‘Where’s your life jacket, Nurse Graves?’ laughed Vera, as they relaxed with Grace in the early morning sunshine while the Georgic cruised gently on a surface that was as flat as a millpond.
‘There’s only one problem with all this,’ smiled Grace. ‘It’s all too perfect!’
Indeed, within an hour the public address system burst into life with an announcement. ‘We must inform you that a passenger has been diagnosed with smallpox and will be taken to hospital in Malta, where there will be a short stopover.’
‘I thought that this was all too good to be true,’ said Madge, ‘but I’m sure there are worse things in life than being stuck on a ship in the Med for a few days.’
‘The biggest problem for us is that sunbathing is simply so exhausting,’ said Vera with a straight face. ‘Sometimes I feel so tired after so many hours in the sun I really need to have a sleep!’
The rest of the voyage to Liverpool was virtually a luxury cruise, though Madge couldn’t help but shudder again when they sailed over the watery grave of the Strathallan off the Barbary Coast of Algeria on the approach to Gibraltar. Even the Bay of Biscay was on its best behaviour as they continued north, and into Liverpool. There they had a stark reminder of the fearful destruction that had befallen the courageous city in the eighty air raids mounted by the Luftwaffe in a bid to cripple the vital northern port. Next to London it was the most heavily bombed city in the UK.
The northwest coast of England differed in a multitude of ways from the west coast of India, not the least of which was the weather. When the Georgic left Bombay in June 1946 the temperature was in the low nineties. By the time the boat docked in Liverpool a bracing wind was swirling across the Mersey and the VAD contingent were wearing coats, sweaters and cardigans for the first time since the outward-bound voyage that started from Gourock in July 1944.
Thrilled as they were at the thought of finally walking on home soil again, the VADs were far from amused to be greeted by medical authorities who insisted they undergo yet another smallpox inoculation, which for Madge was the fourth in just over two years.
As darkness fell and the girls were finally released to board buses waiting at the dockside, Madge turned to Vera and Phyl and couldn’t help smiling at the end of a very frustrating last few hours. ‘At least there’s now light in our darkness,’ she said.
‘What on earth do you mean by that?’ asked Vera.
‘We’re all too blind to see,’ answered Madge. ‘The street lights are on. There’s no more blackouts!’
‘Come on, geerls, yer supposed to be ’appy now youse all home again,’ said a kindly old Scouse porter on the concourse at Liverpool Lime Street station, which was the end of the line for the 250-strong group of VADs. They had journeyed many thousands of miles to nurse soldiers with appalling injuries and woken to the sound of heavy artillery and small-arms fire on the front line in the Burma Campaign with a devotion to duty and unflinching courage way beyond the call of duty.
Now, suddenly, it really was all over. Addresses had long been exchanged on the voyage from Bombay and the time had come for the parting of ways. There were tears and emotional hugs as the very brave young women said goodbye and prepared for the next chapters of their lives.
‘If you find another one like Basil, pop him in the mail for me,’ said Vera before giving Madge and Phyl lengthy embraces. Along with Grace who was heading back to Yorkshire, Vera searched for the train that would take her to Manchester and then north to Sunderland.
For Madge and Phyl the journey from Lime Street to London seemed to take forever but Madge stayed awake to see towns and villages with street lights on at night. They said their goodbyes at Euston, with Phyl heading west towards Reading. There was one last change for Madge before she finally reached Dover Priory station on a crisp, bright morning and slowly made her way across the concourse. There was no hero’s welcome for those returning from the Burma Campaign. No band playing. No parade with drums beating. No welcoming speech from the Mayor. Instead, the greeting Madge received was infinitely better because there serving tea on the station concourse in her green uniform and little hat at the WVS stand was Mum! The letter Madge had sent to say she was on her way home had not arrived so Lily was shocked beyond belief when her firstborn appeared on the concourse at Dover Priory.
‘Mum!’ Madge called. ‘Mum, I’m home!’
Lily put a hand to her mouth in shock before the tears gushed and the two women ran towards each other.
Madge hadn’t wept when she ran for her life to air-raid shelters as Dover was being bombed and machine-gunned by the Luftwaffe. Or when the town was shelled from across the Channel. Or during the deafening, terrifying silence when doodlebug engines cut out over London. Nor when the Japanese spat in her face. It had been important to be brave when she said that heartbreakingly painful goodbye to Basil in Chittagong. The rattle of small-arms fire near the casualty clearing station in the Burmese jungle hadn’t upset her. But when Mum wrapped her arms round her eldest daughter, the tears finally flowed. Madge was home.
The last time she had set eyes on the family house in Dover, the front door had been blown in by a bomb blast, the wind was driving sheets of rain in from the English Channel and an air-raid siren had just sounded
