My mother and father in their courting daysMy parents met after the first World War. Throughout the war my father had been interned in Germany, where he had gone at the age of 19 to improve his knowledge of the language. His prison camp was a converted racing stables at Ruhleben, near Berlin, where the 4000 men and boys from all walks of life slept in the horse-boxes. The prisoners succeeded in developing a complete society there during the four years of the war, including their own postal system, and my brother and I have inherited some interesting memorabilia. Sadly, the experience had a profound effect on my father, and left him shy and retiring and reluctant to undertake new ventures.
My mother had wanted to go to university. Illness prevented this initially, and by the time she was better, my grandfather had apparently decided that such an education was not appropriate for her. The result was that she spent the rest of her life trying to find something to exercise her brain, above and beyond being an excellent wife, housekeeper and mother. Sometimes she found something worthwhile, such as Marriage Guidance Counselling, and sometimes she was less successful. My brother and I have very uncomfortable memories of the period when she was reading books about psychology!
My grandfather, who, I believe had himself had a 7-year engagement, insisted that my parents should not marry until my father was earning enough to keep my mother in the same degree of comfort and respectability in which she had grown up. After three years my parents found this too much to bear, and on 11th July 1925 my parents went off one afternoon ostensibly to a tennis tournament, but came back having got married instead! Barbara was 23 and Laurie was 30. This bold move caused much frostiness in my mother’s home, but eventually my grandfather approached my mother and presented her with a single red rose, as a token of his forgivenness.
There was pressure from my other grandparents too: after their marriage my mother and father wanted to emigrate to New Zealand and farm sheep there, but my father’s mother would not accept such a distancing from her only son. With hindsight, I doubt if that way of life would have suited my mother anyway. (I did not feel able to breathe a whisper of protest when my eldest decided to emigrate to Australia – but it’s a different world now.) My father therefore had to find himself some work to do. He had no formal training for anything, having lost the years from 19 to 23 while he was interned in Germany.
My mother had wanted to go to university. Illness prevented this initially, and by the time she was better, my grandfather had apparently decided that such an education was not appropriate for her. The result was that she spent the rest of her life trying to find something to exercise her brain, above and beyond being an excellent wife, housekeeper and mother. Sometimes she found something worthwhile, such as Marriage Guidance Counselling, and sometimes she was less successful. My brother and I have very uncomfortable memories of the period when she was reading books about psychology!
My grandfather, who, I believe had himself had a 7-year engagement, insisted that my parents should not marry until my father was earning enough to keep my mother in the same degree of comfort and respectability in which she had grown up. After three years my parents found this too much to bear, and on 11th July 1925 my parents went off one afternoon ostensibly to a tennis tournament, but came back having got married instead! Barbara was 23 and Laurie was 30. This bold move caused much frostiness in my mother’s home, but eventually my grandfather approached my mother and presented her with a single red rose, as a token of his forgivenness.
There was pressure from my other grandparents too: after their marriage my mother and father wanted to emigrate to New Zealand and farm sheep there, but my father’s mother would not accept such a distancing from her only son. With hindsight, I doubt if that way of life would have suited my mother anyway. (I did not feel able to breathe a whisper of protest when my eldest decided to emigrate to Australia – but it’s a different world now.) My father therefore had to find himself some work to do. He had no formal training for anything, having lost the years from 19 to 23 while he was interned in Germany.
So they bought themselves a garage business in Henley-in-Arden, near Stratford-on-Avon in Warwickshire. There was a corner shop selling spare parts and accessories, with the house over it and petrol pumps out front. Then across the lane running down the back of the house was a big yard and motor repair shed. My dad loved cars, though he was not much of a business man, sad to say. However, he did show himself in the succeeding years to be an excellent mechanic and handyman, with skills which I believe he developed during his years in prison camp. And as he was happiest when working with his hands, this suited him well.
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