Living-history RAF veteran turns 101
A woman who fed RAF pilots who did battle in the Second World War has turned 101.
Edith Montague, a mother, grandmother and great-grandmother, celebrated with relatives and staff at the Loose Valley Care Home, where she lives, on Friday.
Mrs Montague was born Edith Hughes in Llangefni, Anglesey, the second of 12 children.
She joined the WRAF during the Second World War and met her future husband, Joseph Montague, at RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire.
The couple had two children, son Joe and daughter Jean, who spoke fondly of their mother’s great love of walking and the outdoors when younger, and the tremendous dishes she cooked up with the berries she foraged on her walks.
Mr Montague died in December 1978, aged 65.
Mrs Montague only moved into the care home off Linton Road, Maidstone, 16 months ago.
Joe Montague said: “After a lifetime of hard work, she is very content there and always praises the staff for their kindness and skill.
“At the age of 101, she is now ‘living history’, and we all feel it is a privilege to hear Edith talk about when she was young and living in rural Anglesey with her parents and eleven siblings.
“At the start of the Second World War, she left Anglesey and joined the RAF Bomber Command.
“She still occasionally talks about meeting her husband, Joseph, a Leading Aircraftsman, with whom she enjoyed a long and happy marriage, and how she used to give an extra-large breakfast to the pilots flying that day because she knew that some of them would not return.
“Despite her advancing years, she is still very much her own person with her own views on the world.
“She still enjoys singing along to the hymns and songs on her Welsh CDs and can speak the Welsh language as clearly and precisely as she ever did.”