The Gunpowder and Glory Girls

Book 1: The Bomb Girls

by Rosie Archer

Genres: Historical Fiction; Sagas; Small Town & Rural

Synopsis

The war is drawing to a close, but the munitions girls are still hard at work in the factory. Gladys has been feeling lonely lately but then an act of kindness towards Goldie, a homeless teenager, provides Gladys with a new friend and lodger. But Goldie has run away from her dangerous family - a group of local gangsters, including a particular pimp, who is determined to make the girl his. Can Gladys keep both of them safe while dealing with her own unexpected pregnancy?

Release date: September 1, 2016

Publisher: Quercus Publishing

Print pages: 416

Sample

Chapter One

August 1944, Gosport

‘Come on love, it can’t be as bad as all that.’

The moment the words had flown from Gladys’s mouth, she wished she hadn’t uttered them. The stench of cordite and burning wood, the noise of ambulances after the all-clear had sounded and the shouting from ARP men searching through the smoking rubble was enough to distress anyone, let alone this girl. She had long blonde hair and was sitting alone on a broken box, cuddling an orange-coloured cat and crying noisily.

‘Shove up.’ Gladys parked her bottom alongside her and put her arm around the girl’s shoulder. ‘You want to tell me what’s wrong?’

Gladys should have been on her way to work the night shift at Gosport’s armament factory, where she had been promoted to overseer, but there was no way she could ignore this girl looking so lost and forlorn; it just wasn’t in her nature.

The girl stared at her and her grip tightened on the cat, which was visibly frightened by all the hustle and bustle. Gladys saw the livid bruise on the side of her face, then the red marks around the girl’s thin wrists. She had obviously suffered some trauma.

Gladys’s night shift at Priddy’s could wait for a while. She was early as usual and no doubt the women would be late getting back to their machines because of the raid. Ol’ Hitler and his V1s and V2s were a damn nuisance, disrupting things. She took a handkerchief from the pocket of her cardigan and gave it to the girl, who sniffed and muttered her thanks as she accepted it.

‘What’s your name, love?’ Gladys tried again.

‘Gwendolynne.’ She lifted her head. She was a looker all right, thought Gladys. The girl dabbed at her eyes and the cat gave an angry, drawn-out growl of a meow. ‘But I’m called Goldie, because of my hair.’ She brushed a long lock off her face and another bruise became visible.

‘Didn’t think that colour came out of a bottle.’ Gladys was conscious of her own peroxide-blonde hair, now orange and brittle at the front where her fringe wasn’t covered by the turban she wore at Priddy’s. The damage was caused by TNT, the powerful explosive she worked with.

Goldie sniffed. ‘My gran’s gone. The houses at the top of this street have copped the doodlebug. Mogs is all that’s left.’ She suddenly buried her teary face in the cat’s fur.

‘Oh, I’m sorry, love.’ Would the horrors of this war never end?

‘I needed to stay with her . . .’ Fresh tears fell as she looked up. Gladys decided it was time to take charge of things.

‘Look, love, that’s my place over there.’ She pointed to number fourteen, a terraced house unscathed by the bombing. ‘I think you could do with a cup of tea. I know I could.’ She rose and waited while Goldie hoisted the feisty cat to her chest and stood up beside her. Apart from the cat and her handbag, the girl had nothing else with her.

Together they threaded their way through a small crowd of WVS women busily stacking a table with blankets in a hastily erected tent. A large tea urn, used to give succour to the homeless and those in shock, was already in oper­ation. Several people sat on chairs with blankets around their shoulders, hugging mugs, with dazed expressions on their faces.

Dust filled the air and Gladys averted her eyes as two ambulance men passed by, carrying a stretcher with a fully covered figure lying on it. She knew that person would be going to the mortuary and not the hospital.

When our boys had landed on the French beaches, Gladys remembered, everyone was filled with hope, but Hitler was still sending those terrible, whining rockets that suddenly cut out and dropped, dashing everything in their paths to smithereens.

‘Here we are,’ said Gladys, pulling the string through the letter box and unlocking her front door.

The house was empty now, but she still left her key hanging on a string for visitors. She didn’t like living alone.

Em, her best friend, had gone to live in Lyme Regis. Em’s son-in-law Joel had been offered a managerial position at the care home, Yew Trees, so the whole family had left Gosport.

