Rustington's Violet reaches 105

Violet, who was born in Henley in 1904 but has lived at Ashdown Lodge nursing home in Wendy Ridge, Rustington, for the last four years, celebrated the amazing milestone on Saturday.

She has lived through two world wars, and during the second, made munitions and carried out skilled engineering tasks, a job that she continued long after the bombs had stopped falling.

Violet "has always been a grafter"

Her son Jim said: "She has been the most caring mother to all of us children, she has never let us down and has worked hard for us.

"She has always been a grafter; when we were growing up she always had two or three jobs to make sure we had everything we needed."

Her first job was as a packer at a Schweppes soft drink factory in Henley, where she met her husband, William, a driver for the firm, when she was 18.

Jim said that during the Second World War the family home was hit by a German bomb.

War-time memories

"I was about four or five, and she was washing me in a tin bath in front of the fire," he said.

"All of a sudden there was a loud crash and the roof just caved in; all the dirt and rubble just filled up the bath. She said I was as black as anything!"

Violet added that the dark days of war were something she would not want to relive.

"I hope I never have to do that again," she said, "they were horrible times.

"I have worked hard all my life, you have to when you have a family, and especially during war time."

Jim added that Violet was well into her 80s when she retired, though by then she was carrying out general factory duties, rather than engineering work.

"She worked at this factory for years and years. The man who run it told me that she was the hardest worker he had ever had, in 40 years."

Violet and William, who died 40 years ago, had four children, William, Sheila, Patricia and Jim, though William and Patricia have sadly died in the last few years.

Violet has six grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

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