Chief Commander Olga Hermione Violet Mosley Mayne OBE, Auxilliary Territorial Service

In 1901 Olga Mayne was living with her parents, Major Mosley Mayne, 3rd Bombay Light Cavalry, and Anna Maria (nee Wilkinson), at 1 Abbey Gardens, Kings Road, Richmond, Surrey. She was 16 years old at the time and was born in Southsea, Hampshire.

WW1 British Army Ambulance

Olga drove ambulances in East Anglia during WW1 and later went to Italy where she stayed for three years.

O.B.E.

When asked she said she THOUGHT she got her OBE during WW1.

She formed the Sussex Battalion of the ATS when the force was first mooted in the late 1930s

Olga Mayne

Whilst she was stationed at Oadby Racecourse she died of pneumonia. She requested to be buried in a country churchyard away from any town and so was taken to Great Glen as the nearest country churchyard. The ATS lined a large part of the funeral route and Princess Mary sent a representative to the funeral as it was the first ever military funeral for a member of the ATS. Olga's home was at Risborough Green Sussex although between the wars she had lived in Austria and beside Lake Como. Her Christian names were chosen by the children in the family when she was born and the brother who chose Violet did so because of the colour of her eyes as she had amethyst coloured eyes, which is unusual, and a natural white streak in her dark hair.

Olga's Gravestone
Great Glen

Her gravestone reads:-
Chief Commander/Olga Hermione Violet/ Mosley Mayne/ Aux Territorial Service/ 29th July 1942/ Death only interrupts/ not destroys and sets/the seal of eternity on all/ the lovely things of life.

Olga’s elder sister, Gladys, wrote a letter to a mutual friend of herself and Olga on Sunday 2nd August 1942 which was the day after the funeral. In it she described the funeral in great detail.

‘‘... the service started at 2.00pm. The coffin was covered with the Union Jack and her cap and belt were on it. There was a large guard of ATS girls – and The Director, Jean Knox, Controller of the ATS and the Deputy Director, had both come from London to be her pall bearers and 4 other officers of the ATS of high rank had come too to make the 6 pall bearers. The service was choral and the Brigadier and many officers (Army) were in church. Six men of the Leicestershire Regiment carried her coffin down the church.......They laid the coffin in a military vehicle with all the official wreaths.... and then began the drive of six miles out to the little village of Great Glen where her grave had been chosen......in a lovely serene churchyard and under a great fir tree. A despatch rider went first – then two army vans filled with the ATS Guard of Honour – then the military carriage with the coffin and then our car followed by the others. Along the route at intervals stood single rows of ATS girls who had volunteered and willingly given up their Saturday afternoon – as she passed they all saluted.
About 400 yards from the churchyard entrance we were met by the band of the Leicestershire Regiment – then a long and very slow procession was formed, and the Director, Jean Knox and the other pall bearers marched beside her coffin carrying their wreaths while the band played a lament with muffled drums. At the grave, which had been lined with flowers a bugler sounded The Last Post and the Reveille...

ATS Badge

The Times Saturday August 1st 1942 –
Chief Commander OHVM Mayne

Chief Commander Olga HVM Mayne, OBE, ATS, whose death on active service has been announced, volunteered for work in the ATS in the early days of it’s foundation in 1938. She was one of the first women to be enrolled in Sussex when the first of the ATS officers had the responsibility and privilege of forming the nucleus of the ATS army of today. In the last war she went to the British base in Italy in 1917, where she organised the Soldiers’ Club and canteen until 1920. She was awarded the OBE for her services in 1918. The ATS have lost not only a good officer, but one whose personality and charm will always be remembered by all who served with her in the ATS. She was the second daughter of the late Major Mosley Mayne, 3rd Bombay Light Cavalry.