Gladys missed them all so much, but funnily enough it was her canary she grieved for more than anything – apart from her beloved daughter, Pixie, who had been killed in a raid. The little yellow bird had been given to her years ago by some man she’d been going with, whose name she’d long forgotten. The canary had chirped its way into her heart and when one morning she’d got up for work to find the dear little bird had passed away in the night, she’d been heartbroken.

‘Come along in,’ Gladys said, showing the girl along the passage and into the kitchen. ‘Sit down while I put on the kettle.’

In the scullery she bustled about with cups and saucers, putting them on a tray along with a plate of the last of her precious Bourbon biscuits.

While the kettle boiled, she peeked back into the kitchen. The girl was now sitting on the old frayed armchair beneath the window, still with the cat clutched tightly.

‘You can let him down, he won’t come to any harm here,’ Gladys said. She watched as Mogs made another bid for freedom from the girl’s arms and this time made it. He sat down in front of the black-leaded range and began washing himself. Gladys poured milk into a saucer, took it into the kitchen and put it near the fender on the rag rug.

‘While I make the tea, are you going to tell me who’s been hurting you?’

Goldie looked down at her wrists as though surprised someone had noticed the discoloured flesh. Now there were fresh tears in her eyes.

‘I was tied up.’ Her voice was very quiet, as though she didn’t really want to say anything. The older woman had to stop herself from gasping at the girl’s words.

The kettle began to wail so Gladys finished making the tea, deliberating whether to use fresh tea leaves or simply top up the pot. She then brought in the tray and set it on the table. She hoped the tea would be strong enough, because she’d only put one miserly half a teaspoon of leaves on top of the dregs left from earlier. With only two ounces of tea per person every week she had to be very careful. Gladys lived on tea. Damn the war, she thought. Would rationing ever end? She waited until Goldie spoke again. Because of her bruising she didn’t think it right to urge the girl to tell her story.

‘It’s Fred, my stepbrother. I’ve managed to get away from him. I thought if I got to Gran’s house, I could stay there out of his way . . .’ Now the tears came thick and fast and her words were jumbled and rushed.

‘Hang on a bit,’ Gladys interrupted. ‘I think you’d better start at the beginning.’ She poured out the girl’s tea and stirred in two precious spoonfuls of sugar, thinking Goldie might be in shock. She didn’t take sugar herself.

‘Drink this, love, nothing like a cuppa to make a person feel better.’ She pushed the cup and saucer towards Goldie and sat down on a kitchen chair facing the girl. Immediately she was seated, the cat jumped up onto Gladys’s lap and settled down.

‘Well I never,’ she said, happily smoothing the silky fur. The sound of purring filled the room and Goldie began to speak.

‘A few months ago my mother met a man – his son is Fred, who’s in his twenties. There’s also a girl aged fifteen, his daughter, named Dorothy, who everyone calls Doll.’ Goldie once more pushed back strands of her long hair from her face, this time tucking them behind an ear. ‘My dad was killed in France last year.’ Gladys saw the terrible sadness in her eyes as she spoke of the loss of her father. ‘My gran thought my mum was wrong to get involved with another man so soon. That’s the gran who lived here in Alma Street.’ Gladys nodded. ‘She said she didn’t even want to meet “that family”, as she called them.’

‘Doll is spoilt.’ She looked straight into Gladys’s eyes. ‘I’m not just saying that. They do everything for her, especially Fred, who’s always buying her little treats. He’s more like her father, telling her what to do, what to wear, who to be friends with. He controls her completely.’

‘Doesn’t her father have any say in the matter?’ Gladys couldn’t help interrupting.

‘He doesn’t care who looks after Doll as long as it isn’t him.’

Gladys shook her head. What an awful state of affairs, she thought. ‘But what about your mum, doesn’t she worry about you?’

‘She’s so caught up with her husband and their new life together I think she’s forgotten I exist. I did write to her.’ Goldie looked very sad. ‘She hasn’t replied to my letter.’

Goldie went very quiet. Gladys felt bad about reminding her of her mother’s abandonment, so she asked, ‘This Fred, what does he do for a living?’

‘He runs a club in Southsea and Doll dances on the stage. Actually, she’s a really good dancer. But she’s not allowed to talk to anyone who works there, especially not the other girls who are older and . . . and . . .’ Gladys saw the blush rise from her neck up and over her face, ‘go with men there.’ She rubbed her hand across her eyes and Gladys could see she was tired, but she let Goldie go on talking. She wondered how old the girl was, perhaps about eighteen?

