August 1945 was, of course, the last year of the war. It had been expected to take at least another 6 months to defeat the Japanese. Whilst the Americans were providing the bulk of the forces, Britain was fighting through SE Asia and it was planned to switch forces and material to that front.
The atomic bombs that ended the war were a complete surprise to the public and most of the government. Possibly the prime minister and a few others knew what was about to be deployed but it was one of the most closely guarded secrets in the war.
Despite the end of the fighting, the economic struggle was set to continue for many years. America had provided huge amounts of support under a scheme called lend-lease. Their assistance came at a price and the bill had to be repaid. The final payment, of $83.5 million, was made in 2006 (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/6215847.stm)
Format of the Dig for Victory Guide
The original August 1945 Dig for Victory wartime growing leaflet consisted of 8 pages which I have followed by reproducing the content onto separate pages.
Where an article runs onto two pages these have sometimes been combined into one page for readability or the trailing content moved onto the relevant page.
Where I feel it helpful, I’ve annotated the information. To make annotations obvious, they are coloured green.
