My husband’s mother was Annie Leach.
Annie was born on 9th March 1924 in Crumpsall Hospital, Manchester, Lancs. She weighed 5lb at birth and was the third of five girls born to Herbert Leach and Emma Smith.
In 1939, aged 15, she lived at 38 Pickston Street, Manchester and was a Ring Doffer in a cotton mill. A doffer is someone who removes ("doffs") bobbins, pirns or spindles holding spun fibre such as cotton or wool from a spinning frame and replaces them with empty ones.
Her address in 1951 was 65 Rochdale Road, Blackley, Lancs.
On 29th August 1951 she set sail from Southampton on the New Australia bound for Melbourne. Unbeknownst to him she encountered her future husband on the crossing when she was being seasick and he enquired after her health. She was reticent to talk as she had taken her teeth out. They were both moving to Australia as ‘£10 Poms’ for a better life.
In 1954 she was working as a spinner and her address was 18 Cardigan Street, Carlton South, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Annie married Charles Pitt on 24th December 1955 at St Paul’s Cathedral, Melbourne, Australia and they set up home at 3 Reid Court, Dandenong. They had 2 children, the younger being my husband.
The family moved to 184 Great South Road, Ngaruawahia, New Zealand and then returned to the UK in 1965.
The family lived first at Clitheroe Court, Rayners Lane, Middx and in 1969 moved to 19 Glebelands Ave, Newbury Park, Essex.
Annie worked at Newbury Park Station.
Charles died in 1986 and Annie moved first to Manchester and then to Braintree, Essex.
She died from Alzheimer’s disease in Park View Nursing Home, Witham, Essex on 4th March 2018.
Her ashes were scattered with her husband's at the CIty of London Cemetery.
Comments