“A State of tense Excitement” proclaimed the Hampshire Telegraph on the
31 of July.
st
Most people know of the famous land and sea battles of WW1, the hardship of life in the
trenches; but this is another side of the story, the part played by unsung heroes, the women of the
home front.
These women stepped into the breach to do the men’s work at home. Without them victory
would not have been won. There was no industry, no trade in which women were not employed
and giving satisfaction. All thought they had no vote or legal status under law.
“There’s nothing before us except starvation” (Evening News: Friday 13th
Aug’ 1914)
Portsmouth had a large corset industry, whose main source of labour being the wife’s and
mothers of the men in the armed forces. Many of these women were poorly paid, and at the
outbreak of war many were laid off, and their future was bleak.
As more and more men left their jobs, to go to war, women gradually took their place. This
work gave women, especially widows the means to survive and feed their families.
Evening News: 7 January 1917; One pound per week for widows.
Mr. G N Barnes (Pensions Minister) “This would also do something for the widow, who was
rather a problem. On the whole, he was not inclined to give a hardy, healthy young woman
a lot of money, for it would be better for herself and the state that she should work”.
Women were first employed doing so called women’s work, such as knitting garments,
dispatching food parcels and other gentle forms of work, such as clerks. But not bank clerks.
It was thought that lady- clerks, by nature would gossip about client transactions.
Eventually most types of work were done by women. From bank clerks to drivers, from
munitions’ workers to farm workers; but they were still expected to make the tea!
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Land Girls helped feed Britain to victory in WW1
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Portsmouth women made up half the Hampshire total of the Land Army. Maybe it was a great
opportunity to get out of Portsmouth’s slums and breathe the fresh air of the countryside.
•
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Many farmers were against female workers, believing they were not strong enough to undertake
ploughing and other healthy tasks. But they soon become proficient in ploughing, harvesting, timber
cutting and other strenuous jobs. By 1915 Germany's best chance of victory lay in starving
Britain into surrender through a naval blockade, so the country had to become more selfsufficient in food.
.
At the start of the war Britain produced just 35% of the food it ate. So the work of the Women's
Land Army was vital in the Allies' victory. Britain's food imports made up around 50% of the
country's requirements, so when Germany successfully mounted naval blockades in 1915, the
country faced a problem. Then in 1917 the harvest failed and Britain was left with just three
weeks’ of food reserves, famine loomed. The Board of Agriculture set up the Women’s Land
Army in March 1917. It was officially disbanded in November 1919.
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The Dockyard
The first women workers were admitted in 1915. At first they were employed as clerks, but as
the war wore on they were employed on most tasks, from operating machinery, welding,
painting, electrical work, in fact all jobs except the one’s that required sheer strength such as iron
foundry and the process of ship construction.
The dockyard women all wore a triangular badge: ‘On War Service’, with pride.
The pay in the yard was better than they used to get in domestic service or the corset industry.
But they did face hostility from some of the male workers, being pushed and jostled, told things
like ‘You came here to do men’s work, you do it’, when they struggled to life heavy weights
and’ You never ought to be here’ get out. Men’s pride was at stake, but one, a Beatrice Hobby
retaliated, saying ‘You ought to be where my husband is, not stand in the dockyard and tell us we
should be out of it’! (He was killed in the trenches, gassed)
In total 1,750 women worked in the dockyard. They were given their notice to quit in
1919. They were no longer required and the men wanted their jobs back.
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Munitions Workers
The main munitions factory in the Portsmouth area was at Pridd’y Hard in Gosport with smaller
ones at Tipnor and Horsea Island.
The reason for so many women joining the munitions factories and other parts of the war effort
was mixed between the sense of patriotism felt for working and helping their fathers, brothers
and husbands fighting, or they joined because the wages received were doubled of what they had
previously made (although was still less than that of a man’s). The women working in these
munitions factories were called Munitionettes and the work in which these women did was long,
tiring and exhausting as well as dangerous and hazardous to their health.
