Wigan Album

What, exactly, were they training for?

If I might repeat Mavis Higham’s reply to exactly this question when the photo first appeared, "The girls training corps was set up during wartime to train and prepare young girls who were not yet old enough to join the armed forces. They did drills, fist aid, community and war effort work among other things - general preparation for active service if they were needed when older."

It's what the young people of today are short of.

Keith - "fist aid" ? oo er ! Is this the Ancient and Loyal form of Self Defence ? Closely related to the Northern Martial Art of Ecky Thump well known to those old enough to remember The Goodies.
On the other hand I suppose " fist aid" might be a charity event to support ex boxers.

I really should check the quotes of others more carefully before posting, well spotted Caro!aen.

Marvellous how the photos have turned out of the young girls, even the best on the big photo are fuzzy.
Could they be cadets in the way young lads were at the time in a form of ‘Home Guard’? Thanks for sharing the photo Keith.

Clap trap, Mr Hanson. Our young people today are as fine a generation as we've ever had.

Thank you for your comments Veronica. I’ve come across this on the internet written by a lady who was born in 1926 and lived in Neston, Cheshire.
"When I was about 17, around 1943, I joined the Girls Training Corps. This was a national organisation whose aim was to offer instruction to girls in the skills which they would need if and when they joined the services. So we learnt the Morse Code from an instructor who was based at a local army camp, some aircraft recognition, map reading, took army drill instruction and assisted the Air Raid wardens on their rounds. We were issued with a uniform which was best described as ‘functional’!
All of this was somehow fitted in at weekends or in the evenings after work. "