大象传媒

About a year ago my interest in genealogy grew when I found some members of my maternal grandfather's family on Genes Reunited.

This got me talking to my Mum about her father's part in the war as an officer in the Royal Navy, and the particularly dangerous work he did in East Anglia, laying mines at the beginning of the war and clearing them from the beaches at the end in 1945.

I also realised that my Mum's memories were also fascinating, and asked her to give me more details of the stories I remember her telling me when I was a child. I wanted to record these stories for myself and the rest of our family, as my Mum is now 80 years old. She was very keen to do this, as she always regretted not recording her father's stories of his Naval career through both the first and second World Wars.

I'm keen to hear from anyone who lived in the same areas as my Mum during the war - West Byfleet, Ledbury, Brighton, or the places where my Granddad worked - the Abberton reservoir and the Suffolk coast, particularly Aldeburgh.