The women working in munitions factories were from mainly lower-class families [11] and were
between the ages of 18 and 30 years old.[11] They were to handle these explosives and chemicals
with little training, yet expected to make them quickly and efficiently so the weapons could be
shipped off to the men at war. Not only was the work stressful and dangerous, but the amount
which the women worked contributed to the difficulty of their jobs. The women would work
twelve-hour shifts, six or seven days a week, [13] and at times would be expected to work over
night. These long days in the factories were difficult on the lives of the women because it
affected their home lives, especially those with children at home, and they were expected fulfill
their other household commitments.
The factories had very little ventilation for the chemicals and fumes to escape from, trapping all
of the chemicals in and creating a very toxic environment. Being enclosed in the chemicals some
of the common diseases and illness which occurred were drowsiness, headaches, eczema, loss of
appetite, cyanosis, shortness of breath, vomiting, anaemia, palpitation, bile stained urine,
constipation, rapid weak pulses, pains in the limbs and jaundice and mercury poisoning.[14]
Jaundice , along with other affects makes the skin turn into a yellowish hue, this yellowing of the
skin created the term canary girls[15] Canary girls was a popular name for the women working in
munitions factories because many had yellow skin as a result of jaundice. Although the women
were at a high risk of getting diseases and illnesses, the women would go home at night to their
children and would have these chemicals on them and attached to them carrying them home and
putting their families at risk of health problems as well, especially to those women who were
either pregnant or breast feeding their babies.
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Portsmouth nursing hero
Gladys White was the daughter of Alfred W White a Portsmouth businessman who
introduces the tramways to the city and who lives in a house called The Poplars at the junction of
London Road and Gladys Avenue. In recognition of his services to the city he was allowed to
name a road and named Gladys Avenue after his daughter. Gladys was born on 30th July 1883
and trained as nurse in London. During the First World War she volunteered for service and went
to work in France. In 1918 she was awarded the Albert Medal for rescuing wounded soldiers
from a burning hospital. In 1939 she volunteered for service again and became commandant of a
convalescent home near Guildford. She retired From nursing in 1945 and died in 1963. Copy
photograph' Ref: Salter, C. Hampshire Magazine Jan 1980.
Portsmouth Inventor and scientist
Hertha Ayrton (1854-1923)
Hertha Ayrton was Phoebe Marks at No 6 Queen St, Portsea. The daughter of a Polish
immigrant watch maker. At the age of eight her mother allowed young Phoebe to be taken to
London to be educated by her aunt. This caused some hardship to the family because Phoebe
helped her widowed mother with the sowing that she took in. Hertha’s mother stayed in Portsea
for a long time, living in Union and Butcher St’s.
Hertha was one of the earliest women students at Cambridge, where she studied, but being a
woman she was not eligible for a degree, merely a certificate.
She became a distinguished British scientist, inventing draftsman’s devices, worked on
searchlight technology and in 1915 invented a fan for dispersing poisonous gases in the
trenches.
Hertha was an active suffragette in 1906, providing safe refuge for released prisoners.
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Evening News; July 3rd 1916
Miss Sylvia Pankhurst visits Trade Union Institute Fratton Rd “Women must be the strong
anti-militarist force of the future, so that there may be no more wars”.
•
•
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Did World War One actually improve women's lives in Britain? 'The war revolutionised the
industrial position of women - it found them serfs and left them free.' The war did offer women
increased opportunities in the paid labour market. Between 1914 and 1918, an estimated two
million women replaced men in employment, resulting in an increase in the proportion of women
in total employment from 24 per cent in July 1914 to 37 per cent by November 1918.
The advantages of these alternative employments over domestic service were obvious: wages
were higher, conditions better, and independence enhanced.
Women were forced out of their war jobs by their employers
In many instances, contracts of employment during World War One had been based on
collective agreements between trade unions and employers, which decreed that women would
only be employed 'for the duration of the war'.. As unemployment levels soared immediately after
the war, anger towards women 'taking' jobs from men exploded.
