A new BBC drama, The Night Watch, tells of people's lives and loves during The Blitz of 1940/41.
One of the characters includes Kay, a brave member of the wartime London Auxiliary Ambulance Service (LAAS).
But apart from this new drama, the contributions of the brave women of the LAAS has been largely forgotten.
With millions of British men fighting the Nazis in Europe and Africa, the women back home had to do jobs which the men did. One of them was being a paramedic. And, of course, being a medic in Britain in 1940 was a very important job.
One last surviving member of the LAAS, Caroline Hawes, 94, has given an interview in which she tells of her life in the LAAS, and some of the horrific sights which she saw amongst the burning rubble of 1940 London which will haunt her forever.
“When a bomb dropped, we would go to where it landed,” says Caroline matter-of-factly. “How did we know where to go? We’d follow the fire and smoke.”
Although she is now frail, and her short-term memory is sketchy, her recollections of London during the Second World War are as fresh as if it all happened yesterday.
There were 130 LAAS stations around London, with roughly 10,000 drivers risking their lives daily by heading into perilous situations to try to salvage as many lives as possible.
By the end of November 1940 nearly 13,000 Londoners had died in the Blitz, and a further 20,000 were injured as Hermann Goering’s Luftwaffe relentlessly pounded Britain.
At one stage the Nazis bombed the capital for 76 consecutive nights and more than a million houses in the city were destroyed or damaged.
The last surviving heroine of The Night Watch
by Shiraz Lalani,
Daily Mirror
13/07/2011
London ablaze during the Blitz of 1940. It became known as the Second Great Fire of London.
THE sight was apocalyptic. Scorching flames danced from the burning rubble, drenching the night sky with a menacing orange glow.
Thick smoke choked the air while sirens blared out a warning that more bombs could fall at any moment.
It could be a scene from last night’s acclaimed BBC2 drama The Night Watch, which told of people’s lives and loves during the Blitz, including Kay, a brave member of the wartime London Auxiliary Ambulance Service.
But for Caroline Hawes, now 94 and the last surviving woman who worked for the LAAS during the war, it was grim reality.
While everyone else ran frantically to get away from a burning bomb site, she would head straight for it.
“When a bomb dropped, we would go to where it landed,” says Caroline matter-of-factly. “How did we know where to go? We’d follow the fire and smoke.”
Although she is now frail, and her short-term memory is sketchy, her recollections of London during the Second World War are as fresh as if it all happened yesterday.
She remembers surveying bombed-out houses, taking a deep breath then setting about her task of finding out if there were any survivors in the devastation.
She says: “When we got there it was like a blur. You couldn’t make head nor tail of what was happening.
“You’d see a little cloud and then you’d see one person dead.
“There was rubble everywhere and a body in the middle of it all. And the smoke – lots of smoke.”
As a driver with the Ambulance Service, Caroline was on the front line as the capital was bombed by the Germans.
Claire Foy as Helen , caught in a Nazi bomb attack during the Blitz, in new BBC drama The Night Watch
Aged 23, she was plucked from her office job and with minimal training, sent out in a rudimentary van from her West London base to attend bomb sites to pick up the dead and injured.
It was a dangerous job, and one that confronted her with devastating images that would haunt her for years after the war ended.
There were 130 such stations around London, with roughly 10,000 drivers risking their lives daily by heading into perilous situations to try to salvage as many lives as possible.
And yet for all the sacrifices made by the ambulance heroes who braved the bombed-out streets, their contribution has largely been forgotten as the years have passed.
As the men fought the war on the ground in Europe and Africa, the women came out from their low-paid jobs and home-making to do the tasks that their husbands would have done.
Caroline remembers: “You would have to drive in the dark because of the blackout. We’d go out without any lights on – you couldn’t have your front lights blazing, it was too risky.”
Last night’s BBC drama, based on the 2006 novel of the same name by Sarah Waters, focuses on the tangled love lives of four young people including Kay, played by Anna Maxwell Martin, and Helen (Claire Foy).
Caroline’s experience was without the complicated affairs and racy storylines but it was exciting all the same. Sometimes they would be able to get a night off to go to a concert and occasionally their station would put on a dance – though more often than not it would be interrupted by the wail of the air-raid sirens.
