When the Blitz took place in the summer of 1940, most people were un-prepared; it was unusual that ordinary citizens were now being targeted too. During air raids and blackouts women had to take on the man’s position as well as their own, this was a lot of responsibility for one person. Women had to look after their families, by building secure shelters (the popular Anderson shelter) and preparing for blackouts. When they were not looking after their families they were out working. Some women joined the WVS (Women’s Voluntary Service) where they provided refreshments for those who sheltered in the London Underground tube stations or knitted clothes for those who had lost all their possessions. Other women were wardens; they played a vital role both during and after a raid in coping with the many fires caused by incendiary bombs.
Women managed to hold up morale and keep the country going, it was this that helped lead to Germany’s defeat. Women provided for their families, helped out the fighting soldiers, worked hard doing jobs that they had no experience in, and coped with all the responsibilities that they had to occupy. It was these things that won their victory.
Question 2: In what ways did the lives of women change during the war as a result of their war work outside the home?
Before the Second World War women were seen as housewives and mothers, most women didn’t go out to work everyday and earn a comfortable wage like men did. These perceptions changed during the war where women started to work in industry, the Land Army, and in the Women’s Armed Forces. Their expectations and opportunities improved but after the war a lot of what they had, disappeared and most things returned to normal.
Women started to work in factories, where they were earning higher wages than ever before. Though most women were keen to work, there was a lot of responsibility to come with it. From 1943 the government started to allow married women to work as well as un-married women, so there were a lot more women now working in industry. However, a lot of the male workers were unwelcoming, they felt threatened that women may start to earn the same wages as them. Women’s wages did get close to the men’s wage, but they were still not earning exactly the same amount. Work, for women clashed with some of the responsibilities at home. If a women had a twelve-hour shift it was hard to look after the children, cook and clean with just two pairs of hands. The role of women in the home changed the most during the war.
Another aspect of women’s work, which changed dramatically, was farm working. Before the war, farm work was strictly for men, it was dirty, dangerous and very hard working. However, in September 1939 all this changed when 80,000 women joined the Women’s Land Army. It was hard for a lot of the women because men in particular didn’t think that they could to do such physically demanding jobs. Furthermore, most of the women working in the Land Army came from the towns and were not used to country life. Women were now doing men’s jobs, ploughing, driving tractors, shearing sheep and cutting down trees. The Land Army was a success and it started to prove that women could do the same jobs as men.
Even though things were improving for women, they still couldn’t fight in the war themselves, so instead they had to be the supporting roles where they worked in the Women’s Armed Forces. Before the war women had no significant role in the armed forces, this changed completely during the war, where women learned many new skills such as Morse Code or radar control. Women could now join the ATS, WRNS and WAFF. Most women were conscripted to their service and had no choice where they went; it was hard for some as they were assigned to extremely dangerous jobs where some women were even killed during their efforts. These duties however were supporting jobs, women couldn’t actually go out and fight or lead a troop, they had to attend the injured or make refreshments for the soldiers. Despite some of the difficult unfair jobs, things did change for the better; women were now earning the same as men.
Women took on their own independent roles during the war and with this new found independence they experienced some real freedom, having their own money and their own possessions. Mobile women started to leave home to get a better education, this opened up many doors for a lot single women. In 1944, when an increased amount of American servicemen were placed in Britain, women started to behave differently. Some women started dating American men and started to have more fun with their social lives. There were many illegitimate babies born during the war and after the war divorce increased also. On the other hand, many women had a lot of new responsibilities and war wasn’t so fun, working and looking after the home at the same time was certainly a big change.
Both men and women were changed by their experience of the war, but with their new independence, new responsibilities and new found freedom women gained from the war a great deal more than men. Even though many things returned to normal, women came out of the war with much better expectations and knowledge of the fact that they were capable of doing the same jobs as men, and they were as intelligent as men. All these views were passed down to their children, therefore continuing this new found equality for many generations.
Question 3: the roles of women in the war have often been seen as less important than those of men. Why have women’s roles been seen as less important?
Women played a major part in Britain’s world wide victory in World War Two, however there were, and still is today, a sense that women’s roles during the war were less important than those of the men. There are several reasons for this, the main motives were concerning physical effort, status and education.
Men and women played very contrasting roles during the war, but when combined together they were both equally powerful. The majority of men were out fighting for their country and sacrificing their lives, while women stayed at home supporting the men. This was seen as less critical as at home you were safer, out of harms way, but if your were fighting there was always an incredibly dangerous risk. The work women carried out was not easily seen as a great importance, because it was only a supporting role. A lot of it was background work which, from one perspective didn’t seem like a great deal of effort.
It wasn’t just the physical effort that led people to believe that women’s roles were not important; it was also to do with the level of education at the time. Men were the ones that were educated; they went to school, on to university and then to work. Women however were not given these opportunities and therefore there were not a lot of women around that could make decisions for the country or become great leaders, it was men who did these things. Men made all the military decisions, and were in charge of running the factories and businesses. Churchill was in power at the time and as quite a sexist man he did not give women much of a chance to prove themselves, and as a result women went un-noticed again.
Many years after the war historical information was gathered all around the world, which recorded all the fascinating facts and stories of World War Two. However, it wasn’t the women that wrote the books and read the facts, it was the men. Men had more exciting stories to tell about battling the Nazis and surviving in harsh conditions. People were more prepared to read these stories, than about women working on the home front, it wasn’t seen as interesting. A lot of the history that was collected about women was in the form of letters, possessions or orally passed down through personal stories. Most of this evidence was lost and forgotten.
Women overall were not seen as important, because they were never given a real chance to prove what they were capable of. After the war, in the 1950’s the feminist act developed and women were educated, this made a lot of improvements to gender equality and today both men and women are seen as important in what they do. They may not have been remembered as having important roles during World War Two, but they did however gain a lot of independence and confidence out of it.