The consensus against the employment of married women
Women were also divided, with single and widowed women claiming a prior right to
employment over married women. For instance, Isobel M Pazzey of Woolwich reflected a
widely-held view when she wrote to the Daily Herald in October 1919 declaring that 'No decent
man would allow his wife to work, and no decent woman would do it if she knew the harm she
was doing to the widows and single girls who are looking for work.' She directed: 'Put the
married women out, send them home to clean their houses and look after the man they married
and give a mother's care to their children. Give the single women and widows the work.'
In some occupations, single women insisted on excluding their married sisters. For
instance, in 1921, female civil servants passed a resolution asking for the banning of
married women from their jobs. The resulting ban was enforced until 1946. There were
other setbacks. During World War One, hospitals had accepted female medical students:
in the 1920s, women were rejected by the hospitals on the grounds of modesty.
Women over the age of 30 years who held property] were granted the vote in 1918. Although it
was the younger women who had done the work.
Portsmouth had the distinction of being the first town in which women were called upon to vote.
On the 7th November 1918 an election took place in St Simon’s ward in which Miss Kate
Edmonds, a well known social worker was elected by a majority of more than 600 votes.
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Wrens
The Women’s Royal Naval Service
The WRNS was created in November 1917 as a result of heavy naval losses in the previous years
and a resulting shortage of manpower for active sea service. Many sailors were based on shore
and it was felt that they needed to be released to the ships, although their shore jobs still needed
to fulfilled. As in the civilian world, it was felt that by employing women to do these jobs, the
men would then be able to go to sea. The promotion of the Women's Royal Naval Service was
"Free a man for sea service".
Initially, the Admiralty decided that only 3,000 women would be recruited and would mainly
perform domestic duties, such as cleaning, cooking and serving meals. In the end, over 6,000
women undertook a variety of duties including some that that been deemed too difficult for
women. There were even units based overseas, the first one being in Gibraltar. The WRNS was
led by Dame Katherine Furse. She was a tireless worker and involved herself in all matters
relating to the service. A basic uniform was designed, although the Treasury forbade the use of
gold lace on the women's uniform. They decided on royal blue instead. The WRNS was in being
for nineteen months before the Admiralty finally disbanded the service on 1 October 1919, but
had made a tremendous impression during its short existence. During that period, the service lost
23 women.
Wrafs
Women's Royal Air Force (WRAF) 1918 - 1920
During the First World War, members of the Women's Royal Naval Service (WRNS) and the
Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) worked on air stations belonging to the Royal Flying
Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS).
When the decision was taken to merge the RFC and RNAS to form the Royal Air Force (RAF),
concerns were raised about the loss of their specialised female workforce. This need for a
separate women's air service led to the formation of the WRAF on 1 April 1918.
Nick-named “ Penguins”, having wings but not flying. Stationed at Tipnor.
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Waacs
With heavy losses on the Western Front in 1916, the British Army became concerned by its
reduced number of fighting soldiers. Lieutenant General Sir Henry Lawson suggested to
Brigadier General Auckland Geddes, Director of Recruitment at the War Office, that far too
many men were doing what he called "soft jobs". After talks with the government it was decided
to use women to replace men doing certain administrative jobs in Britain and France. These men
could then be sent to fight at the front.
In January 1917, the government announced the establishment of a new voluntary service, the
Women's Auxiliary Army Corps (WAAC). The plan was for these women to serve as clerks,
telephonists, waitresses, cooks, and as instructors in the use of gas masks. It was decided that
women would not be allowed to hold commissions and so that those in charge were given the
ranks of controller and administrator. Helen Gwynne-Vaughan was chosen for the important job
as the WAAC's Chief Controller (Overseas).
The WAAC uniform consisted of a small, tight-fitting khaki cap, khaki jackets and skirts.
Regulations stated that the skirt had to be no more than twelve inches above the ground. To
maintain a high standard of fitness, all members of the WAAC had to do physical exercises
every day. This included morris dancing and hockey.
Women in the WAAC were not given full military status. The women enrolled rather than
enlisted and were punished for breaches of discipline by civil rather than military courts.
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