Whose finger on the trigger? Mixed anti-aircraft batteries and the female Combat Taboo

War in History

Volumn 4, Issue 4, 1997, Pages 434-453

  Degroot, Gerard J ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF ST ANDREWS   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 9744254454     PISSN: 09683445     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/096834459700400404     Document Type: Review

References (44)

1. D. Sheridan, 'ATS Women 1939-45: Challenge and Containment in Women's Lives in the Military during the Second World War' (MLitt. dissertation, Univer. of Sussex, 1988), pp. 16-17
2. C. Enloe, Does Khaki Become You? (London, Pluto Press, 1983), pp. 149-59
3. J.B. Elshtain, Women and War (New York, Basic Books, 1987), pp. 171-80
4. M. Higonnet et al., eds, Behind the Lines: Gender and the Two World Wars (New Haven, CT, Yale UP, 1987)
5. N. Goldman and R. Stiles, 'Great Britain and the World Wars', in Goldman, ed., Female Soldiers: Combatants or Non-Combatants? (Westport, CT, Greenwood Press, 1982)
6. E. Taylor, Women Who Went to War (London, Robert Hale, 1988)
7. S. Saywell, Women in War (Wellingborough, Grapevine, 1988)
8. M. Goldsmith, Women at War (London, Drummond, 1943)
9. See also D'Ann Campbell, 'Women in Combat: The World War II Experience in the United States, Great Britain, Germany, and the Soviet Union', Journal of Military History LVII (Apr. 1993), pp. 301-23
10. F. Pile, Ack-Ack (London, Harrap, 1949)
11. V. Robinson, On Target (Wakefield, Verity Press, 1991)
12. Saywell, Women in War, p. 17
13. Report of the Committee on Amenities and Welfare Conditions in the Three Women's Services, presented to Parliament Aug. 1942. Cmd. 6384, para. 24. Hereafter cited as the Markham Committee Report
14. Sheridan, 'ATS Women', p. 22
15. S. Bidwell, The Women's Royal Army Corps (London, Leo Cooper, 1977), pp. 127-8
16. A point discussed by R. Holmes in Firing Line (Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1987), pp. 100-06
17. This issue is discussed in relation to the Tailhook scandal in J. Zimmerman, Tailspin (New York, Doubleday, 1995)
18. AA Official History (draft), p. 107
19. J.W. Naylor, 'Mixed Batteries', Journal of the Royal Artillery LXIX (1942), p. 206
20. Taylor, Women Who Went to War, p. 65
21. On Target, p. 30
22. See Zimmerman, Tailspin, pp. 158-9
23. Naylor, 'Mixed Batteries', p. 200
24. Pile, Ack-Ack, p. 192
25. F.A. Pile, The Anti-Aircraft Defence of the United Kingdom', London Gazette, Part 18th (Dec. 1947), p. 5981
26. Lt E.S. Turner, 'Very Mixed Battery', Punch, 1 Nov. 1944
27. Maj. D. Rees Williams, 'The Gunner-Girls', Spectator, 24 Apr. 1942, p. 396
28. Rees Williams, 'Gunner-Girls', p. 396
29. The Times, 29 Apr. 1942
30. Bidwell, WRAC, p. 130
31. Rees Williams, 'Gunner Girls', p. 396
32. J.M. Cowper, The Auxiliary Territorial Service' (War Office, 1949). PRO WO 277/6, p. 49
33. Markham Committee Report, para. 25
34. Pile, London Gazette, p. 5982
35. See e.g. Hansard, 14 Nov. 1944
36. Hansard, 3 Aug. 1943. Summerskill often alleged that the government stuck to the non-combatant status of women to justify their lower pay
37. See also Hansard, 24 Jan. 1945
38. G. Morgan, personal memoir, Imperial War Museum ref. pp/MCR/115, p. 58
39. J. Carr, 'Just Like William', in M. Nicholson, ed, What Did You Do in the War, Mummy? (London, Chatto & Windus, 1995), p. 112
40. Goldman, Female Soldiers, p. 35
41. See also J. Erickson, 'Night Witches, Snipers and Laundresses', History Today, July 1990, p. 33
42. See Diary of A. Laws, Imperial War Museum; A.A. Collins, Tour Years in the ATS', Army Quarterly XL VI (1943), p. 204
43. Op. cit., Ritson's remarks bear a striking similarity to those of other women (in particular, Russians) who have experienced combat. See Elshtain, Women and War, p. 177
44. I. McEwan, The Imitation Game (London, Cape, 1981), pp. 173-4