When my grandparents asked my mum what their future son-in-law’s family did, she replied that his father had passed away and his mother had something to do with broth-making. My father had joked that she was a brothel keeper, my mother was a little naive.
On the insistence of my mother, he was persuaded to shave off his moustache for the wedding. The result was a white patch on a tanned
face in all the wedding photographs. My father was known as John
or Johnnie, this was common with a surname like Walker and when the priest asked my mother to take Albert William for her lawful wedded
husband, she cried out, “who the hell is Albert William?”
Spending your honeymoon in a tent surrounded by the whole regiment was not a great start. The best man used to ride his motorcycle unannounced into their tent before the morning parade
All officers a
nd their wives – in this case just the one wife – were obliged to eat at the mess with the colonel, this was too much for my mother and after a couple of months she went off to join the navy.