AS the Battle of the Bulge raged in December 1944, Field Marshal Montgomery delivered a pep talk to the men and women of ’21 Army Group’ in Brussels.

Jean Buniak, 88, from New Wanstead, was a 21-year-old clerk who had volunteered to go overseas and found herself assigned to Monty’s team.

She sat and listened to the inspirational leader as the sound of gunfire echoed in the distance.

“We had no idea whose guns we were listening to. Were they German? We just didn’t know.

“But Montgomery seemed unperturbed. He just said to us ‘They won’t get far, because I’ve set a trap for them!’ and that was that.

“He wasn’t very tall, but he was an impressive man. You sometimes got the impression that he thought it was just him fighting the war and not the entire army.”

Mrs Buniak had only been in Belgium for two months when the Battle of the Bulge began.

After it was won she and the rest of the unit moved into Germany where they became known as the British Army of the Rhine.

“I volunteered for overseas service because I thought it was better to do that then be assigned to something I didn’t want to do.

“I had never been abroad and was quite taken with the idea of going to Egypt.

“It was only when I got on the boat that they told me I would be going to Belgium.

“I suppose I was a little disappointed at the time, but it turned out to be quite an experience.”

Mrs Buniak worked as a clerk in Monty’s team in a building which had been used by the SS.

When she arrived there was still evidence of the torture the Nazis had inflicted on the local population, and Mrs Buniak recalls there was still an atmosphere of fear among those locals who remained in the area.

“They were very kind to us, but there were rumours that some of them had pictures of Hitler on the back of their photos of Churchill which they kept, just in case the Nazis returned.”

Even during the darkest days of the Second World War, Mrs Buniak recalls there were good times.

“We had concerts and dances in the evenings,” she recalled. “I had a boyfriend in the Air Force who I met at one of the dances, but we lost contact after we moved up to Germany.

“At Christmas in 1944 we were all sent presents by Queen Astrid of Belgium to thank us for everything we were doing.

“There were rumours we might get fur coats. In the end I got some soap, which I was very glad of.”

She was not demobbed until 1946, and on her return to Britain married a Ukrainian refugee, settling in Wanstead in the early 50s where she raised five children.

Looking through her archive of photos from the war years, Mrs Buniak said: “I suppose in a strange way I miss those days.

“They were testing times, but there was a real sense that we were all together.”