My Portfolio

Chapter 8 Back to Marsham     We lost dear mum in nineteen fifty seven.  She died from cancer aged sixty four.  I was heartbroken.  Two years later, I married Jean.  A few years after being married, I took my wife Jean and my first born to Marsham to see Queenie...

Killed in Action   I was just about leaving for work the next day, when a telegram arrived.  I didn't want to open it as they were always bad news.  My mind went back to the time when we received one telling us that Joe had been wounded.  I opened it...

 Brothers in Arms               In spring of nineteen forty four, Fred came home on leave, after completing his initial army training.  Just like Joe and Charlie, he had sprung up pretty quickly only more so.  He must have been about six foot two and he seemed to have filled out...

The Army Call Up In the May 1942, Joe received his call-up papers.  He too, just like Charlie, had to join the infantry (PBI) he had to do his initial six weeks training at Tidworth, in Hampshire.  Joe now being in the Rifle Brigade was always kept on his toes, as...

Moving Back to Bethnal Green     All us evacuees were given the choice to go back home, once we had reached the age of fourteen.  Fourteen was the age for leaving school and starting work.  My birthday being in March, meant that it wouldn't be long before I would be...

A Family at War   In the spring the following year, I suppose that I had been evacuated about eight months by then, another kind of evacuation was taking place.  Everybody seemed to be talking about Dunkirk.  Ted Clarke told me about how we were sending boats across the channel, all...

Evacuation to Marsham in Norfolk    We were ending summer nineteen-thirty nine and I was barely eleven years of age. There was talk of war.  Joe took me to a place somewhere along Old Bethnal Green Road, I think it was to one of the few schools that were in that road. ...

Us's & Co.  Bow and Bethnal Green   I have written this story, not in the pretence that I am a writer or even intend to be. But only to record to the best of my knowledge, certain events that have taken place. I have made a point of avoiding any...

PREFACE   “I have written this story, not in the pretence that I am a writer or even intend to be.  But only to record to the best of my knowledge, certain events that have taken place.  I have made a point of avoiding any form of guesswork or inventive material,...