Foreward
As I was when Ted and I first met
Ted and I first met on August 31st 1942. I was WAAF Flight Sergeant (F/Sgt) Admin, stationed at RAF Balloon Centre, Houghton Green, Warrington. The authorities that be decided to close down the Balloon Centre and hand the site over to the RCAF for a Repatriation Depot. Ted was Warrant Officer First Class in charge of (W/O 1 i/c) Stores, and was the first Canadian to arrive at Houghton Green to start taking over the inventory of the Station bit by bit as the balloon-making personnel were posted elsewhere.
An earlier picture of me with Brother-in-law Andrew
As F/Sgt Admin. it was my job to hand over the inventory as it became available, so it turned out that as he was first of the RCAF to arrive, I was the last of the WAAF to leave. We worked together all day, ate together in the Sergeants’ Mess and spent our leisure time together, so it wasn’t surprising that having become interested in each other, our courtship developed at lightning speed. And as Ted was thirty-two, and I thirty, we were both of an age to know what we wanted in a life partner. So we were married on Boxing Day, December 26th 1942, at Deane Church, by Canon Worsley, my friend and Vicar.
For several weeks previous to this, Canon Worsley had been preparing Ted to become a member of the Church of England, as he felt he could function better as a Christian as an active C. of E. member than as a non-active RC. He was received into the Church of England a week before our marriage.
One year later, December 1943, I was living at home with my parents at 47 Lever Edge Lane, Bolton, awaiting the birth of our first child. To fill in the time, I decided to write a potted history of our ‘Love Story’, thinking it might be interesting to read at some later date. That little book was put away in December ’43, and wasn’t opened again until December 1982, just before our Ruby Wedding! Even then, I had to pluck up courage to read it, wondering what on earth I might have written, but I needn’t have worried. It was factual, and I did find it interesting. So I showed it to my children, and they were unanimous in their request for me to write some more, and bring it up to date.
So, for my children and grandchildren, I am going to try to recollect some of the events of the past forty years and put them in this book. Even if it doesn’t turn out to be so interesting after all, it will have served its purpose in giving me something to occupy myself with in my old age (!) now that my eyesight is beginning to fail and I can no longer read as much as I would like, or make pretty things for the children. Ted can’t see to drive at night either, so we’ve become a couple of stay-at-homes, very contented in our cosy little bungalow, but perhaps to other people a little dull.
Barrage Balloon