Former army recruit Millie Watkins remembers with fondness the day she first met

HM Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.

Now, as her favourite royal approaches her 100th birthday, she pays tribute to the stalwart who refused to leave her country's side during the Second World War.

Mrs Watkins, 79, of Vale Road, Portslade, is extremely proud of her photographs of the Queen Mother's visit to the ATS Wing in Bagshot Park, Surrey, on July 31, 1944.

At the time Mrs Watkins was stationed at Connaught House, now home to Prince Edward, with 50 other women who were trained by the officers at nearby Sandhurst College.

Mrs Watkins said: "The men came from Sandhurst to train the women to take over from the men, because all the men were being killed."

For the 21-year-old it was a bleak time as hundreds of casualties fell.

"At a time when the war was going down fast, and the country was very low she gave us all a tremendous boost."

She said: "She was lovely then, just as she is now. There aren't many people who live until they are 100 and I admire her because she didn't have to stay here during the war."

Mrs Watkins eventually left Connaught House after the war and married her sweetheart William, who she had met while stationed there.

Now a grandmother of two, she will never forget the pride she felt when the Queen Mother, who at that time was still Queen Elizabeth, came to visit.