P Burton

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Birthplace County Durham Washington England

Biography

‘Mrs Burton of Sunderland remembers: I later worked at Gretna Green and the winter (1917) was the coldest I ever remember. In our hostel our bottles of milk were just blocks of ice, and our towels had to be heated before we could use them, so you can guess what it was like working outside where I was loading trucks. King George and Queen Mary visited our factory and we gor new uniforms for the occasion.’ – G Routledge, Gretna’s Secret War, (Bookcase, 1999) p. 55.
‘Emily Davies and Ethel Burnett were daughters of Sunderland shipyard workers, while Mrs. P. Burton’s father was a Durham miner.’ – Chris Brader, Timbertown Girls, (PhD Thesis, University of Warwick), p. 23.
‘Mrs. Burton, from Newcastle, didn’t like being with Welsh girls, who insisted on speaking in their own language when together: ‘We didn’t like it because we knew they could speak English.’ — Chris Brader, Timbertown Girls, (PhD Thesis, University of Warwick), p. 26-7.
‘Mrs. P. Burton, from Washington, Co. Durham, also cited the wages as an attraction. She mentioned the wartime patriotic appeal to females as a further reason.’ — Chris Brader, Timbertown Girls, (PhD Thesis, University of Warwick), p. 31.
‘Mrs P. Burton sent part of her wages home to her mother in Washington, Co. Durham. Her father was a colliery worker and her two brothers had enlisted in the Army.’ — Chris Brader, Timbertown Girls, (PhD Thesis, University of Warwick), p. 105.
- (Note: it appears that much of Chris Brader’s information on Mrs Burton comes from her interview that is kept at the Liddle archives: Liddle Archive, University of Leeds, Item 25, Mrs. Burton.)