A steely RESOLVE

Kathleen Roberts, 98, is proud to leave a lasting legacy after living through the War years

- Kathleen Roberts

Picking up the phone, Kathleen Roberts took a deep breath. It was October 2009 and she’d been plucking up the courage for weeks to make the call to her local paper after seeing the praise the Land Girls – those who worked for the Women’s Land Army during World War Two – had received for their contribution to the War effort.

Surely the women of Sheffield – who had sacrificed six long years of their life to produce vital munitions and parts for Spitfires, in the city’s steel factories, missing out on the tender years of their life – should be recognized too?

‘It would be nice if we just got a thank you,’ Kathleen nervously told the deputy editor. After she put the phone down, Kathleen sat on the stairs at her home and sobbed, convinced she had just made a fool of herself.

But the following day, a reporter came to see Kathleen and listened as she explained what the formidable and feisty women of Yorkshire had endured to ensure the Allied troops had what they needed.

Just as they had in World War One, girls as young as 17 had taken up dangerous and arduous roles in the enormous foundries that lined the River Don, risking life and limb to ‘do their bit’.

‘I saw what those women went through, the pain they suffered and the heartache they endured,’ says Kathleen, now aged 98.

‘Many women had no choice but for their babies and young children to be looked after by relatives, not seeing them for weeks at a time, while others missed out on the most delicate years of their lives,’ Kathleen adds. ‘They deserved to be recognised and thanked.’