Officers on duty at Bladon in 1965 – Sergeant Margaret McCue, left, with, left to right, WPCs Mavis Slaymaker, Lynne Hedges and Pat Harris.
ANOTHER picture of the Bladon Beat has come to light. After wartime leader Sir Winston Churchill was buried at Bladon in 1965, thousands of people descended on the village to see his grave, leading to severe traffic congestion, particularly at weekends.
Oxfordshire Police set up a special team of male officers to tackle the problem.
But Chief Constable David Holdsworth decided women officers should share the burden, taking over the duties one weekend a month.
After we published two pictures of the women officers (Memory Lane, March 12), one of them, Mavis Slaymaker, now Mavis Noble, sent in the photo, left, of four of them on their first Sunday of duty.
Their motto was “courtesy, consideration and cheerfulness”.
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