An Army of Smiles

by Grace Thompson

  ‘That does it, I’m going to see about it right away,’ she said, showing the letter to Rosie.

  ‘I’ll come too. I just hope we’ll stay together. Although it’s unlikely we’ll be lucky once again.’

  They were told that they would be going to France and, as they knew their destination and date of travel, they knew also that there would be no further leave and they would be confined to camp.

  Baba was told and he was shocked to think that Ethel had chosen to leave him.

  ‘I thought after just finding each other again you’d never leave me,’ he said, and there was unaccustomed anger in his eyes. ‘I feel you’ve let me down, Ethel.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Baba, but I thought you’d understand.’

  ‘Understand? Or accept that you always want to please yourself without discussion?’

  ‘It isn’t like that. Losing Kate like that, it was so unbelievable. Rosie and I were worried that she would have to face life without Vincent and then it was she who was killed. I have to continue helping with the fight. I’d feel I was letting her down if I left now. There’s still a job to do. You must understand how I feel?’

  ‘I know all about the job we have to do, but, be honest, that isn’t your reason. You have a letter from your mother, whom you profess to despise, she tells you not to leave and straight away you forget all about us, about me and what I want, and arrange to go. It shows me clearly how low I come on your list of priorities.’

  Trying to explain her reaction to her mother failed. As she put into words her instinctive need to disobey the woman who she felt had let her down so badly, the excuse sounded utterly stupid – even to herself it made no sense.

  ‘I was going to tell you,’ she added lamely.

  ‘Tell me. That says it all, Ethel. Not discuss it, you were going to tell me. What sort of future is there for us if this is what you call sharing?’

  She pleaded, apologized and coaxed and they finally made love and settled for a kind of peace, but as she went back to her billet Ethel knew she had damaged their relationship severely. The worst thing was there was no time to spend putting it right.

  She was shocked by his reaction and wished she could change her mind, but there was no possibility of that. She explained to Rosie about his disappointment at her leaving but not the extent of his anger and hurt. ‘I have to go and I don’t think I’d cancel even if I could,’ she admitted. ‘I want to finish what we started. Doesn’t he know there’s a war on?’ she asked with a wan smile.

  Sid received Ethel’s letter telling them of her decision to go. She was unable at that point to tell them where she was being posted. He guessed that she was going abroad to avoid coming home. He knew where Rosie’s nan lived and went there to see whether she had more news, but both families were unable to do more than hope that the girls would be safe. He bought his ration of sweets and took them back to Mrs Dreen to add to her next parcel.

  Without reverting to their previous closeness, Ethel said goodbye to Baba and she and Rosie left a week later with a group of twenty girls and boarded a ship bound for France.

  Having seen the devastation of their own cities and towns, and expecting to see something similar, the sight of the French countryside was a heart-rending shock. Besides being bombed, the ground had been fought over more than once and for day after dreadful day. The result was large areas that were flattened and completely devoid of buildings or habitation, except in a few places where they saw people living in the cellars of what had once been their homes. Rubble had been pressed into the ground. The earth had been churned up by tanks and hundreds of other vehicles, gunfire had battered the few walls that were still standing and it seemed impossible as they travelled across northern France to imagine that it could ever be returned to a place where people would choose to live.

  The situation was confusing, as the front line varied from day to day. The soft-topped Naafi vans went around the troops handing out tea and a wad, makeshift kitchens managing to churn out the usual fare. Ethel and Rosie were told to help in a canteen that had been set up as a rest centre for men back from the front to relax and unwind from the horrors of the fighting. It was fully equipped with a bar selling teas and coffee and snacks as well as a bar selling beer and cigarettes.

  The premises had been a hotel, but the once-elegant walls had been ravaged by gunfire, the contents ransacked by the armies who had passed through and used its protection for temporary relief. Chairs had been found from somewhere, an odd collection of rugs was spread on the wooden floors. There were heavy curtains at the windows, and even some billowing nets, found in a chest in the cellar, wrapped in tissue waiting for the summer that hadn’t come.

  They weren’t there long. Following the progress of the Allied forces, they were sent to open a canteen in a town close by, with a few Naafi staff and some local women and men to help with the heavy work. They were given bicycles for transport to and from the rooms they had in the hotel.

  While the others moved rubble and cleaned outhouses ready for the stores to arrive, Ethel and Rosie spent the first two days scrubbing the kitchen and painting its walls. They were warned that china was scarce and, searching for more cups and plates, asking in the almost empty shops without success, they eventually found a supply of jam jars – something they had resorted to once or twice before – and deciding to use these, they washed them and stacked them ready to satisfy the needs of the large number of troops who would soon pile in looking for a bit of home. They knew the unusual receptacles would cause much needed laughter.

  This canteen was on two floors, the first was the snacks and tea bar, above, the drinks bar. The top, where the roof leaked into buckets and bowls and baths, was left to the mice who had been treating the place like their own grand hotel. There was also a cellar which promised useful storage, and with a couple of torches Ethel and Rosie went to explore.

