Women’s Land Army remembered on 80th anniversary of VE Day

Defra farming minister Daniel Zeichner has unveiled a plaque in central London to mark the contribution of the Women’s Land Army and the Women’s Timber Corps to Britain’s war effort and food security during the Second World War

More than 100,000 women served in the Women’s Land Army from 1939-1945, carrying out essential farming duties, from general agriculture to pest control, thatching and ditch digging.

Another 15,000 were members of the Women’s Timber Corps, known as the “Lumberjills”, who felled trees, produced timber for pit props, and created vital military supplies, including rolled-up fencing used to support tanks on muddy terrain.

See also: Welsh hill farmer named Farming Woman of the Year

© Defra

Unveiling the plaque on Thursday (8 May) – the 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe (VE) Day – Mr Zeichner said: “It is an honour to see this plaque unveiled in tribute to the women whose dedication and resilience helped feed and supply a nation during some of its darkest hours. 

“These women stepped up when the country needed them most, working the land to keep Britain’s food and timber supplies.

“As we remember their sacrifice, we also look to a future, where the role of women in farming and food production is not only acknowledged – but championed.”

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‘Proud’

Mr Zeichner was joined in remembering the women’s contribution by Clare Whittaker, granddaughter of Eilene Redding, who was a  member of the Women’s Land Army.

“I’m so proud of my grandmother,” she said.

“She left everything she knew to live on a farm and do a job she’d never done before, so the country had the food it needed, when it needed it most.

“I can’t begin to imagine what that was like, and I’m so pleased that her role, and the role of women like her, is being remembered on the 80th anniversary of VE Day.”

Timber Corps

Joanna Foat, historian and author of Lumberjills: Britian’s Forgotten Army, also paid tribute to the 15,000 young women who served in the Women’s Timber Corps.

“They left factories, domestic service and hair salons to step forward for the war effort, felling trees, driving timber haulage trucks, operating sawmills and calculating figures that the government needed for wartime timber supplies,” she said.

“They worked through snow, mud and exhaustion to provide the timber that built aircraft, the floating mulberry harbours, D-day landing trackway, repaired bombed cities, and fuelled the war machine with millions of tonnes of pit props for coal mines.”

Great Britain consumed almost half of its forests and woodlands during the Second World War, producing 18m tonnes of timber.

Extract from the memoir of Eilene Redding

Eilene Redding © supplied by Clare Whittaker

“The war came between England and Germany in 1939. 

“I was working in London at a Jewish warehouse in Houseditch, near Middlesex Street, better known as Petticoat Lane.

“As war progressed, more and more people were conscripted into arms factories. I felt this was not for me if there was anything different I could do. 

“So I made a decision that I never regretted and volunteered for the Women’s Land Army.

“Fitted out with my kit, I arrived in early summer with another girl, Ivy. 

Ivy and I lodged at a bungalow on the farm with one of the farmers and his wife.

“Our first job on the farm was hop training. It was very quiet and peaceful in the hop gardens with only sounds of birds singing. 

“The hops have to be trained three times, so by the time you finished the garden, you started all over again.

“We learned to milk cows by hand and groom and harness the two horses, Tom and Spider, and all the other jobs on the farm, including corn threshing. 

“We often worked late into the evenings during the summer, especially haymaking and harvest time. 

“Although the work was hard and we were out in all weathers, we enjoyed the life and felt we were doing our bit for our country.”

Credit: Clare Whittaker