Luton Army Girl's wartime memories feature in new book

There was a very special guest at the National Army Museum yesterday (Wednesday, November 10) when 97-year-old Diana Lidstone of Leagrave took part in an exclusive panel featuring the last surviving female soldiers of World War Two.

An Evening With The Army Girls was chaired by historian Dr Tessa Dunlop whose new book Army Girls celebrates the 80th anniversary of conscription for women.

Former ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service) cook and lance corporal Diana - who also made the wedding cake for Four Weddings and a Funeral while working at Luton Hoo - didn't know any of the others taking part but was excited about meeting them and hearing their stories.

"I feel interlinked with them," she said speaking to the Luton News ahead of the event. "I'm also very keen to find other World War Two veterans who served as cooks as I did."

Diana, who hails from Sheffield, was adopted at birth and left school at 14 to help evacuate children from London to the countryside.

Later she put her name down to be a cook because she thought it was something practical that she could do.

She was one of a team of 15 and recalls: "We learned field cooking outside and that nothing, absolutely nothing, could be wasted. It was all about quantity - 500 Yorkshire puddings, 500 scones and thousands and thousands of chips."

She also remembers making scrambled eggs topped with a piece of whale meat as a starter in the officers' mess.

She thoroughly disliked doodlebugs and had a front row view of the Battle of Britain from her home in East Sussex. "We counted the number of planes leaving for Germany and compared that with the number that returned," she said.

Another memory is of travelling to Newcastle in the freezing cold, and in the dark, to collect an ATS member who had gone AWOL.

Her husband David was captured by the Germans and was a POW for five years in a camp near Auschwitz. He also fought in Korea where he was badly wounded.

Diana says he never talked about his experiences but wrote them all down in a diary which she had printed for the family. There is also a copy in the Imperial War Museum.

When the war ended, the couple ran a restaurant in Cranbrook in Kent. Diana would wake up at 6am to make breakfast for the local hop pickers.

They moved to Luton in 1954 with their children, Catherine and Andrew, and opened a shop called The Biscuit Barrell opposite Maidenhall Primary School.

In those days the area round their home in Bishopscote Road was completely covered in farmland. Diana smiled: "I'd look out the window and see sheep and orchards. Our road was a dirt track and I used to get fresh flour from the windmill up the hill."

She now lives with Catherine and still loves to cook. Her daughter has a sweet tooth and adores any pudding containing apples.

Diana was absolutely thrilled when she was approached to do the book. It's given her a new lease on life and brought back many memories.

The WRAC (Women's Royal Army Corps) organisation played a crucial role in getting all these wonderful women veterans together for the project.

It's the only charity that exists specifically to support women who served or still serve. It offers camaraderie as well as emotional and social support.

Any woman who has served - even for just one day - can benefit from its benevolence grants, should she fall on hard times.

> Army Girls by Tessa Dunlop (Headline, £20) is already receiving rave reviews. Broadcaster Jeremy Vine said he was gripped from the first page while historian and film maker Lucy Worsley wrote: "Wise, witty, compassionate and personal."

Professor Kate Williams described it as "fascinating, poignant and important... Army Girls is above all a vivid celebration of life."