‘Fred touched me at every available moment.’ Gladys saw she was embarrassed talking about this, as she wouldn’t look her in the eyes. But she went on. ‘He’d get me in a corner and put his hand up my skirt. He’d come into the bathroom when I was washing; there was no lock on the door, you see. He was always going through my clothes, touching my underwear. I tried not to be alone with him. Once he came into my bedroom when everyone was asleep and he was putting his hands on me.’ Goldie’s face hardened. ‘He left when I said I’d scream. He laughed and told me that next time he’d gag me so I couldn’t call out. He said he was going to “have me” and there was no escaping my fate.’ She shivered, as though talking about it brought back her fears.

‘Didn’t you tell anyone?’ Gladys couldn’t help butting in, passing Goldie another handkerchief. She used it to wipe her nose.

‘Of course I did.’ For a moment she looked indignant. ‘But Mum accused me of being jealous and trying to stop her getting married and moving down to the seaside in Cornwall. That’s where Mum’s gone; her and her new husband have a live-in job.’

Goldie drank the last of her tea and Gladys began to pour more. The cat jumped down, disturbed by the sudden movement, and began licking itself. When Gladys was once more settled in the chair, Mogs jumped back onto her lap.

‘Mum left the three of us together in the house.’ Goldie shuddered. ‘I came home from work today – I work in a laundry – and found Doll was spending the night with a schoolfriend who Fred fancies and there were three friends of his in the kitchen, drinking home-made elderberry wine and whisky.’ Goldie paused to explain, ‘Mum made lots of different wines when she could get the ingredients. Mostly she gave bottles away as Christmas presents. Anyway, there were empty bottles on the table and the place stank of cigarettes. When I went to open a window I saw it was nailed shut. I must have looked surprised, because Fred started laughing. He said I was going to get what was coming to me. His mates started laughing as well and I knew I was going to be . . . going to be . . .’ she took a deep breath, ‘passed round like a thing, like I had no say in the matter.’ The girl had put the handkerchief to her face and was sobbing as though her heart was going to break.

Gladys got up from the chair, letting Mogs slide to the floor, and went over to Goldie, putting her arms around her.

‘Cry if you want,’ she said. The girl’s shoulders heaved as she sobbed. After a while Goldie quietened; as Gladys sat down again, she carried on.

‘Fred got hold of me and started pulling at my clothes and hitting me, but I managed to run upstairs. He wouldn’t let his mates touch me, he said he wanted to be first. But he got one to come up and hold my arms while he tied my wrists together. I was scared stiff, screaming at him. Then he tied a blindfold around my eyes.

‘He said I had to calm down a bit so he went downstairs with his mate. It took me ages to get that blindfold off – chewing on a piece of the material that was hanging down – so that it slid from my eyes. I found he’d taken the key so that he could lock the door from the outside.

‘I knew I had to get away. My window was cracked and the frame had moved when a bomb had exploded across the way. He couldn’t lock that, but he’d banged in a nail. I pulled the nail out; once I’d got it loosened it wasn’t so bad.’ She showed Gladys her bloodied fingertips and broken nails. ‘But first I managed to get the string off my wrists by sawing at it with a nail file from my handbag.

‘I could hear them drinking and laughing downstairs and I was terrified that Fred would come up and discover I’d got free. I managed to climb out of the window and onto the flat roof below, then I jumped down and ran along the alley at the back of the houses. I only had my handbag and precious little money in my purse with me. I just wanted to get away from them.’ She drank some more tea. ‘I thought if I could get to Gran’s place she’d let me stay with her, then I wouldn’t have to go back to that house.’ She sighed. ‘I had enough money for the ferry and I walked here from Gosport town.

‘But when I got here the V1 had arrived first. The ARP warden said there was nobody left in the three houses at the top of the street. He was lovely, he got a lady to give me some tea. Then I saw Mogs, Gran’s cat, sitting on top of a wall.’

As if he understood that they were talking about him, Mogs yawned, showing sharp white teeth. Then he stretched, his paws out in front of him, his claws digging in the rug. Jumping up once more onto Gladys’s lap, he circled then curled into a ball.

‘Now,’ Goldie sighed, ‘I don’t know what to do.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t want to go back to Southsea; besides, I don’t have enough money for the ferry.’ She paused. ‘I know Fred will come after me because I made him look stupid in front of his mates. I’m frightened of him.’ She couldn’t hold herself together any longer and put her face in her hands again. Gladys watched her for a while. She hated to see her so distraught. Then the girl mumbled, ‘Oh, I loved my gran. I just don’t know what to do or where to go.’

