_The key role of women in the Eighth Air Force

The first US troop ships sailed into Liverpool and Glasgow in early 1942, but they were very soon joined by vast numbers of women.

These women, belonging to the Women’s Army Corps (WAC), the Army Nurse Corps (ANC) and the American Red Cross (ARC), were destined to join the Eighth Air Force in the East of England in what was to be known as ‘Little America’. Their work was pivotal to ensuring the war could continue to be taken to the Nazis in Europe.

The first group of WACs arrived in the UK in July 1943. Among them were trained radio operators, aircraft plotters, stenographers, telephone operators and administrators. Many more followed, part of the 350,000 servicemen and women who transitioned through the region between 1942-45, with most being sent to the various Air Division HQs at Brampton Grange (1st Air Division), Ketteringham Hall (2nd Air Div) and Marks Hall later Elveden Hall (3rd Air Div) as well as the 8th Air Force Headquarters at High Wycombe.

The women lived on base in purpose-built barracks and living areas designed specifically for women although they didn’t get any extra luxuries. The only things they did get were private shower and toilet facilities, unlike the men.

It was still cold, damp and dark compared to what they had been used to at home with nothing but a few scratchy army blankets to protect them from the elements.

Sgt Hildegarde Molnar was part of one of the first groups of WACs to arrive in July 1943. She was stationed at Marks Hall in Essex as a Court Martial stenographer, travelling to many different airbases where she would sit in on court hearings to take notes, then later write the official reports on the case.

In a letter home to her parents in August 1943 she described a typical days’ work: ‘We get up at 6:00, clean up our barracks so they will pass inspection, then walk a mile to breakfast. This is one thing I still can’t get used to, but have to put up with, waiting so long for breakfast. Then report for work at 8:00. One hour for lunch and we work until 5:30. This schedule goes on every day, including Saturday and Sunday!’

One thing Hildegarde particularly enjoyed was visiting London on her 48-hour pass that was given every other week. In a letter to her parents, she describes one thing that she particularly enjoyed, ‘The first thing that deserves a mention is the wonderful work of the American Red Cross for the boys and girls over here.

They have a palatial place for us WACs in London, at least it seems so after living in barracks. There we have beds with mattresses, quilts and pillows and the costs of accommodation is ridiculously low. They serve meals for one shilling which is around 20 cents. With rationing we are better off eating there than any of the restaurants.’

Geraldine Hill, or Gerry as she was called, achieved the rank of Sergeant in the Women’s Army Corps as an enlisted woman pioneer who was stationed in England during World War II. She plotted the courses of Allied planes in flight over England and worked in the flight control section of the Eighth Army Air Force Division headquarters.

The American Red Cross were already present in the UK long before the first waves of US troops arrived in England, providing help and comfort to displaced people during the Blitz of 1940. But as vast amounts of American personnel arrived, there was a need for service clubs and places for the troops to go during their time off.

The ARC was to play a huge role in the lives of the men of the Eighth Air Force, providing the friendly, smiling face of an American girl who would serve them hot coffee and a snack whilst listening to their worries without passing judgement.

Every US airbase would eventually have an Aero Club that would be staffed by 2 members of the American Red Cross and volunteers from the local community. The clubs would typically consist of a snack bar, library, games room, writing room and large function room.

Clubmobiles, mobile canteen units, would travel to military bases and serve coffee and doughnuts to the troops.

The girls in charge would effectively run the club as a business, managing the accounts, organising food rations and deliveries, sourcing and hiring other staff members, building maintenance and event organisation.

The club was open every evening as a space where servicemen could go to relax and at the weekend there would often be organised dances or parties for them to enjoy. In large towns and cities the service clubs would have accommodation.

The Red Cross also requisitioned old Greenline coaches and military trucks to use as Clubmobiles, mobile canteen units that would travel to military bases and serve coffee and doughnuts to the troops.

One Clubmobile would typically be staffed by three or four ARC girls who were trained to make thousands of doughnuts and gallons of coffee and serve these to the hungry servicemen, while playing popular tunes from the on-board gramophone.

They were particularly popular on the fields of the Eighth Air Force, where they would arrive early in the afternoon to serve the ground crews whilst they ‘sweated in’ the crews returning from a mission. Once safely on the ground, air crews would make their way over to the Clubmobile to receive a hot coffee, doughnut and cigarette before attending de-briefing.

In 1942, the authorities realised they would need Rest Homes for the airmen based in Britain, very different to a military base, and the responsibility was handed to the American Red Cross.

Over the course of the next three years, they set up around twenty ‘Flak Houses’ in large country houses or hotels that had been requisitioned by the Air Ministry. Airmen would be sent to the Rest Homes for around a week to ‘escape’ the war. They would be provided with civilian clothes and rank no longer applied so the experience was as un-military as possible. The Red Cross would arrange multiple different activities such as tennis, horse riding, clay pigeon shooting and golf.

Evening entertainment was also available as each house had a bar and dances were held regularly. Each house would be staffed by a handful of Red Cross girls as well as civilian employees who would serve as butlers, cooks and cleaners. Doctors and nurses from both the US or Commonwealth Forces would be on hand to help with any ailments, both physical and mental, that the airmen may have been experiencing.

The US Army Medical Department would provide vital and, often, life saving support to the men of the Eighth Air Force, setting up military hospitals in country parks across the south and east of England. These hospitals were home to thousands of nurses of the US Army Nurse Corps, all fully qualified nurses with at least three years’ experience in hospitals.

Nurses, given officer rank to have authority over the male orderlies that would be working under them, would typically work 12 hour shifts sometimes for 30 shifts in a row without a day off, meaning they had very little time to themselves and were often worked to the point of exhaustion.

The biggest of the hospitals to serve the Eighth Air Force was the 65th General Hospital at Redgrave in Suffolk. It housed nearly 1,500 beds on its various wards and during its 22 months’ service treated 17,250 in-patients and 30,000 out-patients.

As well as casualties from the Eighth Air Force it also treated wounded troops from D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge in the Ardennes. The 65th opened on the day of the first Berlin air raid and that night they received their first casualties.

One nurse, Dorothea Salerno, remembered the wounded arriving in train loads during the Winter 0f 1944-45 and said she would often have to work 36-hour shifts in order to keep up with the constant flow of casualties.
She recalled, ‘They needed a hospital for the Eighth Air Force. We were moved to East Anglia, right off the North Sea. That was some of the straightest and best land to have airplanes land and take off. We were right near the airfields, and we could see and hear the planes rendezvous over our hospital. But we worked terribly hard there. If a plane made it back across the sea, and if there were injured aboard, they were usually brought to our hospital.’

Some nurses were sent to assist the medics on air bases, providing initial treatment to the wounded as they returned from missions and accompanying them during their transport to a larger hospital. The average time it took from being wounded to the arrival at a specialist hospital was five and a half hours and thanks to the efforts of the men and women of the US Army Medical Department, the mortality rate of wounded in the Army Air Force was just 0.4%.

The nurses were allowed to enjoy themselves on their days off with the American Red Cross playing a key role in their morale, providing many dances at the hospitals for staff and patients as well as being visited regularly by the Clubmobiles.