Revealed – heroic story of first ATS girl killed in war
AHISTORICAL researcher has uncovered the life of the first Auxiliary Territorial Service girl to be killed during the Second World War after extensive research on service personnel.
Bernard Pratt, a local historian and researcher, has been researching the service personnel from the First World War who had a connection with Littleborough, and collaborated with researcher Ralph Davidson to research the service personnel from the Pennine districts of Rochdale who fell either 75 or 80 years ago during the Second World War.
On the Littleborough History website, Bernard details the life and death of 18-year-old Private Nora Caveney, who was the first ATS girl to be killed during the war and the second employee of Breda Visada in Littleborough to be killed.
He said: “It’s a very moving experience and it has an emotional impact researching these people’s lives.
“They need remembering and I think their sacrifices need to be remembered. Nora’s story was unusual as she was the only servicewoman from the area who died during the Second World War.
“It has been rewarding, fascinating historically as it has built up a picture of Littleborough all those years ago.
“It has been very emotional at times and does generate a connection of those perhaps a little lost over the years but for whom we owe so much.”
Nora was born in Todmorden on May 10, 1923, to parents John and Hannah who were employed in weaving cotton sheeting.
In 1939 she lived in Todmorden at 4 Cooperative Street, Walsden and worked as a cotton bobbin winder.
Where she worked in 1939 isn’t clear but she was later employed by Breda Visada at Python Mill in Littleborough, working in the reeling room.
The brave young war hero volunteered for antiaircraft duties in the Auxilary Territorial Service, Royal Artillery and was posted to one of the first mixed sex batteries to take over front-line gun sites on the south coast at
Westwood, second Battery, (5th AA Division, 35th AA Brigade, AntiAircraft Command, Southampton).
It is believed the teenager almost certainly lied about her age to have been accepted into the 148th Mixed Heavy AntiAircraft Regiment as it was only opened up to female recruits partway through the Second World War.
She operated specialist predictor computers and monitored enemy planes approaching Britain to alert gunners stationed across the UK.
On April 17, 1942, during a German bombing raid Nora was stood at a predictor machine following an enemy plane at a gun site on the south coast when she was struck by a bomb splinter.
Another AA girl stepped in and the guns were able to continue firing.
Other ATS girls on the predictor kept on with their jobs throughout the rest of the raid which lasted nearly an hour.
Private Caveney’s commanding officer said: “The guns were still firing as the stretcher party took her back to camp.”
The second in command said: “The girls’ discipline under fire was praiseworthy.
“The drill for the replacement of a casualty was carried out perfectly as if it had been a demonstration. Seasoned soldiers could not have behaved better.”
Nora’s name is remembered on the Breda Visada War Memorial in Littleborough Library.
She was buried with full military honours at Netley Military Cemetery, grave No 2210.
Her parents received a telegram saying that Nora had been killed while they were on holiday in Blackpool but they were able to attend their daughter’s funeral where members of her own battery formed a guard of honour.
A recreational hut on the gun site where she died was erected in her memory and a photograph of Nora in uniform is hung on a wall draped in the Union Jack.
The site in Southampton where Nora died has been marked with two information boards to commemorate her and remember the sacrifices she made for her country.