She took the girl’s hands away and looked into her swollen face. She’d already made her decision.

‘I have to go to work now, but you’re more than welcome to stay here. There’s a bed, made up, upstairs in the front bedroom. There’s a hot-water bottle under the sink.’ She waved a hand towards the scullery. ‘Put it in the bed to air it. I’m sorry about your gran, I can’t do anything about her, but when I come home in the morning, we’ll talk again. Hopefully you’ll feel better after a night’s sleep. Fred won’t find you here. You’ll be safe.’

Goldie stared at her. ‘You’d do that for me?’ She was incredulous. ‘You’d let me stay here?’

Gladys nodded as she gently pushed the sleeping Mogs to the floor and got up. The orange cat, now wide awake, was now twisting itself in and out of Gladys’s legs.

‘You can’t possibly know how relieved and thankful I am.’ Goldie gave a huge sigh. ‘Thank you.’ She looked at the cat. ‘Gran said Mogs hated everyone, but he seems to have taken a real shine to you.’

Gladys bent down and patted the cat. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Because I’ve taken a real shine to the pair of you.’

Chapter Two

Gladys opened her locker and took out her navy-blue dungarees. The air in the room smelled of sweat and stale perfume. It was noisy, all the girls talking at once while they changed their clothes.

A bomb had exploded in the creek behind the armament factory. It had blown a wooden footbridge to smithereens and a couple of moored boats had disintegrated. Happily, no one had been injured and it was far enough away from the buildings not to cause any problems. She’d been right in thinking there would be a late start tonight.

Pam came over and searched her. It was a criminal offence to take in any hazardous materials that might cause a spark, because of the risk of explosion inside the factory. Even hairgrips had to be removed. Jewellery as well, except for wedding rings, which were allowed to be worn, but only if covered with a strip of sticking plaster.

Gladys pulled on the hated boots provided for all the workers. Ordinary shoes, especially those with metal tips and Blakeys on the heels, were highly dangerous.

Then she tied on the white turban that made her head itch. Although she didn’t like the headgear, she appreciated that without it all of her hair would become yellowed and frizzy, just like her fringe. The colour white denoted the station in which she worked. There were different colours for different stations.

Hiding tobacco and matches for a crafty smoke during breaks often meant instant dismissal. One woman in a different factory, it had been reported in the newspapers, had been sent to prison for the offence.

She rolled up one sleeve and examined her arm. The TNT floating in the air caused the workers’ skin to yellow and gave them the nickname ‘Canaries’. Gladys had worked at Priddy’s for so long that her skin was very tanned, making her look as though much of her time was spent outdoors.

Some of the workers became ill with liver and chest complaints and jaundice. Sometimes their periods ceased. Hadn’t her own periods stopped recently? Maybe, she thought, it was because she was getting older, going through an early ‘change of life’. Gladys was well aware she was nearer forty than thirty. Or perhaps they’d stopped due to delayed shock caused by the terrible burns on her back she’d received when one of Priddy’s workers had dropped a grenade. She knew she was lucky to be alive. Gladys had spent time in the marvellous Queen Victoria Hospital at East Grinstead, where they had treated her so well that very few scars remained.

Sores and itching skin were common complaints, caused by the dangerous chemicals the workers handled. If one felt particularly ill, a few days spent in a different department was usually the answer. The workers were also the recipients of a pint of milk every day to help keep them fit.

Gladys walked along the stone-floored corridors to the manager’s office, to see if there were special orders needing to be relayed to the night workers.

She thought about Goldie and how frightened the girl was. As she remembered the cat, a smile lit her face. It would be nice having company about the place, she thought. Goldie would be safe staying at Alma Street. She would need work though, to pay her way. Goldie had said she worked in a Portsmouth laundry, but Gladys doubted the girl would want to continue with that job. After all, she’d have to cross on the ferry twice a day and Fred might be waiting for her at her workplace.

She decided she would ask the manager, Mr Scrivenor, if there was a vacancy at Priddy’s. They always needed workers to help build bombs. Hitler mustn’t be allowed to win this war. Goldie might be glad of the higher wages that were paid to the women working in the Ordnance Factory. She could expect between £2 and £4 a week. With overtime and bonuses, Gladys had received almost £7 in her wage packet last week. That was a lot of money, but it was wartime and food prices seemed to rise all the time. Goods were rationed, but cheapness didn’t come into it. She knocked on the door.

