I will call them Bessie and Rob. It would have been in June 1943 when they were together. She was a WAAF and he was a Canadian Airman. Both young and sadly, now both dead. Bessie's mother had died just over a year ago, 1942, March. So she will have been vulnerable, lonely and away from home. That is, what ever home was then.
So, she met this blond, good looking Canadian, bliss. But like many a young woman then, she got pregnant! March 1944, she had her baby.
Yes, it was me.
In those days, it was shocking for someone to have a baby out of wedlock. Some mothers' kept them though. Very brave and you found out very quickly, who your friends were! The mothers' that put their babies up for adoption must have missed them every day of their lives. There will be 60+ people all over the world that either, don't know their biological parents, might not have know they had been adopted.
The young ladies of those days could be in their 80's now. Some a little bit younger.
Bessie married an English man in 1946. They had to adopt me. I have the papers yet.
My sister was born in 1948 and our family settled down.
When Bessie died in the 70’s, dad asked me if I knew that Bessie was my real mum. I said yes. But it made me think. So I asked sister if she knew what he meant.
You see, when I was about fourteen, my mum had to tell me that she had given birth to me before she was married. I thought that dad had come home from the war and made an honest woman out of her. I never asked questions, none at all. If mum hadn’t told me, my Godmother would have had told me as Godmother felt I had a right to know.
I know, when mum told me this, she was really embarrassed. She maybe didn’t want me to know really or just didn’t know HOW to tell me.
As sister and I grew up, met boys etc, mum used to tell us about the handsome Canadian she used to go out with. Told us his name too. Funny how I remembered it. So after she died, I decided to try and find Rob. Oh yes, I had asked dad and he said he didn’t know who my biological father was.
When dad died, I tried even harder. No success though, none at all.
Many years later, my boys were all grown up and I was a granny I got a computer and also the Internet. Doors opened.
To this day I don’t know how I did it but wrote to some place and received some papers about Rob. Where he used to live, and the names of his parents also. Photos show we had a look of each other. My friends say, he HAS to be my father as we looked alike. More so when I was a child.
Through a friend of mine, I got the unusual name of a woman I thought was his daughter. She was easy to trace, not many with a name like hers I can tell you.
This woman turned out to be Rob’s step-daughter. He was single when he was over here. He went back home and married a woman with two children, a girl and a boy. Then they had a baby boy from that marriage. He will be my half brother, Ric.
I talked to Ric, nice chap he sounded on the phone. He said he would write back to me if I wrote to him. I was so happy, I found out how Rob had died and a few other things too. That was about three years or so now, if not more. Since then, nothing, not a thing.
You see I made the mistake of telling Ric’s half sister that I thought Rob knew my mum was having a baby. Oh dear, cat among pigeons or what? No way would he not have told his new family. Actually, I disagree but that’s not the point. He may well have told his wife I suppose, that’s if he DID know. But the rest of the family???
Dunno.