pound!" In today's money that is £22 million every 6 months.
2 - The personnel of B Watch shown in the group picture are 1941 is as follows:
RAF and WAAF servicemen and women of B Watch (Operations) at RAF Watnall.
Back row (L - R): T Davis, R Mann, P Mould, A Harris, A Patterson,N Jackson, M Vickerstaff, A Kershaw.
3rd row (L -R): R Holt, M Jessop, M Thomas, W Luker, F Beetles, M Harrison (who did all the cartoons and poems), W Holt, M Tomlinson, M Jackson, E Townley, L Ashby, V Peatman, M Parsons, E Dale.
2nd row (L - R): J Lyle, M Radford, Sgt Fowler, F/Sgt Young, Group Captain Turton-Jones, Wing Commander Wood, Sgt Sooby, P Howard, F Gibbons
Front: H Hyatt, R Parr, P Swift, J Ingram.
3 - RAF Watnall - Initially completed in 1938 the installation did not become fully operational until late 1940 when control operations were transferred from nearby R.A.F. Hucknall. Numerous hutments were erected within the immediate locality providing administrative support and residential accommodation for up to 900 personnel. Within the grounds of Watnall Hall, prior to demolition, were six individual structures including a large timber stores unit, four Laing hutments and a temporary brick built ablutions block (Hadfield 1985). Sir Lancelot Rolleston, former Chairman of the County Council, and owner of the estate died in March 1941, leaving his widow Maud in residence surrounded by frantic wartime activity. Part of the Hall was used as accommodation for Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) personnel with the Rollestons retaining a flat on the first floor.
Map of the RAF Watnall showing the various accommodation blocks, Messes and Ablution blocks. The main WAAF area is in the bottom left over what is today the new estate houses on Carman Close..
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ROLLS-ROYCE developed at Hucknall the PV-12 aero-engine, forerunner of the Merlin, which was vital to Allied victory. In the period immediately before the war, 98 and 104 Squadrons, with Hawker Hinds, operated along side 504 Squadron which later got Hawker Hurricane fighters. With war looking inevitable in late August, 1939, 504 moved to Digby. 104 left in 1938, so only 98 Squadron, with its highly limited Fairey Battle light day bombers, was there until March, 1940.
After France fell, Hucknall was the temporary head- quarters for No 1 Group, Bomber Command, until July, 1941. In the early war years it was a repair depot for damaged Spitfires and Hurricanes, the work being undertaken by Rolls-Royce.
During the Battle of Britain an escaped German prisoner-of-war, Franz von Werra, tried to steal a Spitfire at Hucknall awaiting return to its squadron after repairs. He was thought by some to be a spy but it transpired after the war that this was just a rumour. The German said he was a Dutch pilot who had force-landed and need- ed transport to get back to his squadron. He was caught sitting in the Spitfire trying to work out the controls.
From January, 1941, Hucknall housed No 1 (Polish) Flying Training School and Polish units were based there for the rest of the war. No 1 FTS became No 16 (Polish) SFTS and in July took its Tiger Moths, Battles and Oxfords to its new base at Newton. It was replaced at Hucknall by No 25 (Polish) Elementary Flying Training School which remained for the duration of the war.
Rolls-Royce continued to test aero-engines at Huck- nall but not the new jet aircraft these went to Balderton because Hucknall had only grass runways. After the war 504 squadron moved back to Hucknall with Mosquito T3s and NF30s and later Spitfire F22s.
5 - Conscription for women was only introduced in December 1941
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