104-year-old Betty Haslam has received a letter from Westmorland and Lonsdale MP Tim Farron commending her for her World War Two service.
Betty lives in Sandside and said that the world has changed 'completely' since she was a young woman but she remains as sharp as ever by doing her own cooking and maintaining a wide circle of friends.
Her neighbour and friend Anne Salisbury, who she goes to the local Methodist church with, wrote a letter to Mr Farron about Betty, who lives in a flat upstairs from her.
Betty, originally from a village near Droitwich, trained as a nurse in Oxford and served in the Second World War with the Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service. She was sent out to Egypt to serve during the Battle of Alamein, and then saw out the war in Palestine.
Betty said that she volunteered because she 'wanted to be useful.' She was made into a Lieutenant at 21 years old treating service men with severe injuries, the memories of which remain with her to this day.
Despite this, her anecdotes from the war were not all negative, saying that she enjoyed living abroad.
"It was a great life, it was a lovely experience," she said.
"I saw a lot of places at government expense when in those days I wouldn't have afforded to go away. I went to the Valley of the Kings and the Pharaohs, I used to go to the Sphynx and the pyramids, I went all around there on a camel. I went to the Dead Sea - I had a photograph of myself reading a newspaper in it because of course you can't sink because of the high concentration of salt."
She married her first husband Leonard Challenor in a 'very nice wedding paid for by the army' at the garrison at Palestine, and her first son was born in Jerusalem.
Sadly, Betty has survived all of her four husbands and two children. She said jokingly that she was 'very cross' about people leaving her, but hopes there will be a great party when she moves on.
In the meantime, Betty enjoys her life with her friends Anne Salisbury, Jeff Holden and the people she knows from the church.
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