Kathleen was born on 21/8/1893 at Keele in Staffordshire to Matthew and Ann/Annie Darlington. Matthew was at different times a farmer in Staffordshire and a hotel proprieter in Llandrillo-yn-Rhos. Kathleen was the youngest of 8 children with 3 sisters and 4 brothers.
Having enrolled in 1913 on 11/5/1917 Kathleen was selected for the Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) which was a voluntary unit of civilians providing nursing care for military personnel in the United Kingdom and various other countries in the British Empire. She was posted to the Berrington Military Hospital (formerly Cross Houses (The Union) Work Houses at Atcham Shrewsbury) from 23/5/1917 to 23/12/1917 and Park Hall Military Hospital Oswestry from 20/11/1918 to May 1919. She also worked for the VAD for 3 months at Stafford General Infirmary. Her VAD record shows her character and work to have been “very good”.
Kathleen married Richard L Thomas in Stafford in 1931 but was widowed the same year.
By 1939 the widowed Kathleen was living with her older sister Hannah in Stafford. She was registered as performing “unpaid domestic duties” but continuing her voluntary work as a Special Constable with the Staffordshire County Constabulary. She married George Leigh in Stafford in 1946.
Kathleen died in 1980 in Chatham in Kent age 87.