This book is about women in World Wars I & II - women working in factories and on farms, or toiling perilously in field stations just behind the front lines, in inhospitable hospitals and convalescent homes. It is, therefore, about the prodigious contribution women made to the war efforts from 1914-1918 and 1939-1945, standing in for the men who had left their places of work for the various theatres of war from Greece and Italy to Belgium, from Mesopotamia to France. Their tasks were many and various: keeping the troops supplied with shells, bullets and explosives, keeping the nation from starving to death, keeping hundreds of thousands of wounded troops alive so that they might fight another day. The book is, in short, the uplifting but sometimes tragic story of the many women who stepped up to work in the factories, hospitals, field stations, in transport and in civil defense, on the farms and shipyards, or signed up to the various military and civil services during the two world wars of the 20th century, ‘wars to end all wars…’.

The book is different because it deals with women’s labour in both world wars and in all occupations, it covers the discrimination and prejudice they faced from men at every level, military and civilian, even when they had demonstrated beyond doubt that they were quick learners, industrious and proficient, and usually as good as any man. The book raises the embarrassing question why it has it taken so long for the prodigious contribution women made in both wars to be recognized, and why some women workers still remain air brushed from our military history after more than a century.

As it turned out, little was beyond their capabilities and it is reasonable to suppose that without their huge efforts and accomplishments both wars might have turned out very differently for us.

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• About the author
• By the same author
• Acknowledgements
• List of Illustrations
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part One: World War I
  • Chapter 1 Women at work in World War I – women as temporary men
  • Chapter 2 Women in the services
  • Chapter 3 Women nurses, physiotherapists and doctors
  • Chapter 4 Women working on the land: farms, forage and forests
  • Chapter 5 Other wartime women’s organisations
  • Chapter 6 Women in industry in World War I
  • Chapter 7 Small arms manufacturing
  • Chapter 8 Munitionettes – the canary girls
  • Chapter 9 Balloons and policewomen
  • Chapter 10 Between the wars
• Part Two: World War II
  • Introduction
  • Chapter 11 Women workers in the military services – here we go again
  • Chapter 12 Women workers in the civilian services
  • Chapter 13 Nursing and other health care workers
  • Chapter 14 The Emergency Services
  • Chapter 15 Women on the farms, in the fields and in the forests
  • Chapter 16 Women in the war factories
  • Chapter 17 Prostitution in the World Wars
  • Chapter 18 The Day the war ended
• Appendix 1 Marie Curie’s War Effort
• Appendix 2 Stamford Military Hospital, Dunham Massey and The Carrel-Dakin Treatment
• Notes
• Further Reading
• Plates