In 1917 aged 14 years, my mother, Olive Daisy Fuller, joined the staff of the General Post Office then in Queens Road, Hastings, as a Telegram Girl (the Telegram Boys were all serving in the Army).
She took the King’s Shilling and swore allegiance to HM King George V. Her duties were to deliver telegrams on foot all along the seaboard areas of Hastings and St. Leonards as well as over the Fire Hills as far as the old Coast Guard Cottages. Telegrams were a popular means of fast communication in both civilian and military life at that time and Olive was kept very busy, visiting large private houses, businesses and military HQ as well as more humble dwellings in the poor slum areas. She frequently had to deliver telegrams from the War Office and the Admiralty informing ‘next of kin’ that their beloved family members had been ‘killed in action’, this being the only notification they would receive.
There was to be no sentiment in Olive’s official duties, she was only to knock the door and say “Telegram for Mrs ‘So & So’, will there be a reply?” She was permitted to wait for four minutes for a reply, but what reply could there be to such devastating news? “Thank you for killing my husband, it was so kind of you to let me know!” would hardly seem appropriate. Very sadly, Olive had to visit the same woman in Hastings Old Town on three occasions; first her husband was killed, then her youngest son was killed and then her eldest son was killed, her whole family being wiped out within a few months.
With the care of a local pharmacist, Olive only just survived the Asian Flu pandemic which killed half the population of Europe later in 1917, but when the Telegram Boys returned to duty after 1918, the girls were discharged and had to find other more ‘ladylike’ employment. Olive lived on through the terrors of WW2 to attain the grand old age of 96, and she died in St. Leonards in January 2000.
This story was submitted by Clifford De Meza
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