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School, Edinburgh, and Harrogate Ladies’ College. On leaving school she
toured Europe, learning German and French in the process.
At the outbreak of war, Elspeth quickly realised that she wanted to join the
war effort in some way. As her daughter recounts in an interview about her
mother, this was prompted by a family event:
“She attended her cousin’s wedding and she felt that it was morally wrong
that she, a single woman, should be continuing to enjoy civilian live while
he, just married, taking on responsibility for a wife, was joining up - so she
enlisted the following day,” says Mrs Redfearn.
She joined the Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD), a civilian unit providing
nursing care for the military personnel. Here she worked as a driver and
gained her rst aid qualications, before joining the WAAF in January 1940.
After a two week training course to be a plotter in the operations room of
a ghter base, she was posted to Biggin Hill. She was soon promoted
to corporal, supervising other WAAF plotters whose task was to display
the path of the incoming enemy planes as they headed towards the south
coast.
Biggin Hill was one of Fighter Command’s main airelds and quickly became
a Luftwaffe target during the Battle of Britain. Towards the end of August
1940, the German focus was to take out ghter airelds in the south-east
of England, and Biggin Hill was one of the most important of these airelds.
Even when it was obvious that these German ghter planes were heading
directly for their post at Biggin Hill, Elspeth and the other women stayed at
their post, continuing their work.