  It had once been used as a wine cellar but there were no bottles now apart from a few empty ones. Boxes and baskets and a few broken chairs were all it contained, and when a creature which they guessed was a rat ran across their path, they swore they would never venture there again.

  They told some of the local girls about the unwelcome lodgers. In monosyllabic English, which they incorrectly thought might be better understood, they asked the girls not to report the rats. In the insanity of the killings all around them, destroying the rats was something they couldn’t cope with.

  The following day they were told they had been dealt with. Fortunately, the ratcatcher had come on their day off and they saw nothing of what went on. Rats were also seen by others and, aware of the dangers of infection through contaminated food, the staff knew that something more had to be done.

  One day a chicken came in and at once Rosie stood guard over it and dared anyone to kill it. Named Veronica, which Rosie insisted was what it said, it became a mascot and survived the war.

  Rosie had never mastered the art of driving but Ethel felt confident to drive practically anything. ‘As long as it starts when I turn the handle, I’ll be fine,’ she told anyone who asked. ‘What goes on under the bonnet I know nothing about and I’m happy for that to remain a mystery.’ So when the man who normally drove the van around to the men nearer to the front line was ill, she volunteered to take his place, as long as Rosie could go with her.

  They did this for several days, but the fighting became confused as areas were taken, lost and retaken, with pockets of resistance holding up one group while others advanced. Sometimes when they reached the place where they had been told to set up, there was no one there. They would stop, open the flap which was their counter and wait, but when no one came they would drive on until the men saw them and approached. They would stay and serve for as long as they were wanted, then return to base, fill up and prepare to go out again.

  They rarely went out at night – the men refused to allow it insisting that they, battle-hardened soldiers, were better able to cope should they meet the enemy. Ethel and Rosie had
both learned to shoot during their initial training in Scotland, but Rosie was thankful not to have to carry a weapon with instructions to use it. She didn’t think she could ever pull a trigger and watch those blooms of red roses appear on the jacket of a human being. Ethel insisted she could and would, but whether she would act swiftly enough, or gather the courage to do so, was something she secretly doubted.

  The news was coming through of further attacks on London and other cities. This time with another flying bomb, Hitler’s V2 Rocket which carried a ton of explosives and fell to earth at a phenomenal speed. Now there was the worry of not being near home while their families faced this new terror.

  ‘There’s nothing I could do even if I was stationed in the same town,’ Rosie said, ‘but knowing Nan’s there on her own makes me afraid for her. There’s no logic in that but it’s how I feel.’

  ‘Perhaps she isn’t alone. Maybe your mother is with her.’

  ‘That’s a nice thought. I’ll tell myself they’re together, shall I?’ She looked at Ethel and added, ‘Like your family, all close together.’ Ethel didn’t reply.

  The rats continued to be troublesome and some squaddies were instructed to blow up an unused drainage system, which succeeded in removing the rats but unfortunately made the water undrinkable. Until the engineers could put things right, the staff had to carry water from a nearby house in galvanized baths and buckets and any other container they could find, for everything they needed.

  As the battles, the intermittent resistance and the inexorable push towards Germany continued, the two girls faced the day-today wearisome routine with fortitude. When they were tired, thoughts of Kate urged them to greater effort, each in her own way using the memory of their friend to help them through. Rosie still dreamed of Baba and Ethel’s thoughts were with him too, worried by the argument they’d had before she left and had failed to settle. With preparations for their posting, there had been no time to spend talking through their disagreement, reaffirm their love. They had parted after a final meeting and had passionately made love but without returning to their previous certainty that all was well.

  Letters got through but there were none for either of the girls, and they were usually too tired to consider the disappointment or think about writing. Finding clean water and heating it to make hot drinks, cook food, wash dishes, and cleaning places to keep their stores safe from infestation took most of the time when they weren’t serving in the canteen or on the road with the van.

  When they set out with the heavily loaded van, they were given clear instructions on where to go and were kept well clear of the front line. They were warned to stay well back from the gunfire. ‘You’ll be no use to anyone if you get in the way,’ came the chill warning. ‘Remember, both sides have guns that can kill, there’s no priority when a shell lands, no matter which side fired it. If you’re in the wrong place, you’re dead!’

  One morning in October 1944, they set off as usual. It had been raining most of the previous day and through the night. Mud covered the ground and formed a slippery carpet on the roads and they wondered whether their rather smooth tyres would cope. As they drove, the sounds of dull thuds were heard, warning them that they were in a war zone, as if they needed reminding; the devastation could be clearly seen all around them. Their route had been changed due to bombing and now led them through what had once been orchards and the remains of a village. Swerving past destroyed buildings, around huge craters and across once peaceful meadows was saddening. The rain continued, reducing visibility, but following the written instructions and knowing that the point for which they were heading was not far away, they were confident, until they found that the route they should have taken was blocked.

  Explosions had destroyed a bridge over a small river that had worn its way down into the earth and now flowed several feet below ground level. They stopped and studied their instructions but soon gave up trying to work out a way through from what little information they had. They turned away to find another way through. Within a short time they were lost.

