Land Girls

- Season 1

(2009)

Halfway through World War Two sensible Joyce, a war orphan with a husband in the R.A.F. and vain Nancy, a reluctant conscript, arrive at the village of Helmstead to work as land girls at Pasture Farm with Frederick Finch and his son Billy. Along with married Annie and her teenaged sister Bea - whom Annie has brought along following an incident back home - they are billeted at Hoxley Hall. Lady Ellen Hoxley, a haughty aristocrat, runs local war charities but her husband Lawrence, a wounded Great War hero, is kind and approachable, inviting everyone to his wife's ...

Bea is pregnant by G.I. Cal, and tells a shocked Annie - who cannot have children herself - that she wants an abortion. Annie dissuades her and, with Billy, confronts Cal in the pub where a fight breaks out. Bullying Home Guard Sergeant Tucker is convinced there is a collaborator on the farm and settles on Nancy, who can speak Italian. He gets Ellen, the Land Girls leader, to spy for him. She is reluctant but searches Nancy's room whereupon Nancy accuses Bea of going through her clothes. Billy tips Nancy off as to Tucker's suspicions.Joyce wins Lord Hoxley's respect ...

As Lawrence and Nancy continue their affair Esther, the Land Girls' supervisor, reluctantly hands Nancy's letters to Tucker, who arrests her as a spy because her father is Italian and her real surname is Morrelli but Lawrence steps in and has her released. Esther finds out that Bea is pregnant but, for the time being, decides to keep her secret. Farmer Finch has a narrow escape when a Rations Officer comes close to arresting him as a black marketeer. Joyce's husband John is less fortunate. He temporarily deserts to see her as he is scared his first bombing mission ...

John returns to his base and is posted on active service. Nancy is going to drive Joyce to see him but cries off when Lawrence tells her that his wife will be away for the weekend and they can spend the time together. Joyce catches them kissing and tells Lady Ellen, who makes Lawrence take Joyce instead. 'Trekkers' - bombed out families - arrive at the farm, looking for work and Annie befriends Adam Blackfield and his sick, shell-shocked mother who get left behind when the other trekkers are forced to leave,following a burglary at Hoxley Hall. She fetches a doctor for...

Billy marries Bea, having convinced himself that she is not using him and they love each other. John Fisher attends the wedding, as does Adam, with whom Annie is now in love and prepared to ask her husband Harry for a divorce. Bea is disapproving, given that her sister's marriage to Harry got them away from an abusive father. Lawrence tells his wife he is leaving her for Nancy. She tries to bribe Nancy with a hundred pounds and tells her Lawrence was not a war hero. However, when an increasingly deranged Tucker accuses Adam of sabotage after a faulty grenade explodes ...