Donning her black stockings and cap, a 17-year-old June Brown set off to Chatham to start her naval service. Here, she looks back on the memories that have lasted
The war was almost over by the time I was involved. I joined up in 1944, at the age of 17. I thought I’d prefer the WRENS – the uniform was a bit smarter – although I could never wait to take off my black stockings and put some nice silk ones on.
My first base was at Chatham. I was a cinema operator. Goodness knows why they gave me that role. It was very strange, if you said you wanted to do something, they always put you in something else. Mind you, I probably said I wanted to be an aircraft mechanic, despite having no experience of that at all.
I did my basic training up at Loch Lomond in Scotland. It’s a lovely place, but you had to do route marches and get up at 5am to scrub floors or great big baking tins. You can imagine how it horrible it was.
Then I was posted to HMS Armadillo in Ardentinny, on Loch Long. I loved it up there. The good thing about it was that there was a submarine base at nearby Arrochar. In my free time I’d visit my submariner officer friends in their wardroom. We’d drink pink gin. One even let me look up the periscope.
My job was teaching sailors survival skills, whether in the water or jungle. We also showed training films to pilots about how to land on aircraft carriers. It was a much more dangerous procedure in those days. Nowadays they catch them in all kinds of cables. A lot of my young pilots did get killed attempting to land on those things.
I also showed those first films to come out of the concentration camps, Belsen I think it was. I was only 18 and didn’t know such things had gone on. It was absolutely horrendous.
And a schoolfriend of mine from Ipswich, Ernie, was in the Merchant Navy – he was torpedoed three times. Fortunately, he was rescued each time. Although I did hear that he had a nervous breakdown later, but then you would, wouldn’t you, having gone through all that.
After Loch Lomond, I was sent to Somerset – HMS Heron, a naval air station at Yeovilton. It’s funny but I only remember the lovely things now – like learning to ride a horse along the bridle paths or walking through fields of buttercups. And that if you were early getting into Yeovil, there were always plates of fancies. If you were lucky you might even get a chocolate Èclair to share with a friend.
And VJ Day was just a kaleidoscope. I remember that the lights had come on again once the European War was over. There’s a picture of me in the Mall with these crowds swirling round. I’ve got a French sailor’s hat on – one with a red bobble on top. It was a wonderful euphoric occasion.
Looking back, I didn’t really do a great deal in the war, although I suppose someone might have been saved by my films. It sounds awful when you think about all those people who had their lives destroyed and then there was me, not really doing very much for the war effort.
When I left the WRENS, I went to the Old Vic School and became an actress. Before the war, I’d wanted be an osteopath. Then no-one would have heard of me and I’d have done far more good!
I don’t really feel I’m a worthy representative of the forces. But I do want to be buried at sea. I wonder if anyone would do it for me? I don’t want to be burned and I don’t want to buried – but I wouldn’t mind being eaten by the fishes.
