Kate Adie with WI Federation chairman at Salisbury City Hall on Monday. 28/10/04THE redoubtable ladies of the Wiltshire Women's Institutes gathered in Salisbury this week to hear from another woman of substance - veteran war reporter Kate Adie.

The journalist regaled the hall with tales from her life and career, from joining the Brownies and acquiring an unfortunate lifelong aversion to uniform, to her battlefield exploits during the first Gulf War, when she was the only female among 43,000 British troops in the Iraqi desert.

Reflecting on the changing roles of women in society and relating it to her own experiences in wartime, she raised plenty of laughs - but never more so than when she was telling of her early experiences of working in local radio.

Her declaration that "there is more going on behind the twitching curtains of a village than at any war zone or major political summit" drew more than a ripple of amused recognition from the assembled audience.

The City Hall was packed to the rafters for the annual meeting, which began with the traditional rendition of the WI anthem, Jerusalem, and featured presentations on the activities of the organisation over the past 12 months and a chance to acknowledge publicly the prizewinners in a host of county-wide competitions and initiatives.