Ms Butler has been researching a book on the Australian Women's Land Army and came to Leeton to gain a better understanding of the activities of the women involved and how they have been honoured here in Leeton.

She was a little disappointed.

The Australian Women's Land Army was formed in 1942 as a response to a labour crisis on farms in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area.

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The scheme provided female farm labour to replace the men who had joined the war effort.

Young city girls, normally around 18 years of age, volunteered their service to help out and many ended up in the Leeton area.

Untrained and innocent of rural life, the women found themselves camped in very ordinary circumstances at the Leeton Showground, subject to army style discipline, while working from dawn to dusk in the heat, performing back breaking jobs like ploughing and picking fruit.

Some farmers doubted the girl's ability with a Murrumbidgee Irrigator (MI) article in 1942 questioning how the girls would be able to "... stand up to the arduous orchard work..."

A Mr Poulsen, around the same time, was reported to say that "... it hurt him to watch them work..."

Meantime, a Mr C Crowe reported that the standard of the women's work was better then the men of the previous year.

The work performed by the women soon brought nation-wide attention and in January 1943, the Director General of Agriculture, Mr Bulock declared that the effort of the women had saved the apricot harvest in the Leeton Shire area.

He added "... their work is one of the outstanding features of the land war effort in the Leeton-Yanco-Griffith area".

Journalist, RK Gerrand of the Melbourne Herald, went even further and in an article titled "Miracle on the Murrumbidgee" in January 1944, waxing lyrical about the Murrumbidgee irrigation settlement "... as fine a show of Australia at war as you could find anywhere in the Commonwealth".

Two of the women who came to the Leeton area were Peggy Williams (Feast) and Ursula Garner. Also three others in Joan Dilorenzo (O'Keefe), Linda Piltz (Tailby) and Jess Dare, who went on to marry local boys and stay in the area.

Peggy commented "we just got stuck in. Nobody complained. Everyone helped each other without anyone giving orders. The spirit was really amazing. We had country women among us, and luckily, they taught us the basics. Their advice saved us from snakebite and chemical poisoning".

Ursula arrived in Leeton on December 6, 1942 in 106-degree heat and had to carry her cases and bedding to the cannery dormitories and would later work on properties at Merungle Hill and Wamoon.

She reported some of the girls caught the next train home.

When the war ended, most of the women returned to their previous lives and over the years their valuable role in the war became a memory.

In 1972, trees were planted at the Leeton Showground for the people of Leeton by the Australian Women's Army and a plaque on a cairn established, but that too faded from memory.

When Ronna Butler visited Leeton, she had difficulty finding the cairn behind clumps of trees and bushes and was disappointed the efforts of the Australian Women's Land Army was not better celebrated in our shire.

The Leeton Family and Local History Society Inc agree with that sentiment and, in 2022, are working towards re-establishing a more fitting tribute to the girls performed.

The society is searching for any information from families of Land Army women in order to assist with this tribute.

Acknowledgements:

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