The devastation of a London street after another Luftwaffe attack
By the end of November 1940 nearly 13,000 Londoners had died in the Blitz, and a further 20,000 were injured as Hermann Goering’s Luftwaffe relentlessly pounded Britain.
At one stage the Nazis bombed the capital for 76 consecutive nights and more than a million houses in the city were destroyed or damaged. Caroline would attempt to treat some of the injured at the scene, before rushing them to hospital as the sound of aircraft and sirens filled the air.
SHE sighs as she remembers: “Oh, some of the things I saw... you’d think about them for a long time. You couldn’t help but remember those things.
“You didn’t get to talk about them much, mind. Everyone else had all gone through their own experiences and were too busy thinking about what had happened to them.” She adds: “Often when you’d arrive, other people had already tried to get the injured out so they could be put straight into the back of the ambulance.
“Often they wouldn’t be able to hear because of the explosions. And there would be blood.”
It was a hard job that was not well paid – and the conditions the ambulance drivers had to put up with when they were waiting to spring into action weren’t exactly ideal.
They would usually be huddled in freezing shelters as they anticipated their next dangerous task but Caroline’s face breaks out into a smile as she says: “It was hard work – at times it was non-stop. But it was lovely. It was fun. I still lived at home with my parents. Sometimes they’d get scared for me and sometimes I’d be frightened too.
“But you didn’t have long to think about that because as soon as you’d drop someone off at the hospital you’d be checked over and then sent back out to get more people.”
After the war, Caroline left her ambulance job and had seasonal work before she retired.
Those fading photographs of Caroline and her colleagues smiling suggest a camaraderie that went beyond friendship but she never married or had children.
London still bears the scars of the War. This is bomb damage on the side of the Victoria and Albert Museum
She now lives in a care home in South East London.
The black and white photos on her sideboard of her beaming are the only obvious trace of the amazing life she once lived.
It was scary and unforgiving but she has fond memories of that time.
And although they were praised for their heroism, Caroline does not class herself as a hero.
“We just did what needed to be done,” she says.
“It was great fun. I loved it because each day was different.”
The last surviving heroine of The Night Watch - mirror.co.uk
One of the characters includes Kay, a brave member of the wartime London Auxiliary Ambulance Service (LAAS).
But apart from this new drama, the contributions of the brave women of the LAAS has been largely forgotten.
With millions of British men fighting the Nazis in Europe and Africa, the women back home had to do jobs which the men did. One of them was being a paramedic. And, of course, being a medic in Britain in 1940 was a very important job.
One last surviving member of the LAAS, Caroline Hawes, 94, has given an interview in which she tells of her life in the LAAS, and some of the horrific sights which she saw amongst the burning rubble of 1940 London which will haunt her forever.
“When a bomb dropped, we would go to where it landed,” says Caroline matter-of-factly. “How did we know where to go? We’d follow the fire and smoke.”
Although she is now frail, and her short-term memory is sketchy, her recollections of London during the Second World War are as fresh as if it all happened yesterday.
There were 130 LAAS stations around London, with roughly 10,000 drivers risking their lives daily by heading into perilous situations to try to salvage as many lives as possible.
By the end of November 1940 nearly 13,000 Londoners had died in the Blitz, and a further 20,000 were injured as Hermann Goering’s Luftwaffe relentlessly pounded Britain.
At one stage the Nazis bombed the capital for 76 consecutive nights and more than a million houses in the city were destroyed or damaged.
The last surviving heroine of The Night Watch
by Shiraz Lalani,
Daily Mirror
13/07/2011
London ablaze during the Blitz of 1940. It became known as the Second Great Fire of London.
THE sight was apocalyptic. Scorching flames danced from the burning rubble, drenching the night sky with a menacing orange glow.
Thick smoke choked the air while sirens blared out a warning that more bombs could fall at any moment.
It could be a scene from last night’s acclaimed BBC2 drama The Night Watch, which told of people’s lives and loves during the Blitz, including Kay, a brave member of the wartime London Auxiliary Ambulance Service.
But for Caroline Hawes, now 94 and the last surviving woman who worked for the LAAS during the war, it was grim reality.
While everyone else ran frantically to get away from a burning bomb site, she would head straight for it.
