VERA WREN, 1930-42

Dates at Homes: 1930-1942

Cottage: Hawthorn

Foster Mother: Miss Douglas

After leaving the homes Miss Douglas asked mum to call her Grandma Douglas and when mum announced she was getting married Grandma Douglas arranged to meet her at Victoria and together they went to buy her wedding dress and all the pieces that were needed to go with it. What I didn't realize until recently was that Grandma Douglas insisted on paying for it all.

A Sussex Son and his Sweetheart

Born in 1925 and initially brought up on the family run farm in Sussex, Norman left school at the outbreak of war without any qualifications. Working his way through a string of jobs, including gardener to Harold Macmillan, the hard winter of 1947 led him to employment at Hildenborough Hall. There he met Vera, slim, attractive and with shoulder length hair which framed a radiant smile. But Vera had grown up in a world of silence in a children’s home in Essex. With limited hearing affecting the development of her speech, a traditional education was considered unsuitable. Therefore, as all the other girls set off for school, Vera cleared away the breakfast dishes, the first in a long list of chores that she would spend her school days completing.

Turning back the pages of time, an insight into past generations of the Wren family sets the scene for the Biography of Norman and Vera Wren. Charting two very different childhoods in 20th Century Britain, it reveals their contrasting experiences of war and follows the couple’s new life together in a marriage that would last for almost 63 years. With rich historical detail, it is a true story of courage, determination and love.

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