The bus was carrying 49 mostly teenage girls. It pulled up in front of Blamey barracks at Kapooka in New South Wales. The girls wrestled their suitcases off the bus. “We had to march in formation, which we didn’t know how to do, along narrow pathways, some of us wearing dresses and high heels,” says Eleanor Rush. “We got marched down to the mess hall for our first meal and the whole place went silent. In marched 49 women and there were a thousand men, recruits, having their dinner.”
It was “daunting”, says Noela Whitmore. On the bus, a corporal had already screamed at them, “You are now members of the Australian regular army. From now on you’ll refer to me as corporal. Is that clear?” his voice rising on the word “clear”.
