By Hugo Gye PUBLISHED: 07:31 EST, 3 January 2014 | UPDATED: 08:13 EST, 3 January 2014 Two friends who served together during the Second World War have been reunited 70 years later after a chance encounter revealed they were living just 12 miles from each other. Bessie Thomas and Millie Titshall were radar operators for the WAAF when they were both teenagers, and became close friends serving at a station in Inverness. However, they lost touch towards the end of the war - and although they tried to contact each other during the following decades, they never managed to get in touch.
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Bessie Thomas, 89, and Millie Titshall, 90, served together as teenagers
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The close friends lost touch after the war and never saw each other again
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But Mrs Thomas responded to a newspaper ad appealing for information
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She didn't recognise Mrs Titshall's name because she has since married - but it soon emerged the pair lived 12 miles apart in County Durham
The day of the pair's first conversation happened to be Mrs @placeholder's 90th birthday, and came 70 years after they had last seen each other.