“I probably would have anyway. And the Army Air Forces needs nurses desperately.”
“Just come home, Allie. I promise I’ll be nicer when you do.” Alex doubted that but appreciated her sister saying it.
“I’ll be back soon, Char. Take care of your babies. Maybe you’ll have a boy next time,” Alex teased her, and Charlotte shook her head.
“Oh no, I’m done. Four girls are enough for me. I’ll be ready to kill myself fifteen years from now with four teenage girls fighting with me.”
“I admit, it’s a frightening thought.” Alex hugged her tight then, and Charlotte left shortly after, with tears running down her cheeks. Her parents hugged Alex again and went to bed. When she went to her room that night, Alex sat smoking quietly by the window and realized that, whatever their failings and no matter how different she was from them, her family loved her to the best of their limited abilities. It was a comforting thought as she prepared to leave them. For once, she was sad to leave, but she wasn’t afraid of what lay ahead. She couldn’t wait to get to England and start flying missions.
* * *
—
Lizzie had come to similar conclusions in Boston. Her parents were distressed that she was going overseas too, with both her brothers in the Pacific. But whatever their ideas, or their goals for her, and however little they understood the dreams she had, she never doubted that they loved her, and would always be there if she needed them. It was the best she could hope for, and all she needed to take with her.
* * *
—
Louise took the train from Kentucky to North Carolina, and she was grateful to have the time with her parents. Her father canceled his office hours for the day, and spent the time with her, and her mother joined them as soon as she could leave school.
She had always been close to them, and they had always encouraged her to follow her dreams and fight for what she believed in. She tried to live up to what they expected of her, and she set the bar high for herself. What she was doing now was no different. They were proud of her, and they stood tall on the station platform in the segregated section as they watched the train pull away when she left. She hung out the window waving at them, in her uniform. She could see the tears glistening on their cheeks, and she kept waving until she could no longer see them.
* * *
—
All three girls got to the ship punctually after their leave, and they were happy to see each other. It had been an emotional few days, saying goodbye to their families, and it had been a quiet reflective time for Audrey. All of them were excited about what lay ahead of them, who they would meet, what they would do. And they wondered if they would be equal to the tasks set before them.
Only Alex had ever been to England. The others had never been out of the country, and most of the girls they talked to in their unit hadn’t either. It was going to be exciting too, working with the RAF and English nurses, and being housed with them. The army and the war were broadening their horizons and giving them new opportunities, which would change their lives forever.
All the nurses reported to the ship on time after their leaves. They headed to the SS Henry Gibbons, an army transport ship being used to carry troops between New York and Southampton. It had a capacity for over two thousand passengers. They were bunking six to a cabin, in triple bunks. Alex, Lizzie, Louise, and Audrey, and two other nurses had been assigned to the same cabin. There were eighty-two flight nurses traveling to England, and two thousand male troops on the ship. At six in the morning, the day after all of their leaves had ended and they boarded the ship, and a full twenty-four hours before they had all been told they were sailing, an alarm sounded and the troop ship they were traveling on left the dock on the tides with no further warning. Alex woke up with a start, but most of the others slept through it. They were leaving a day earlier than they’d been told, for wartime security. They would travel as swiftly as possible, sailing both day and night, hoping to avoid U-boats and German fighter planes spotting them. They were to dock in Southampton, and the nurses would travel in buses for two hours to Down Ampney in Gloucestershire, the RAF base where they would be stationed. They’d been told it was two and a half hours from London.
The nurses tended to stick together on the journey, standing at the rail and talking about where they’d been, where they came from, where they had been assigned in England. They would be briefed by the RAF about their procedures when they got there.
And as they stood at the rail in the morning sunshine, on a crystal clear cold day, they looked at the sea of men below them on the lower decks, and Lizzie wondered how many of them they would be transporting one day, after they were injured. It was a sobering thought. They were all traveling in uniform. A mass of thousands of khaki uniforms. The nurses were the only females on board.
A few of the nurses mingled secretly with the enlisted men, which was not allowed. It didn’t seem worth the risk to Audrey and the others, just to flirt with the men, so they stayed with the other nurses.
“And here, my mom was worried I’d never find a husband,” Alex commented, and the others laughed, as they stared at the soldiers below them. “Somehow I never counted on meeting a man while I’m in the army.” But others did, and found them, for a night, or longer.
“I don’t want to meet a guy,” Lizzie said. She hadn’t gotten over Will yet, even two years later. Every man she met paled in comparison to him.
“Maybe a nice English boy,” Audrey said. She hadn’t had a date, or time for one, while her mother was sick. She liked the idea of meeting a nice man one day, but she hadn’t had the opportunity in years.
“I’d rather wait til the war is over,” Louise said soberly, and her situation was more complicated.
None of them were desperate to find boyfriends. They had too much else on their minds.
The two nurses they were sharing their cabin with had looked startled when they saw Louise, but made no comment after a quick glance at each other. The others seemed nice enough, and they decided to ignore her.
The days on the ship dragged by and there were some tense moments, when the ship slowed, and they all suspected the lookouts had spotted something or the captain had been warned. Then their speed would pick up again. The captain was pushing the ship hard to get to England in a hurry. Ships just like theirs had been torpedoed and sunk by U-boats or attacked by the German Luftwaffe, but day followed day without incident. And finally, five days later, land came into sight. More than two thousand cheers rose from the ship as they all stood on deck. They had made the journey safely, and their next adventures awaited them.
Chapter 8
When war was declared in Europe in September 1939, although they were older, Prudence Pommery’s parents were among the first to offer their home to house as many children as they could manage during the evacuation of children from London. They had three grown children of their own. Maximillian was twenty-two, Prudence was twenty, and Phillip was nineteen. Both their sons enlisted in the RAF immediately. A month after war was declared, Prudence signed on for an accelerated two-and-a-half-year nursing course at the local college, near their Yorkshire manor.