The not-so-weaker sex

Women turned their hands to a great many new tasks during the war and proved their capabilities, especially in jobs considered too difficult for the 'weaker' sex. Women took on jobs in shipyards, the docks and railway workshops. Hitler, on the other hand, was reluctant to recruit women to work in industry in large numbers. Nazi thinking only allowed German women a stereotyped role as carers for children and cookers of meals - not riveters and lathe operators. This attitude severely held back German production.

One woman was in no doubt about the benefits of the war:

'To be quite honest the war was the best thing that ever happened to us. My generation had been taught to do as we were told. At work you did exactly as your boss told you and you went home to do exactly what your husband told you. The war changed all that. The war made me stand on my own two feet.'

Neil Demarco: The era of the Second World War; Oxford University Press, 1993/2000, page 64