It's a milestone birthday for one Hatfield care home resident this Thursday.

Gladys Carter, nee Lancaster, will be celebrating her 100th birthday at Acacias Mews in the town, where she has lived since last year.

Gladys, known as "Pat" to her friends, was born on June 17 1921 in Tadcaster, Yorkshire.

Her mother died when she was just three years old, and her father remarried so her family for her formative years consisted of one sister, Evelyn, and two stepbrothers.

During the war she drove ambulances and ammunition lorries as a member of the ATS.

She met her husband, Reg, and married on September 28 1945 in Tadcaster.

The couple went on to have two daughters, Patricia in 1947 and Barbara in 1950, and lived in Battersea in London until their retirement.

After Reg died, Gladys moved to WGC to be near her daughter Pat and lived in a warden controlled flat at Woodside House, in Bridge Road, becoming a regular member of the local United Reformed Church.

Following a fall in 2020 she moved for respite and eventually permanently to a residential home just in time for the first Covid lockdown.

Acacia Mews home manager Julie Ricci said they are putting on a socially-distanced 1940s tea party to mark her big day: "She is very proud of time as an ambulance driver in the Second World War, taking injured patients to hospital. On occasions she would be asked to drive a bombs on the back on a lorry which was then taken to the airport. And always comments that she had to drive like hell.

"She is a very independent sociable lady, who still enjoys a cup of Yorkshire Tea, and is very proud of her routes from Tadcaster, Yorkshire. Pat enjoys a good natter and the company of others.

"We are very much looking forward to a fulfilled afternoon with her fellow residents and close family."