It is 1943, and a month into their service as Land Girls, Bee, Anne and Pauline are dispatched to a remote farm in rural Scotland. Here they are introduced to the realities of 'lending a hand on the land', as back-breaking work and inhospitable weather mean they struggle to keep their spirits high. Soon one of the girls falters, and Bee and Pauline receive a new posting to a Northumberland dairy farm. Detailing their friendship, daily struggles and romantic intrigues with a lightness of touch, Barbara Whitton's autobiographical novel paints a sometimes funny, sometimes bleak picture of time spent in the Women's Land Army during the Second World War.
Barbara Whitton is the pseudonym for Margaret Hazel Watson (1921-2016). During World War II, she served as a volunteer for Britain in the the Women's Land Army (WLA), the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (FANY), and the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) as a driver. She chronicled her wartime experience in stories and novels.
Title: Green Hands (Imperial War Museum Wartime Classics)
Author: Barbara Whitton
ISBN: 9781912423262
Binding:
Publisher: Imperial War Museum
Publication Date: 2020-09-10
Number of Pages: 224
Weight: 0.4201 kg
Terrific. * Daily Mail (UK) *
Charming and evocative. . . . It offers a light-hearted snapshot into [Whitton's] experiences, including the friendships and romances, as the story follows three young and inexperienced Land Girls. The author's evident enjoyment of this period in her life shines through but those less rosy aspects are also confronted, including the back-breaking nature of the work and the sexism many women faced as they took on a variety of roles, traditionally performed by men. * Militaria & History *
Witty, warm and hugely endearing, Barbara Whitton's Green Hands is full of engaging characters, burgeoning friendships and pure hard-graft. A lovely novel for anyone interested in wartime Britain, it leaves the reader with renewed admiration for the indefatigable work of the Women's Land Army. -- AJ Pearce, author of Dear Mrs Bird
Tales from the home front are always more authentic when written from personal experience, as is the case here. Barbara Whitton evokes the highs and lows, joys and agonies of being a Land Girl in the Second World War. -- Julie Summers, author of Jambusters
