Many thanks to her son Roger for sharing Jennifer's obit with us.  

“I was a bit of a wimp, really”. Mum’s words a couple of years ago. But if she was, then she was one determined and loyal wimp.

Mum was born in 82 Adelaide Road, Hampstead, and brought up in Gloucester, where she joined her parents, Ernest and Hilda and her older sister Kate - and, in so doing, she made up a four, as she would do many a time over the years at the bridge table. Her parents were both doctors, and they worked from their large family house at 172 Southgate Street.

Mum went to primary school in Gloucester. She remembers being bullied a bit in her school years - probably due to wearing glasses, with a patch over her lazy right eye - and her sister Kate came to the rescue on more than one occasion. But when she made a friend, it was generally a friendship that lasted a lifetime. For example, to the end, she kept in touch with her friend Cynthia. They first met when they were four.

War broke out when Mum was eight years old. At the age of twelve Mum, along with her two dolls Brian and Molly, followed her sister to Sidcot, a Quaker mixed boarding school. In fact, she and Kate very nearly went to America together in the war, to Washington. They had already been to the embassy and got the papers they needed, and a family had even been found for them to go and live with. But not long before they were due to leave, another ship on a similar journey was torpedoed and sank, and they were advised not to travel. 

Mum’s greatest memory of the impact of the war, apart from occasionally finding shrapnel on the street, was that her Dad Ernest, who loved his cars, had to downsize from a Bentley to an Austin 7, to make the doctor’s petrol allowance go further. 

Apparently, Gloucester, being in a valley and often shrouded in mist, escaped much of the bombing, which often carried on instead to Bristol - coincidentally where John, her future husband, and his family were living.

More friends were made - and kept - at Sidcot. In fact, I found out that another name for the Quakers is The Society of Good Friends, and this feels remarkably apt. Because, throughout her life, Mum fostered friendships. Here at Sidcot she made two more friends for life - Rita and Elizabeth. Maybe it was the daily cold bath ritual there that bonded them together. 

Mum then followed in her father’s footsteps to Bristol University, studying French. Her first boyfriend was a campanologist called Jack Worrall, but the bells didn’t ring long for Mum. Nor did they at first with John (Dad) when they met at university. They went to the Sorbonne together in 1950, but it was not until the third year, back in the UK, (when this supposed wimp asked him to the hall dance), that “the bombshell” happened, as she described it. 

After graduating with a First-Class Honours Degree (typically, she said that was luck), Mum went to secretarial college in London. But she fell ill in the Spring of 1953 with TB and lived in a sanatorium; her recovery took the best part of a year. At about the same time, Dad did his National Service. He had hoped to go to Germany and learn a new language, but his hopes were dashed; they were short of a winger for the rugby team in Salisbury, so he was posted there. Which, as it turned out, worked rather well, as it meant he was able to visit Mum in hospital far more often. 

Mum and Dad were married on May 28th, 1955 in Westbury Park, Bristol. By then, Mum’s parents were no longer together - it had not been the happiest marriage - but Ernest still walked Mum down the aisle. They honeymooned in Scotland travelling around in Hilda’s Morris Minor, and soon Dad’s job with the Bristol Steam Navigation Company took them to Antwerp in Belgium. It must have been quite a scary time to move to a new country, a new language, armed only with a long wave radio. But Mum was stronger than she realised; they made friends through work, through the church, through the expat community. 

Gwynn and Lett, Zoe and Bob, Nancy, Richard and Sue, Shirley and Hugh, Wally and Gill.

Mum and Dad sang in the choir together with Bruder Jan. Recorders were played, babies were made. They had a house built in Boechout - incidentally, I went to visit it a couple of months ago. I knocked on the door and explained why I was there. “Oh, you are the English family!” said Christina, the owner. “The neighbour has died now, but every time I spoke to him, he would talk about the English family, and the mother who still writes to him”. 

Jacques and Marguerite, Peggy and John, Bill and Sue, Roger and Vera, Bill and Margaret. 

There are a few events that stick out in the memory from days in Boechout: Mum getting the wheels of her blue Renault 4 stuck in the tram tracks in Antwerp town centre, breaking her ankle falling down the stairs, but generally Mum wasn’t the story; she was the quiet backbone of the family, the facilitator, who would be waiting with paprika crisps after our swimming lessons, who would drive from Belgium to Bristol every half-term and term end, who would just patiently raise her eyes, while five boys looked on smiling as she tried to change out of her swimming costume on the beach under a large towel. “Oh John” she would say; “Oh John”…

Mum and Dad moved back to England in 1980, to Lavenham. It was a really good fit for them. Soon they were very involved there, with clubs and courses and outings. Recorder playing, Scottish dancing, working at Little Hall, Bridge, gardening. 

Joan, Joy, John and Maureen, Margaret, Mary and Neil, Nolene, Jane and Oenone, Sue, John and Yvonne…

I think it’s fair to say that, once you have children, you look on your parents in a new light. It certainly happened to me. Mum brought up four boys, most of the time single-handedly. This suddenly seemed a staggering achievement to me. “I don’t even really like babies”, she added. 

But Mum loved it when the boys got married - finally, there were women to talk to and Mum could quietly walk away from Rugby Special, French cricket, and talk of a rare birdie on the 13th hole. She loved helping Kathy through her pregnancy in Lavenham, reminiscing with Jan about the West Country, talking to Katie about the Church, and even stroking pregnant Hilary’s back as she struggled in the bathroom.

Dad died 21 years ago. And Mum lost her soulmate. A few years later, she even said to me that she was ready now, that she’d had enough. But she was ever-brilliant at keeping busy. 

She moved to Deacon’s Close. French classes, theatre trips, village talks, visiting gardens, more Bridge - once again making up a four. 

Jean, Colin and Beth, Jill, Mel and Laura, Margaret, Andy, Denise, Sally and Paul.

Looking back, you realise how many paths she crossed, how many lives she became a part of. Her Society of Good Friends. So many names - and so many birthdays that she always remembered. She was renowned for remembering birthdays, anniversaries. She was the birthday search engine before Google was invented. 

And she adored the family, the grandchildren, the great grandchildren. Mum loved her knitting and her lace and, all the while, she was the thread that kept our family together. 

The last year was hard on Mum. Having had carers living at home with her for 8 months - huge thanks to many people, especially to Kally - she had to move into a care home and came down to Sussex. She was frustrated, physically less stable, mentally more forgetful, and many a sentence would start with “Oh dear…” But she would still muster a smile, with slightly raised eyebrows, and a visit would raise the spirits, along with a piece of flapjack that was never as good as the one she made. For those who came to Martlet Manor, thank you so much. 

And so the end has come. An un-extraordinarily extraordinary life. Hearing this, she would probably say, “Oh dear”. And she was. Very dear.