National Service And Finding My Wife!

A Memory of West Kirby.

On 3rd of June 1953 I arrived at West Kirby by steam train with a good many other RAF recruits who had been brought to the town to do their recruit training at Royal Air Force Recruit Training School West Kirby located at Larton, Wirral, Cheshire outside the town to the North East.

My home for the following six weeks was Hut D31 Churchill Squadron. By and large for me it was relatively a good experience, I was an athlete and quickly roped into the camp team and Physical Training Squad which was being trained for a Special Physical Training Display at the Royal Liverpool Show that was held in a large park at Wavertree, Liverpool, so I escaped some of the square bashing.

On a weekend I would walk into the town and spent hours exploring the surrounding open spaces, My favourite spot was Grange Hill from where I saw my first sun-set which never happened in my home town as we could not see the skyline.

As I was a Methodist I attended services at Westbourne Road Methodist Church. A coach ran from the camp and back. My first attendance was on the evening of Sunday 7th June. It was their Sunday School Anniversary and two teenage girls sang a duet one with red hair the other a little shorter with fair hair. We were made very welcome there and there was an after-church social for us and the young people where we able to meet and socialise over a cup of tea and a biscuit. This function was presided over by John Bernstein a short dapper man with glasses.

The following Sunday I walked into town for the morning service and after had my lunch at a Café on Banks Road which I think may have been called the "Thistle" but it has for the moment slipped my memory!

At the evening church social I sat with a RAF lad called Brian Twaites and behind a two other RAF boys I did not know who were sitting with two of the lasses from the church. These two lads finished there six weeks after we had been there for three weeks. And for the remainder of our stay I and my RAF mate Brian found ourselves sitting with the same two girls who we walked home after on our way back to camp their names were Sonja and Sylvia I was walking with Sonja.

I was sad to leave West Kirby as I loved the area and would have liked more time to have explored but it was not on the cards at that time. On my last Friday after the passing out parade I went for a last look round the town.

On my way back to the camp I bumped into Sylvia at the foot of Grange Road Hill where the Carpenters Lane footpath comes out opposite Darmond's Greens. She was on her way home from her singing lessons with Mrs Sandford who lived in a large house with her companion Miss Hughes up Grosvenor Avenue the second road in off Carpenters Lane. I had used this path on several occasions to reach Ashton Park which I found to be beautiful and peaceful.

I joined her and we walked along Darmond's Green and up Leigh Road and onto Grange Hill which we climbed up one side then over the top and down the other side to the top of Raeburn Avenue. We said goodbye at her gate and I continued down the road turning right into Greenbank Road past the shops and through Gilroy Road until back onto the Saughall Massie Road which ran past the camp.

Saturday morning 18th July 1953 I set off for home and for some leave before returning to the RAF.

On the Wednesday 8th of August 1953 I left Grays for RAF Sutton on Hull the Training School at that time for members of the RAF Fire and Rescue Service.

In the NAFFI the following day after kitting out I met, much to the surprise both of us, the lad who had sat in front of me at Westbourne Road Methodist Church at West Kirby. During the course of our chat I learnt that his name was George Marsdon and it turned out he was writing to Sylvia Newton the fair-haired girl and he gave me her address so I could write and get her friend Sonja's address.

To cut a long story short George, Sylvia and Sonja became my pen-friends along with other young people I had met that summer and we exchanged letters for the rest of my three-years service.

When my military service ended I applied for a job as a Fireman to a number of Civilian Fire Services and Aerodromes. All except the Cheshire County acknowledged my application but had no vacancies. I went West Kirby having arranged to stay at Sylvia's home for the interview, although I had a good interview I did not get a job as I was to short. I decided settle at West Kirby as I had made some very good friends there. I rented an apartment, two rooms and a small kitchen with a shared bathroom at 8 Church Road.

As the days passed my love for Sylvia grew and led to marriage at Westbourne Road Methodist Church on 22 March 1958 we set up home in my flat at West Kirby.

At the suggestion of one of the leaders of the Sunday School at Westbourne Road I applied for employment with British Rail and was successfully granted an interview which I passed commencing at Birkenhead Goods then via the Movements Control organisation which took us via Chester, Sale, Crewe, to Weston-Super-Mare in 1971, where after a further career move in 1979 as a full-time Trade Union official to Harrow returning 2001.

We miss our walks over Grange and Caldy Hill and into the wider countryside around the Wirral and we love the old photos that show some of the places we remember.

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