大象传媒

My grandmother's name is Muriel Molloy but it hasn't always been that. In fact she's had three. She was born in Littleborough in Lancashire, the daughter of an exceedingly wealthy coal merchant and as such she had never really had a job or worked. It was while she was still in Littlebourough that she met Jack Mingham.
They had known each other for several years, Littleborough being a rather small and insular place and eventually romance blossomed and they decided to get married. By this time the war had started and fabric for wedding dresses was becoming rather scarce so Muriel had hers made from parachute silk. Looking at the photos you would never be able to tell that the dress was made from something so functional, it looks so expensive, but then people back then were a lot more practical than we are today I suppose.
Jack was in the RAF, I think he was a mid-gunner and so they knew that he would be away a lot. They got used to it, he would go away and then he would come back for a while. But one time, when they had been married for about 6 months was different. He was on leave and he announced he had to go again. And she knew, she doesn't know how, but she knew that she wouldn't see him again. What can you do? He couldn't not go on those grounds and so she kissed him goodbye and he left. She never saw him again. Jack was shot down and killed, along with most of his crew, over the Hook of Holland and like so many other women of the time she was sent a formal, bland telegram telling her that her husband of 6 months was dead.
For a while she did nothing. She stayed at home and she grieved. One day she was out in the town and she decided that she couldn't do it anymore. She had to find something to occupy herself and so, on the spur of the moment, Muriel, who had never even held a part time job walked into the nearest recruiting office and signed herself up for the WAAF. And this is how she found herself travelling all over the country, training, working in the secret offices where they charted the position of planes, bunking in with girls from walks of life she had never even come across before.
It's also how she met Vernon Molloy, my grandfather. He died this February but they had 4 children, 9 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren (so far) proving that although there are truly tragic stories out there, they don't all have an unhappy ending.

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