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I met Jack before the war began, he lived in Willington and I lived in Crook, and we were due to get married in the Easter of 1939 but he got called up and the wedding was delayed. We managed with some help to obtain a special licence and eventually got married in August of that year. I worked at a bakery at that time and made my own wedding cake ready for the Easter ceremony, but it then had to be stored until we finally married.

After I worked in the bakery I worked in the munitions factory at Aycliffe. I was an Aycliffe Angel! I had a problem though - the powder used for the bullets made me ill most of the time. Each night I travelled home I had to put my head out of the train window to be sick. As I was so ill I was eventually given my release papers. But I was called in front of a committee for not reporting for work — there was one man who was nasty and asking why I hadn’t been going to the factory. I was so angry that I threw down my official release papers in front of him and walked out. I heard nothing more from ‘the Committee’.

Jack was in the Middle East and fought at El Alamein. He was shot in the arm and was sent to Alexandra in Egypt to recover. When he was considered well enough Jack was sent to Sicily and was shot by a sniper in the leg and then was back in hospital to recuperate for the second time!

Jack was back on the front line again when he was sufficiently recovered. He was in Cannes, France for the D-Day landings and his friend was blown up beside him. Jack was unconscious from that moment and knew nothing more until he woke up in Alderhay hospital, England. His third lucky escape!

One of the things that concerned Jack was that because he was injured and hospitalised he had lost all the presents he had bought me in his time abroad.

My husband was sent to a convalescent place in Burnley, where I tried to visit him, but he wasn’t allowed out. So I had travelled all that way on my own to a strange place desperate to spend time with Jack to be so disappointed. When Jack came home we lived with his family and his younger brother was told not to frighten him as he had suffered what was then known as shell shock. I remember once we went to the pictures and there was a war film on. When a ship was bombed in the film the noise sent Jack into shock. He shook so much that I had trouble getting him out of the cinema and then home. It was a frightening experience. This shell shock affected Jack for many years.

Jack was in the Seaforth Highlanders from 1939 to 1946. This no longer exists, as some regiments were dropped and others amalgamated after the war. He was stationed in a place called Strathpeffer, a spa town near to Dingwall. The place was built up by the soldiers while they were there, including a cinema and a dance hall.

We were a very close couple and had 2 daughters who adored their father. Jack died in the 1980’s and the whole family still miss him.

Disclaimer: Story submitted by Angela Stobbart at Willington library on behalf of Ivy Maddison

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