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Brian-Hargreaves

A veteran interview with

Brian Hargreaves

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Home | Veterans | Brian Hargreaves

A veteran interview with

Brian Hargreaves

Brian-Hargreaves

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Cite this interview:

MLA Style:
Hargreaves, Brian. A Veteran Interview with Brian Hargreaves. Interview by Unknown. Legasee, n.d. https://www.legasee.org.uk/veteran/brian-hargreaves/. Accessed 21 Jul. 2026.
APA Style:
Hargreaves, B. (n.d.). A Veteran Interview with Brian Hargreaves [Interview by Unknown]. Legasee. Retrieved July 21, 2026, from https://www.legasee.org.uk/veteran/brian-hargreaves/
Chicago Style:
Hargreaves, Brian. n.d.. A Veteran Interview with Brian Hargreaves. Interview by Unknown. Legasee. Accessed July 21, 2026. https://www.legasee.org.uk/veteran/brian-hargreaves/
Harvard Style:
Hargreaves, B. (n.d.). A Veteran Interview with Brian Hargreaves. [Interviewed by Unknown]. Legasee. Available at https://www.legasee.org.uk/veteran/brian-hargreaves/ (Accessed: 21 July 2026)
Vancouver Style:
Hargreaves, B. A Veteran Interview with Brian Hargreaves [Internet]. Interview by Unknown. Legasee; n.d. [cited 2026 Jul 21]. Available from: https://www.legasee.org.uk/veteran/brian-hargreaves/
An interview with

Betty Webb

Betty joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service in 1941.

Joining during the Second World War, Betty was sent to train at the Welsh Barracks near Wrexham. After performing well in her tests, she was sent to interview with the Intelligence Corps in London. She remembers being immediately taken to sign the Official Secrets Act and proceed to working in listing translated messages in Bletchley. It was at this posting that she discovered her talent for paraphrasing, and from this point onwards was given the task of paraphrasing translated enemy messages to be sent on to Burma. Remarkably, Betty was then sent to work in the Pentagon before moving to the British Army Staff base in Washington DC. In her interview she describes the lack of news made available to American civilians surrounding the war in Europe, and her frustration at the lack of understanding future employment had on the highly classified status of her military work. When asked her thoughts on the disbandment of the WRAC, Betty felt disappointed that there was no longer a women's army as she enjoyed the independent identification of the female corps.
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Service:
Interviewed by:
Martin Bisiker
An interview with

Douglas Hassall

A narrow escape from being executed after spending three and a half years in a Japanese prisoner of war camp.

Douglas Hassall shares how he narrowly escaped a death sentence after spending three and a half years as one of Japan’s prisoners of war during World War 2. Douglas accepted early on that escaping would be foolish as any escapees were executed; the camp being located in Vietnam also left the nearest allies 1100 miles away.  The Japanese employed beatings and other instantaneous punishments, something alien to a British soldier like Douglas, their neglectful medical care equally as shocking to him. Despite his horrible treatment Douglas highlights how incredibly lucky he was as the other camps had prisoners sleeping outside with no access to clean water. The few lenient guards allowed them to hold concerts and church services however over time the Japanese replaced them with cruel guards who murdered the prisoners’ pets.    Douglas got his first hint of freedom after a British interpreter secretly told him that allies were closing in, both of them unaware that Japan’s prisoners of war were all destined to die. Prison labour had halted and transportation of prisoners to the execution site had begun when the second atomic bomb fell forcing Japan to free everyone at the very last second.  Unfortunately Douglas’ release was bittersweet due to the plane transporting one of his friends back to England crashing killing everyone on board.   
Service:
Interviewed by:
Rebecca Fleckney
An interview with

Bernadette Dolan

Bernadette 'Bernie' Dolan worked with the Royal Engineers Postal and Courier Services.

Bernie's interview begins with her retelling the story of how she never wanted to join the army, but as she was too short to join the police, she found herself at the army recruitment office instead. She was posted to Mill Hill in London to train with the postal and courier services. Bernie handled classified mail and transported important documents during the height of the Cold War and IRA threats. In 1978 Bernie was posted to Northern Ireland where she was flown with mail to different barracks and sites all over the country. She remembers experiencing an explosion in the barracks, and in that moment realising that no one was safe from the bombings. After Ireland, Bernie returned to Mill Hill, then Dusseldorf where she ran a post office on the Rhine. She was then posted to the Falklands and responsible for organising soldier's mail as it came into the port. On her return home she was promoted to Quartermaster, and later Sergeant Quartermaster in the Royal Artillery Regiment in Warwickshire. It was at this point in her career that she began to feel the WRAC shifting, and was sad to leave in 1994 when the Corps disbanded. Bernie shares her story because she believes it is important to document history and portray what has happened in the past.
Service:
Interviewed by:
Martin Bisiker