Elizabeth Shakespear Nel (née Layton; 14 June 1917 – 30 October 2007) was a personal secretary to Winston Churchill from 1941 to 1945.
After training in air raid precautions, she returned to London, where she obtained work with the Red Cross.
She sat at a silent typewriter where she immediately fell foul of the Prime Minister by making a mistake.
Layton met President Franklin D. Roosevelt while in Washington D.C., with Churchill at the White House.
[1][4] Churchill and his wife Clementine, upon hearing the news, advised them to have four children, reciting together, "One for Mother, one for Father, one for Accidents and one for Increase.
In later years, she was invited back to London on several occasions, including in 1990 for the 50th anniversary of Churchill becoming prime minister.
[6] She also returned in 2005 to join the Queen for the opening of the Churchill museum in the underground Cabinet War Rooms, beneath what is now the Treasury on Horse Guards Road.
[7] After the war, she married South African soldier Frans Nel and settled in Port Elizabeth.