Beyond the Sea: A Wren at War

Love, duty and true-life adventure in the shadow of the Second World War

Christian Lamb is one of the last surviving Wren Officers to have served her country throughout the whole of WW2.

Having joined the Women’s Royal Naval Service at nineteen, she quickly rose through the ranks, serving at a degaussing range before being posted to Operations and Radar in Belfast. There she joined the team tracking the movements of the Royal Navy and the dreaded Kriegsmarine in the Battle of the Atlantic, the biggest sea battle of the war.

Plotting the progress of the Royal Navy’s ships became an intensely personal mission for Christian when her fiance John’s ship HMS Oribi was surrounded by a U Boat ‘wolf pack’. Though her colleagues tried to persuade her to cut short her shift, Christian insisted on remaining at her post to mark Oribi’s progress as the terrifying attack unfolded. Thankfully, HMS Oribi and John made it to shore.

Newly married, Christian was next posted to a vital role back in London COHQ. In a basement office in Whitehall, she worked on top secret maps for the D Day landings, while Winston Churchill paced the floor upstairs.

Now in her 101st year, Christian is keen to share her remembrances of duty, danger, love and marriage in war before they are beyond living memory.