Sadie Hall

	General experience.
	This page: includes inventory and audio clip.

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Nora and Sadie on a few days leave in 1943

Inventory of Sadie's Donation

• Identity card
• W.L.A. membership card
• Photographs
• Copy of diary, from 1940-1945
• Original letters to Sadie from various sources including a repatriated German P.O.W.
• Letters from the W.L.A relating to her call-up, release and uniform concessions
• W.L.A. release certificate, 16 December 1946
• Greeting cards including W.L.A. Christmas card
• Newspapers and magazines
• Theatre programmes
• Miscellaneous cuttings (including pictures and sketches)
• Leaflet, 'Join the Women's Land Army'
• Small elements of uniform including hat-band, arm bands and rat-catcher badge
• W.L.A proficiency badge and certificate in pest destruction
• Certificate from the Queen for exceptional service in the W.L.A from the period 30 March 1942 -14 December 1946
• War-related booklets
• French francs
• Dance invitation, American Red Cross
• Tape-recorded

Inventory of Nora's Donation

• Photographs
• Pages of manuscript recollections
• Tape-recorded

Nora and Sadie on rat-catching duty 1944/45 (Copyright: Western Times D & E Gazette Exeter)

GIRL RAT-CATCHERS
W.L.A Members Kill Over 100 In a Day

For the past seven months Misses Sadie Greaves and Norah Carter, members of the Women's Land Army, have been employed in the unusual occupation of rat-catching in the Tavistock district, and have achieved a large measure of success.
Yesterday they made their biggest 'bag' and when 'tails' were counted it was found that they had captured 43. This number is not the measure of their success, however, for it represents only those which endeavoured to escape from one of the nests which were gassed.
The young women are confident that they must have exterminated over 100 rats during the day.

A group photograph of the Devon-based W.L.A girls

Arm bands, a W.L.A. Proficiency badge and Rat-Catchers badge (top left)

A letter to Sadie from Hans Ellenberger, 19 May 1947

Transcript

On the right: a letter to Sadie from Hans Ellenberger, 19 May 1947.
Sadie explains the origin of this letter (one of a set of five donated to the Centre):

"A very short walk from Bramble Hill was a p.o.w. camp. As we were going out to work in the morning so were they and we passed in opp. Directions. Lilian (one of our girls and half German) suggested we responded by smiling, if only slightly, to their glum faces. We did, and the nicer ones after a few days returned the smiles and before long we actually waved!!

The Americans were very generous in many ways; and often we were given 200 pack boxes of cigarettes and sweets etc from complete strangers who happened to be passing by in a truck. So we thought of a very good use for them!

The black-out hid so much; and having had a quick conversation (in day-light) from the wall top, we arranged with the Germans another quick rendezvous 'under cover'. So began an occasional hand-over of things to improve their dull lives, including magazines. The wall was high and I had to stretch quite a bit I seem to remember!

After returning home my mother and I managed occasionally to send small parcels to Hans."

Sadie Hall Audio Clip:
Sadie is asked to describe the gin traps that she used.

Audio Clip Requires Real Player - free download here

Transcript of Audio Clip

A bit like a man trap?

Yes, and then there was a metal, what would you call it, handle from it with a chain on, and you used to knock the spoke in to the soil and then you had to camouflage it, so it couldn't be seen and I camouflaged mine once so well and we had long spoons for poison and instead of putting the spoon around when I was going to pick them up, because there wasn't a rat in, (I knew more or less where I had put it), I was moving about with my hands, which I shouldn't have done, it was my own fault because I had been at it for years then and I got my hands in. And I have never forgotten because my friend must have had a perverted sense of humour, she stood there and said, "well, you should know better by now", and I said, "for goodness sake get them out", because it was rather difficult to get down, and fortunately they weren't broken or anything, but they must have gone sort of straight in. But the unfortunate thing was that you did catch owls. We did catch a beautiful Barn Owl once and some people used to catch cats and things and we didn't. I don't, I can't, the only thing I can remember ever catching was an owl and some people who were careless used to kill cats and all sorts, but I can honestly say that we didn't, and after we had left, the old sort of supervisor, old Potter, said that the men had come back from the war and somebody had poisoned a cow, because they'd just. . .

We had, we used to have arsenic, cyanide, because, I mean it's unbelievable now, there was a store in Axminster which had been part of the carpet factory and sugar was stored there, and Nora and I were taken to put (and it was the first time actually we had used cyanide) to put cyanide down, to make sure they were killed and didn't get at these, and it was the most terrible, terrible responsibility and fortunately we were both intelligent and you know, were really, were very very careful and how much we got up again, but things did happen in the war which I am quite sure would never never happen now.

[Sadie would like us to point out that Potter was a gamekeeper.]

	General experience.
	This page: includes inventory and audio clip.