My dad was a seaman, an engineer on an international freighter for many years, both on the east coast of Canada and the west coast of Canada. I’m not sure exactly when he met my mom, but it must have been while he was on a shipping route that went up the west coast of North America. He was on a boat called “Pacific Exporter”. (For technical details about the ship, see http://www.clydeships.co.uk/view.php?ref=2511)
My mom lived in New Westminster, Canada, and attended Holy Trinity Anglican Church. On Friday evenings, the Seaman’s Mission at the church would have activities to keep the men from the freighters out of the bars and give them something to do while in port. My mom and her friend, Winnie, would go regularly to these social events. I don’t know which year she first met my dad.
The story went that my dad had a girl in every port, and my mom had a boy on every ship. But I don’t think that was true at all. They seemed to have become serious about each other, though I don’t think all of my mom’s family approved of her choice. However, in 1939, the year that they got married, my mom was 32 and my dad was 28, so they weren’t particularly young.
In the spring of 1939, my mom took a boat which went down the west coast of North America, through the Panama Canal and over to England. She arrived in England on 17 April. She stayed with some friends in Wembley, near London, before heading north to Greenock, Scotland, on 20 April. She stayed with my dad’s sister, Violet, at 45 Newark Street, Greenock, until she got married.
Paddy and Joyce were married on 5 May 1939 in Scotland. My dad now worked in Glasgow as a boiler inspector and they lived there. In September 1939, the Second World War broke out, so whatever they had originally planned about where to live was disrupted by the war.