In the summer of 1944 Kathleen Oates - a Wren assigned to the Women's Royal Naval Service during the Second World War - was transferred to the Isle of Man. During her time on the island, she wrote dozens of letters to home which provide a unique commentary on the operations at Ronaldsway and what life was like on the Isle of Man 80 years ago. Her daughter, CHRISTINE SMITH, pores through her mother’s letters as part of a series of columns based on Kathleen Oates’s writing...

Eighty years ago, the life of the base at Ronaldsway rumbled on pretty much as normal, with no complaints from Kathleen.

Indeed, she no longer commented on the positive attitude of the men with whom she worked (i.e. compared to the male navy officers she encountered in Liverpool), as she now took it as a given.

However, they were still able to surprise her, as she wrote to her family: ‘This may amuse you, I’d a button off my shirt sleeve, and I was talking to Jane in the CRR, chief noticed it, got a button, needle and thread and stitched it on for me!

‘He was decorated by the King for bombing the ‘Tirpitz’ – see how I’m looked after!’

Kathleen was clearly impressed by ‘Chief’ being associated with the destruction of the German battleship Tirpitz in Norway.

This was achieved in November 1944 after several attempts, including the use of Barracuda bombers, so often mentioned in Kathleen’s letters.

The Tirpitz had threatened convoys bound for Russia and the British Navy had been forced to maintain a heavy presence in the area, to ensure the German ship remained in port, so its eventual sinking was strategically important.

The social, as well as professional, hierarchy which operated in the forces, was reflected in Kathleen’s comment: ‘I’m going to the flicks with one of the air-gunners tonight – ‘twill be the first time I’ve ever been out with an English rating!’

Her Isle of Man life continued peacefully and uneventfully.

‘We didn’t go to Douglas yesterday (February 10) as it was very cold and even started snowing. We went into Castletown for tea – had poached eggs on toast and lovely almond cakes.

‘We then raided the British Legion canteen, knowing that they had their chocolate ration in on Saturday. So it was a very quiet day and easy on the finances.’

Her Sunday was equally unremarkable: ‘My afternoon off and of course it pours down! I wanted to go to Port St Mary for tea – instead I’ve been playing table tennis for about two hours in the YM canteen. I’m now sitting by the fire with the Janes – we’re all very industriously writing letters.’

Kathleen’s letter continued happily on Monday 12th.

‘This morning I spent in the cabin – Cynthia brought me a cup of tea and marmalade sandwich back from the Mess – I stayed in bed until 9.30am.

‘I then got up – put on my ‘bells and waistcoat’ over my pyjamas – swept the cabin and lit the stove, had a bath – dressed - and settled down in front of the fire to do my darning.’

By that afternoon, Kathleen was on duty: ‘And again it chooses to pour down. I’ve done all my odd jobs and filled in flying report forms, so now I’m adding a few lines to yesterday’s effort [her letter].

‘Will have an easy afternoon as there’s no possibility of any flying. Chips and bacon in the Mess for supper this evening, so they’ll be a rush – everyone will be going in to eat.

‘Don’t know what I’m doing this evening – perhaps I’ll to the camp cinema & see ‘In Which We Serve’? I would enjoy that again.

‘If I stay in, I may sew, which wouldn’t improve the headache I have – so I’ll probably go and play table-tennis at the canteen.’

Yet again, Kathleen would have been able to reflect that she was doing well compared to her peers.

That week, she received an indignant letter from her cousin Joyce, who was a private in the ATS at Winchester.

The Auxiliary Territorial Service had been created so that women could fill the roles of their male counterparts at the front.

Thus, ATS women worked as telephonists, drivers, cooks, butchers, bakers, postal workers, clerks, ammunition inspectors and military police. Joyce was far less settled in her position, complaining to Kathleen: ‘At the moment we are rather fed up because last week we had a letter from war office, informing us that now there isn’t sufficient work for us and draughtswomen are to be remastered into other trades.

‘Of course they express their regret and are very sorry! Naturally!

‘They of course don’t realise how sorry we are, to say the least of it, but so we are now awaiting a posting to a command holding unit to see what’s to become of us.’

Given that the pilots and crew at Ronaldsway were being trained for the Pacific War, Kathleen knew she would not face the same uncertainty as cousin Joyce in the ATS – not for a while, at least.

As in January, a theme in letters exchanged was what one was able to buy where.

In a parcel from Leicester that week, Kathleen had been pleased to receive several oranges, sent by her parents.

‘Thanks for the oranges – they are lovely. We had one given at lunchtime about a week ago, but I haven’t seen them in the shops here.’

Oranges were to be had in more than one English town, as Mrs Muir, a Liverpool friend, reported that there were ‘plenty of lemons and oranges around but no potatoes to be had’. The availability – or otherwise – of goods, was clearly newsworthy.

Thus, Kathleen wrote with a request to her family: ‘Will you try and get a comb for me. I realise what an awkward problem that is, but here you can’t buy them at all. Unfortunately we can’t get them from ‘slops’ here.’

‘Slops’ was the navy term for the official shop for the forces on the base.

Kathleen’s friendship with the Muirs in Liverpool had been a very happy one, but was not without its social perils.

She had received a good deal of generous hospitality from them when posted at Liverpool’s Gladstone Docks, and they had even invited her sister Dorothy to stay.

However, a neighbour of the Muirs was an ATS girl and had just been posted to Leicester.

The hospitality needed to be returned, and Kathleen told her parents that she would be writing to say that the ATS girl should call on her parents.

‘I’ll have to explain that Saturday, Sunday and Monday are the only nights when you’re in the house – and that will mean explaining about the shop.

‘I ought to have told the Muirs while I was there – but I didn’t.’

Kathleen was referring to her secret – that her family lived over the fish and chip shop run by her father.

For someone who had been a decorated Captain in World War I, this represented a serious tumble down the social hierarchy ladder and was something she avoided mentioning to her very middle-class peers in the Wrens. And now she would have to make things clear to the Muirs: her discomfort was apparent.

On a more upbeat note, the progress of the war was mentioned in father Chris’s letter to her: he wrote on February 8 about the ‘thrilling news these days’, with the bombing of Berlin and the Russians crossing the river Oder.

In a later letter that week, postmarked February 11, he observed that the war situation was still ‘going well, with the Russians 30-40 miles outside Berlin and Monty almost through the Seigfried Line’.

He speculated that when the weather improved, ‘the western front may flare up’.

The results of the Allies’ progress through Europe could be felt: mum Elsie commented in her letter to Kathleen on the arrival of 200 Dutch children in the UK - ‘we heard them singing on the wireless’.