moving boxes

yes today my exercise has been moving boxes again and I am slowly getting ready for my guest


and now there is a clear path to the LIDLSCOPE
and the window

but then I got distracted :-

because I found a box of letters of condolence to my mother from October 1942
David was her nickname for my father Ordinary Seaman A H Watkins
who went down with HMS Somali 24/09/1942

this letter was from Mrs Joyce Loft whom I remember lodging at 220 Widney Lane with the Wilkes, when her husband was flying out of RAF Gaydon or the training unit, at Wellsbourne Mountford

No 22 OTU flying training with Wellington bombers
I was taken to see one which had crashed in an orchard at Wellsbourne

they were canadians and he died in 1944
Their little boy Christopher Loft later drowned, but is immortal in my memory as he coined the phrase "HORRID LITTLE CABBAGES" to describe brussel sprouts

Name:	LOFT, LESLIE GEORGE
Initials:	L G
Nationality:	United Kingdom
Rank:	Flight Lieutenant
Regiment:	Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve
Unit Text:	415 (R.C.A.F.) Sqdn.
Age:	36
Date of Death:	09/04/1944
Service No:	104798
Additional information:	Son of Paymr. Lieut.-Comdr. B. G. Loft, R.N., and Lillian May Loft; husband of Joyce Margaret Loft, of Guildford, Surrey.
Casualty Type:	Commonwealth War Dead
Grave/Memorial Reference:	Plot 1. Row B. Grave 10.
Cemetery:	WEST THORNEY (ST. NICHOLAS) CHURCHYARD

this picture brought happier memories

of my grandfather who died one year before I was born
Alfred Henry Watkins b: 13 AUG 1862 in Llanvair Kilgeddin,


My beloved granny Blanche Eveline Watkins - nee Jones , kept it on her dressing table at the Haven, Monmouth Road, Usk






the back of the picture was blank so I pencilled his name and dates on it











Dec 21 1900
is a new date to me and is possibly of their engagement
because they were married in the June quarter of 1901

this was my photo set up using the Sony Handycam