  They drove on, following tracks which they hoped would take them to a place from where they could be redirected. Then a heavy bombardment began and the shells were coming from behind them. They had overtaken the front line and were almost certainly in enemy-held territory.

  With a swear from Ethel, they stopped and considered what to do. Rosie gave an excited squeal. ‘Ethel, we might be in Berlin before the army!’

  ‘We can’t stay here, but I don’t think I can turn,’ Ethel frowned, looking back at the uneven surface and the narrow track. The track was pitted with water-filled holes that Ethel had managed to avoid driving forward but would surely hit if she tried to reverse.

  ‘There’s a farm just ahead.’ Rosie pointed to the right where a huddle of ruined buildings stood, with a track that seemed fairly sound leading towards the main house. Ethel hesitated, wondering whether she could manage to reverse to a place where the van could be turned around. Then she saw that parked beside one of the buildings was an army lorry. A British army lorry. There was no sign of a driver and, as she brought the vehicle to a stop, no soldiers appeared to demand they identify themselves.

  The rain was unceasing, drumming on to the mud, and the sound of gunfire and explosions were muted to a dull distant rumbling. Restarting the engine, she took the corner carefully and headed for the main buildings. The track was narrower than the one they had left, and she was watching the road and trying to keep an eye on the buildings, half expecting to see the nose of a rifle appear at the corner of one of the walls.

  ‘What’s German for do you want tea and a wad?’ she whispered nervously. When she saw a water-filled crater ahead she was unable to avoid it and the van lurched and stopped with one back wheel in the depression.

  They got out and tried to place stones under the tyres to give purchase, but apart from getting covered in mud and soaking wet, they achieved nothing. They stood there, the rain a pattering, monotonous murmur. They were so wet and miserable it was tempting to climb aboard the van and sit there until someone arrived, friend or foe, at that moment they didn’t really care.

  ‘I’ll go and see if there’s anyone about,’ Ethel said. Rosie tried to dissuade her.

  ‘Perhaps we could walk back the way we came and see if we can get back to base.’

  ‘I think we’ll be wiser to stay with the van. At least it’s shelter.’

  ‘And food,’ Rosie said with an attempt at a grin.

  ‘I’ll just walk to the corner of the building by that lorry and look around,’ Ethel said, trying to sound casual.

  ‘What if it’s a trap, or a mine field?’ Rosie pleaded. ‘Stay here, we ought to stay together.’

  Ethel told her to wait and, promising not to go further than the corner, she squelched her way around to the side of the van. She was no hero, she was plain terrified. The alternative, to sit and wait until someone found them was worse. Still she hesitated. She looked at the farm buildings that seemed threatening in the dull light of the gloomy day. They could hide Germans or British soldiers. Or she could find lifeless bodies of either, or both.

  Thankfully the rain had finally stopped. Taking a couple of cakes and leaving Rosie to open up in case there were troops in the vicinity needing their services, a vain hope intending to cheer her friend, Ethel walked nervously towards the lorry along the narrow track.

  It was empty. A copy of the tuppenny magazine Everybody’s, was on the seat, an empty Woodbine packet beside it. Taking a deep breath to calm her racing heart, she went cautiously around the corner. It wasn’t until she had walked to the furthest side of the farm that she saw another lorry, this time with two men in the cab.

  The gunfire was continuing, sounding close at times then fading. The men hadn’t heard the van approach. There were no guards set and she walked closer. The men were talking and to her relief the voices were British. A Geordie lad and a Welshman, discussing their recent darts tournament. The man on the passenger side ha
d a cigarette between his fingers and he flicked away the end of it and held out his hand, waving it about, gesturing to make some point, and Ethel slapped a cake into his palm.

  The man yelled and ducked down, muttering a long list of swears.

  ‘Char and a wad?’ she asked cheerfully. The cake fell to the ground as the man jerked and shouted again in shock.

  ‘Tut tut, what a waste,’ Ethel complained, looking down at the cake. ‘Don’t you know there’s a war on?’

  ‘Where the bloody ’ell did you spring from?’

  ‘His language was what you might call flowery,’ she told Rosie a few minutes later as they finished preparing the counter ready to serve, ‘and not something I’d like to repeat into your innocent ears.’

  The guns still sounded, but spasmodically and some distance away. Rosie and Ethel set up the counter having been told that the rest of the men who had become separated from their group had gone on a ‘reccy’ and would be back soon. The others came back about twenty minutes later having been back to find their lines and receive orders on how they should proceed. The officers had been killed and only sixteen men remained of the forty who had set out. The two men in the lorry had been left behind to observe and wait.

  ‘Some observation!’ Ethel teased.

  ‘All right, I won’t tell anyone how you got the van stuck in a crater that could be seen half a mile away, if you don’t tell Winston Churchill I’m a slacker. Right?’ the Welshman laughed.

  As the clouds lifted and drifted away, the bombardment started up again in the distance and the air was filled with the screaming of shells and explosions and in some places fires started and added to the terrifying display. Sights, sounds and the choking smell of the fierce battles continuing around them filled their heads with fear and imaginings, and both Rosie and Ethel wondered whether they would ever be free of the nightmares that already disturbed their sleep.