‘Come in.’

‘Good evening, Mr Scrivenor, is there anything I should tell the girls on the night shift?’

Gladys liked Rupert Scrivenor. He was a fair man and a kind boss, always ready to listen to the girls when they had problems. He was immaculately dressed, as always, in a suit and white shirt with just a little of the cuffs showing beneath his sleeves.

‘No, Gladys.’ That was another thing that made him popular – he always remembered the workers’ names. When he walked through the factory he would stop and chat and ask after their families. Everyone respected Rupert Scrivenor. ‘We’re getting back to normal after the latest rocket attack, which delayed production. Luckily the bomb didn’t hit us.’

Priddy’s was named after Jane Priddy who in 1770 sold the land to the Board of Ordnance as a powder depot to serve the navy’s fleet. In 1775, Nelson’s gunpowder was stored there, and now 4,000 people, men and women, worked there supplying explosives. With green-painted roofs to foil the enemy aircraft, Priddy’s stood just outside the heart of Gosport, hidden in woodland and backing onto Forton Creek, where the munitions could be loaded onto ships. A strip of water separated Portsmouth from Gosport and small ferry boats like black beetles carried passengers back and forth. Nelson’s flagship, the Victory, was moored at Portsmouth’s dockyard.

At break-times, when she worked the day shift, Gladys loved sitting in the sun and eating her packed lunch. The wind blowing the scents of wild flowers helped to disguise the muddy smell of the creek, and the stink of the gunpowder.

‘Sir, I have a friend staying with me who needs work . . .’

Rupert Scrivenor stared at her. ‘And you wondered if there’s a job here?’

Gladys knew she was blushing. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘This friend, can you vouch for her?’

Gladys didn’t know Goldie at all, not really. But her sixth sense told her the girl was trustworthy. She believed her story. How awful to be scared to go home when home should be the one place a person could feel safe.

‘Yes,’ she replied.

‘Then tell her to come along and have a chat with me.’

Gladys thanked him, left the office and went first to her own workshop. There she’d give the women their instructions, make a note of any absentees and attend to any problems her girls might have about work. All that sorted, she could then go to the detonator shop where she’d be ‘filling in’ for a girl who was sick. Sprinkling detonators with mercury was extremely dangerous and the girls were paid an extra two shillings and sixpence a week to do it. She’d already asked if any of her girls wanted the job, but they’d all declined.

‘Hello, Marie.’ The big, beefy woman was already at work with the other women at the long bench. The wireless was playing but the girls weren’t singing along. This was exacting work and they had to keep their wits about them. Gladys looked at Marie’s arms, though not a great deal of her skin was visible. ‘I see your rash has cleared up.’ Marie nodded, took off her mask and put down her heavy face shield.

Gladys knew Marie had been working with mercury powder for a long time and it had made her skin red and itchy. Marie had been moved to a different workshop, but as soon as the rash cleared she was back again. She had a large family, her husband had been killed on the beaches in France and she needed the extra money.

‘You ain’t forgot how to do this job, have you?’ Marie laughed. Her teeth were rotten; that was another hazard of breathing in the chemicals.

‘What, me?’ Gladys laughed. ‘I been here so long, I reckon I could run this place single-handed.’ A couple of the women laughed. Gladys was well liked. She pressed her mask into place.

Marie grinned and passed her a tub. Gladys had to work behind a steel shield with a Perspex window. She also had to wear a cotton-wool mask, which she hated because it rubbed against her lips and made her mouth sore.

She took the tub over to a container called a hopper that had an opening at its base for the mercury to be released. A tray of detonators lay ready for her to sprinkle the powder on top, one at a time; she then had to slide them along the table, carefully, for the next worker to do her part of the job.

‘After break I’ll be cleaning detonators with you,’ Gladys said to Marie. The mask also made her voice sound funny.

There were eight women powdering the detonators and four cleaning them. Although Gladys didn’t like doing this job, she would at least be working at something different after her day off tomorrow. This was the last of her night shift and then she’d be back on days, unlike Marie who was permanently on nights, because it paid more.

‘Have you seen Marlene lately?’ Marie asked.

Last week Gladys had been for a drink with Marlene, who had the most gorgeous red hair.

‘Yes, we went down the Fox. Bu. . .