IN 1995 the Swindon Advertiser ran a story marking the retirement of police officer Wendy Stevens from Shrivenham.

WPC Stevens had always vowed to give the force precisely 30 years’ work, and it was a vow she kept.

By the time she retired, the officer was working at police GQ in Devizes, and had spent many years patrolling in Swndon.

It wasn’t the first time we interviewed Wendy; in July of 1974 she had featured with other female officers in a story headlined: “You can’t beat being a bobby girl.”

The headline and the article itself offer an insight into a different world where female officers weren’t expected to work nights – although they were on call in case a female officer was needed.

Nor were women paid the same as men, but that would soon change thanks to new legislation.

“In September the girls will get equal pay,” we said.

“Some of the men claim that if they want to be treated as equals they should do late night duty.

“The girls say that they would rather be on full night duty than on call, and that in any case they do some jobs which probably no man could do as well.”

These jobs included dealing with survivors of sexual offences and child abuse.

Wendy said: “Ours is the more distressing job in many ways.

“While they have the horrifying accidents to cope with, for instance, we have the clearing up afterwards.

“This is the sort of job I didn’t think I could ever do. I used to shake.

“But when it comes to it you find you can cope with it.”

We photographed Wendy, who was 31 at the time, on a neighbourhood patrol with colleague Sue Thomas. In 1974 they were among just 36 women in the Wiltshire force, while the men numbered 850.

Wendy had spent six years with CID before returning to uniform duty, and spoke of her job satisfaction.

“You don’t always go knocking on doors because somebody has done something wrong,” she said.

“If you can go back home at the end of the day and say, ‘I have done everything I could possibly do to help,’ that’s something good.”

On her retirement 21 years later, Wendy didn’t shy away from expressing a controversial opinion.

“My own personal view,” she said, “is that equality ruined the police service.

“To the outside world we were always equal – we were all police officers.

“The job has changed a lot during my time and I think the pressures are much higher now.

“You don’t get the time to do things like talk to people in the street.”