Entertaining the troops

I was in the Army for three and a half years; I was a vehicle mechanic stationed in Ashford, Kent. It was a lovely barracks, about seven different regiments were there and we used to muck about in the mess room. One day there was a show on, for sergeants and officers, and I was sitting in the NAAFI with my friend from Devon, when all of a sudden the captain called out “Craftsman MacDonald”, and then he said “Come on Dorothy”. My friend said ‘It’s for you’ and I said “No! I’ve not had any notice!”.

Anyway I went, I was an acrobat and tap dancer before, and when I got on the stage there was Reg Varney on the piano. I said “Well I can’t do the splits or acrobatics here, like” and he said “Do you know any old numbers?”’, and I replied ‘Yes I do..’ He said “Well, sing My Old Man and Oh Johnny How You Can Laugh, and I want you to go down the steps and sit on the Colonel’s lap”. I said “Oh my god you must be joking!”

And he said “You do it, and I’ll be very very pleased if you do!” Well, I did do it, I went back up on stage and they all clapped, of course. After that day, Reg and I got a show up together, I was in charge of the girls and he was in charge of the boys and we got it all organised (he worked at the Windmill Theatre first of all) — and about three days’ afterwards peace was declared.

Later on I went to work for the BBC for a while, I wrote and asked for a request to be played, they did play it and said that I was stationed there and that it was Reg Varney was the pianist in the show. I really enjoyed it, I didn’t regret one bit of it.

I had five brothers, all of them in the forces so we all did our bit. One of my brothers was machine-gunned on D-Day. I went to Liverpool and saw the sights there, which was really horrible, but the people were so kind to us, so I have memories about D-Day and the war.

I married a Canadian, went back and forth a few times and had three children. It didn’t go right and later I re-married, then after 35 years I met my Canadian husband again, my son took me to Canada to meet him. He hadn’t altered very much, and we talked about old times and that. I have some good memories of wartime and no regrets.

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