Wednesday, 4 March 2020

The working women of world war one.

Traditional gunpowder had been replaced by materials such as cordite and sulphur which were mixed by hand, despite being dangerous to human health. As a result, the women's skin would break out into hives and their hair would be discoloured

Pictured: A group of women workers employed at a Brick Works in South Wales as the First World War left factories, pits and munitions factories without any staff

Pictured: A war worker carefully paints the roundel on the wing of an SE5A aircraft at the Austin Motor Company factory in Birmingham, September 1918

As International Women's Day approaches, this colourised collection of pictures shows women planing propellers for fighter planes as they built the machines the nation's men would fly into battle

Pictured: A fastidious female worker inspects Mills hand grenades in 1914 in a picture since colourised by Cardiff electrician Roy Leonard in a bid to bring home the reality of war

Pictured: Female workers roll casks of beer across the floor at a brewery in Cheshire, September 1918 as they kept the country going while its men were at war on the continent

Mr Leonard, 57, who has colourised the pictures, said: 'Women played a critical role in the UK's war effort, without them supplying the front line then no war could have been fought. 'I think that's why colouring photos is so useful, people are used to colour all the time these days and tend to think of black and white shots as "art" or something other than reality'. This shot shows female war workers feeding the charcoal kilns used for purifying sugar at the Glebe Sugar Refinery Co., Greenock

Pictured: A welder at work in an aircraft factory in the Midlands, September 1918, a whole decade before they were even able to vote. Cardiff electrician Royston Leonard colourised the photos and said he was shocked by the working conditions revealed in them. 'For the girls working in the armaments factory, it was a very hard job and a lot got ill from the chemicals used in the making of the shells,' he said

Pictured: Workers in a rubber factory in Lancashire, September 1918 as women across the country stepped up to fill the vacancies in vital industry due to the mass conscription of British men

Pictured: Female munitions workers guide 6-inch howitzer shells being lowered to the floor at the National Shell Filling Factory in Chilwell, Nottinghamshire in July 1917. By 1917 munitions factories, which primarily employed women workers, produced 80 per cent of the weapons and shells used by the British. Known as 'canaries' because they had to handle TNT which turned their skin yellow

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8073005/The-working-women-WWI-Captivating-colourised-photographs-female-heroes.html
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