AS PART of today's International Women’s Day, here’s a photograph to celebrate a group of Monmouthshire women who served in the army in the First World War.
Their banner and uniform shows that they were members of Queen Mary’s Army Auxiliary Corps.
The unit was originally formed as the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) in July 1917 with the aim of freeing up more men from clerical and other non-combatant roles in the army so that they could fight at the front.
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The women then backfilled jobs in administration, stores, catering as cooks and waitresses, and as drivers and mechanics, initially only in Britain, then also in France.
Adverts appealing for recruits promised Good Wages, quarters, uniform and rations.
Queen Mary was impressed with their work and became patron of the corps in 1918 – when its name was changed. The QMAAC was finally disbanded in September 1921.
The women here are wearing the long buttoned coats of the uniform with their collars outside.
We don’t know their names but the photographer, George F Harris was based in Monmouth.
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