Bather was born in Winchester, the second of two children born to Shropshire-born Arthur George Bather and Sheffield-born mother Lilian Dundas Firth, who had married in August 1895,[1] a steel-manufacturer's daughter, and their only daughter.
On 14 January 1928, she was fined £3 with 30 shillings costs for dangerous driving after a collision with a motorcyclist at West End.
On 5 April 1939, she joined the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) with the rank of company assistant (equivalent to pilot officer in the RAF, the lowest commissioned officer rank)[4] and was already living at RAF Odiham by the time of the 1939 Register that September.
[5] She served in Bomber Command, rising to be senior staff officer in charge of WAAFs, and also went to Canada in 1941 to help set up the Canadian Women's Auxiliary Air Force.
Bather attempted to "feminise" the female officers, redesigning the uniform in 1946 and allowing policewomen to wear makeup on duty.