“When a bomb dropped, we would go to where it landed,” says Caroline matter-of-factly. “How did we know where to go? We’d follow the fire and smoke.”
Although she is now frail, and her short-term memory is sketchy, her recollections of London during the Second World War are as fresh as if it all happened yesterday.
She remembers surveying bombed-out houses, taking a deep breath then setting about her task of finding out if there were any survivors in the devastation.
She says: “When we got there it was like a blur. You couldn’t make head nor tail of what was happening.
“You’d see a little cloud and then you’d see one person dead.
“There was rubble everywhere and a body in the middle of it all. And the smoke – lots of smoke.”
As a driver with the Ambulance Service, Caroline was on the front line as the capital was bombed by the Germans.
Claire Foy as Helen , caught in a Nazi bomb attack during the Blitz, in new BBC drama The Night Watch
Aged 23, she was plucked from her office job and with minimal training, sent out in a rudimentary van from her West London base to attend bomb sites to pick up the dead and injured.
It was a dangerous job, and one that confronted her with devastating images that would haunt her for years after the war ended.
There were 130 such stations around London, with roughly 10,000 drivers risking their lives daily by heading into perilous situations to try to salvage as many lives as possible.
And yet for all the sacrifices made by the ambulance heroes who braved the bombed-out streets, their contribution has largely been forgotten as the years have passed.
As the men fought the war on the ground in Europe and Africa, the women came out from their low-paid jobs and home-making to do the tasks that their husbands would have done.
Caroline remembers: “You would have to drive in the dark because of the blackout. We’d go out without any lights on – you couldn’t have your front lights blazing, it was too risky.”
Last night’s BBC drama, based on the 2006 novel of the same name by Sarah Waters, focuses on the tangled love lives of four young people including Kay, played by Anna Maxwell Martin, and Helen (Claire Foy).
Caroline’s experience was without the complicated affairs and racy storylines but it was exciting all the same. Sometimes they would be able to get a night off to go to a concert and occasionally their station would put on a dance – though more often than not it would be interrupted by the wail of the air-raid sirens.
The devastation of a London street after another Luftwaffe attack
By the end of November 1940 nearly 13,000 Londoners had died in the Blitz, and a further 20,000 were injured as Hermann Goering’s Luftwaffe relentlessly pounded Britain.
At one stage the Nazis bombed the capital for 76 consecutive nights and more than a million houses in the city were destroyed or damaged. Caroline would attempt to treat some of the injured at the scene, before rushing them to hospital as the sound of aircraft and sirens filled the air.
SHE sighs as she remembers: “Oh, some of the things I saw... you’d think about them for a long time. You couldn’t help but remember those things.
“You didn’t get to talk about them much, mind. Everyone else had all gone through their own experiences and were too busy thinking about what had happened to them.” She adds: “Often when you’d arrive, other people had already tried to get the injured out so they could be put straight into the back of the ambulance.
“Often they wouldn’t be able to hear because of the explosions. And there would be blood.”
It was a hard job that was not well paid – and the conditions the ambulance drivers had to put up with when they were waiting to spring into action weren’t exactly ideal.
They would usually be huddled in freezing shelters as they anticipated their next dangerous task but Caroline’s face breaks out into a smile as she says: “It was hard work – at times it was non-stop. But it was lovely. It was fun. I still lived at home with my parents. Sometimes they’d get scared for me and sometimes I’d be frightened too.
“But you didn’t have long to think about that because as soon as you’d drop someone off at the hospital you’d be checked over and then sent back out to get more people.”
After the war, Caroline left her ambulance job and had seasonal work before she retired.
Those fading photographs of Caroline and her colleagues smiling suggest a camaraderie that went beyond friendship but she never married or had children.
London still bears the scars of the War. This is bomb damage on the side of the Victoria and Albert Museum
She now lives in a care home in South East London.
The black and white photos on her sideboard of her beaming are the only obvious trace of the amazing life she once lived.
It was scary and unforgiving but she has fond memories of that time.
And although they were praised for their heroism, Caroline does not class herself as a hero.
“We just did what needed to be done,” she says.
“It was great fun. I loved it because each day was different.”
The last surviving heroine of The Night Watch - mirror.co.uk
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