Ivy Caswell
American Red Cross Service
Ivy Caswell grew up and lived in Shrewsbury where she found herself working in a munitions factory during the Second World War. Deciding she wanted a change from her daily routine, she visited the local Employment Exchange, who sent her for an interview with the American Red Cross Service at a military hospital near Kidderminster.
Ivy travelled by train for an interview for a secretarial job with the Red Cross detachment at the US army’s 52nd general hospital stationed at Wolverley. She was amazed at the informal interview that followed, and remembers being asked to, "sit down, have a cup of coffee, or would you like a cigarette". Of course she was very relieved and happy afterwards when Kate Bush offered her the job.
A very nervous and shy young Ivy Caswell started work along side her new American colleagues at the hospital in Wolverley. Ivy was lucky to be in given lodgings in Kidderminster with the relations of some family friend’s back in Shrewsbury.
Ivy Caswell shortly after leaving Wolverley with the 52nd general hospital.
It took Ivy a while to settle into her new job of recording and relaying messages between the numerous patients at the hospital and their families back home in the states. Because of the nature of her work, Ivy soon found herself visiting many of the hospital wards where she would chat with the patients. She found it difficult to understand the broad American accents. However she soon became a popular figure on these visits to the wards where she was very often mistaken for an American girl.
At the end of the Second World War, Ivy moved with the 52nd general hospital at Frenchay Park near Bristol, where she stayed for a few weeks before going to Paris with the American Red Cross Service. Ivy stayed in Paris just long enough to visit all the popular sights before being sent first to Viesbaden, Munich and then onto Regensburg.
Ivy continued working for the Red Cross for just another two years before leaving their employment. Today she lives in Shrewsbury, where she has many fond memories of the wonderful and kind people she met.
