archiwalia arch

Al fresco entertainment 1941, courtesy of the Whizz-Bangs. Christina is on the far left. Note the officer on the front row using binoculars while two men on the back row seem more interested in getting their picture taken. THE REMARKABLE life and tragic end of the English singer and dancer who became an aircraft plotter in Malta in the Second World War has been told in a new book. Christina Ratcliffe worked in the underground Royal Air Force operational headquarters beneath Lascaris Bastion in Valletta. In June 1942 fifty-three female civilian plotters worked at Lascaris, some as young as fourteen. Six including Christina were decorated for gallantry. What they did, how they lived and how some of them died is told in part using their own words. Plotters were employed on an early form of air traffic monitoring that played a vital role in World War II, particularly during the Battle of Britain, The Blitz and the bombing of British cities that followed. Their descriptions of life beneath the most intensive, prolonged bombing the world has ever seen are extraordinary and rare: female perspectives at the heart of military conflict. The extraordinary story is told in Paul McDonald???s new book, Ladies of Lascaris, published by Pen and Sword. Paul McDonald / mediadrumimages.com