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Chapter 2 Early family life in Streatham Common

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  1952 Streatham Common mum(Estelle) dad (Bill) me and Jacky We lived in a Royal Navy House in Streatham Common near the Ice Rink from when I was born until I was 12years old. It was a large semi detached house in Lewin Road owned by the Royal Naval Association. My dad looked after it.  We lived on the ground floor so had an outhouse,  which dad used as a carpentry workshop, a garden which had a pear tree in it that we used to climb, and an outside loo.  On the middle floor was another flat where a Mr and Mrs Clarke lived and a large planning room with maps and military flags and the only indoor toilet and a bathroom. I don't remember ever using the bathroom! On the top floor lived my friend Gillian and her mum and dad. Her mum died and she and her dad moved.  In our flat we had a living room with a large round table and an inefficient coal heater. Mum once chase us round the table when we were arguing. That was out of character. She was incredibly patient....
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Sins of Omission. Chapter One. South London in the late 1940s.

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I was born in West Norwood at my grandmas house on 26th September 1948. I think I was born at midnight. My mum was a civil servant at the Ministry of Works-yes it does sound like something out of Harry Potter! She had met my dad, a naval officer during the war. But now he wasn't a naval officer because the war had ended and he was either working on the docks or training at Acton to be a telegraphist with Cable and Wireless. But I'm getting ahead of myself. My birth was a shock! I suppose every birth is a shock but mine was for many reasons. My dad was actually married to someone else, to Joan Macanally in Wallasey. He also had another daughter Eileen, born 29th August 1946, but I wasn't to learn this until about 23 years later. So my birth was shameful. It was so shameful that my dads name wasn't on my birth certificate and was added at a later date in the 70s.  I was born at my grandmas in West Norwood, 27 Wolfington Road, in the first floor back bedroom that I think h...
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