Marge Arbury was born in Cobham and at 19 years old she joined up to serve her country.  She completed three weeks of initial training at a training camp in Guildford, where she found out she was very good at Morse code, and because of this was selected to be a wireless operator. She was sent to the Isle of Man to be a Y operator. When she arrived she was required to sign the Official Secrets Act, Marge recalls that one person was sent home, as she had a German grandmother so wouldn’t be eligible for the role. She remembers the six months on the Isle of Man, learning how to understand Morse code, getting her ready for her new role as a wireless operator. In October 1943, she was sent to Harrogate, Forestmore, where she started to decipher German enigma messages. Marge never expected that she would be a spy when she first joined up, she thought she would be driving lorries! Her role as a wireless operator involved going through transmissions trying to find hidden Morse code messages.  She was responsible for covering messages coming out of Yugoslavia, from the German Army, Navy, and the Gestapo. All of the messages were passed on by motorbike to Station X, also known as Bletchley park. Whilst stationed in Harrogate, due to the secrecy of the role, people thought she wasn’t contributing anything, and townspeople didn’t treat her well. This couldn’t be further from the actual truth and the important work she was working. Marge stayed with the Y service until the very end of the war and was eventually demobbed in October 1946.

Originating from a military background, Mary knew she wanted to join the army and officially signed in 1978 when she left school. After excelling in her assessments, she chose to join the Royal Army Pay Corps knowing that they had bases all over the world. Following her initial training at Guildford, Mary was posted to Brighton where she worked on translating army promotions into symbols in order for occurrences to be coded into computer systems. She was then moved to Krefeld in Germany and placed in a pay team with two other RAPC individuals. She remembers her time in Germany as the moment in which she, like many others, became aware of the IRA threats and realities of life in the army. Having joined the WRAC towards the end of the 1970s, Mary reflects on the changing nature of women's roles and remembers the introduction of weapon training. She describes the extensive NBC training in Krefeld, in particular 'Active Edge' exercises which were intended to mimic Russian invasion. Mary describes the relationship between technological development and pay duties, and her developing awareness of the discrepancy in pay. With the disbandment of the WRAC she went for commission and became the only female RAPC. Her interview is an inspiring and authentic account of one of the many trailblazing women who broke the system.