Letter from Donald West to me (Michael West) on 2nd August 2004.

Partially Transcribed (limited to family History).

[...]

But straight on to the genealogy. I'm afraid my side of the family tree is not very extensive. Here's what I can remember at the moment. There may be a few more details buried in the attic in Keighley.

On my mother's side: James Harrower Crockett (or Crockatt - I'm not entirely sure of the spelling) was killed in World War I, possibly in 1916, not 1917. He was said to be a sniper.  Before that he worked on the railways (North British Rail).  He and Ellen (or Helen, as I remember it) certainly lived in Culross for a while, since I have (somewhere) two framed certificates commemorating them joining the Culross Band of Hope, a temperance organisation. (This seems a little ironic since in later life my Grandmother was one of those people who like to keep a bottle of brandy on the go "for medicinal purposes.") At some point they moved to Houston, near Paisley, but I don't know whether this was before or after James was killed. At that time Houston was a village and fairly rural - probably now just a suburb.  My mother used to speak of 'The Laird' - the Scots equivalent of the Squire.  My mother, Janet (always known as Jenny) and her younger sister Margaret (always known as Peggy) certainly grew up there and may have been born there.  Peggy was in fact born posthumously, so the date of her birth would give some idea of James' death.  They lived in Houston until about 1937 (Peggy attended Art School in Glasgow) then moved to Stafford, employment in Scotland still being scarce. There Jenny met Walter Irving West (always known as Irving - he disliked his first name) and married him in 1939.  My brother Frank was born in 1942 and I came along in 1945.  
In 1946 the family moved to Horsforth, near Leeds, then in 1947 or 48 to Park Road in Bingley.  Jenny died in 1976, Irving and Peggy in 19886, Grandmother Helen having gone in the early 70s (I think).  Helen had two sisters who emigrated to Canada, one or both ending up on Prince Edward Island.  One I never met, but Jean came over for a couple of visits (you may even remember her yourself).  I don't know much about them, but there was at least one son, Claude, so there may be some remote cousin around.  Anyway, neighbours of my Great Aunt(s) in PE Island were the Heckberts, and Son Earl Heckbert being over here in the war with the Canadian Army (about 1944) came to call on the Crockatts, met and married Peggy.  (so you can boast, as I do, that there used to be an Early in the family.)  Unfortunately Earl had a hard time in the Italian campaign and developed TB, from which he died in 1947 or 48.  Bad luck, since it was just before an effective treatment was developed.  Helen and Peggy followed Jenny and Irving north in about 1950 and lived in Sandbeds (on the Keighley side of Crossflats) for five years or so, then moved to Taunton, Somerset, for another five years, finally coming back to the bungalow in Gilstead which you probably remember.  THey both had widows pensions and Peggy worked in various town planning departments.

On my father's side there's rather a shortage of relatives.  Irving came from Northamptonshire or thereabouts - probably kettering, possibly Bedford.  His father was Walter West, middle name (if any) unknown.  His mother's names I don't know at all.  There's a problem here in that Walter was illegitimate, and his mother apparently refused to identify the father.  This may have been because she thought it was nobody else's business, but a more likely guess is that she was paid to keep quiet.  She would certainly have had a hard time otherwise, since this was about 1890 and her relatives, in true Victorian fashion, apparently disowned her.  These days single parenthood is nothing to get excited about, but in the olden days it was all very shocking.  In fact, I din't know anything about it until the 1970s, after Walter had died (Probably about 1973. He was in his 80s)  Walter's mother would I guess have been born about 1860-70.  She died some time in the 1950s, when in he 90s.  I met her once, but remember only that she was very small - about four feet six.  My grandmother, Walter's wife, died in the early 1950s.  A mild, quiet woman, never in very good health.  I liked her.

Walter was a lathe operator, which probably kept him out of the army and saved his life in the first war.  He lived in Bedford, Kettering, then Stafford until about 1950 when he came to a house in Priesthorpe Road (the one that ran uphill just in from of Mornington road Church, just along from Norman Street)  [... John Braine anecdote removed ...]  Walter worked for a few years at Anderton Springs, then moved south after he retired and his wife died.  He married again, which lasted only two or three years before the second wife died.  Then married  a third time, this last wife inheriting most of his estate.  I remember my mother didn't like him much - always refered to him as a mean old sod (or words to that effect), a characterisation which seemed rather justified when he left my father (his only child) the sum of £50, not a lot even in those days. Anyway, whatever family relics he may have had are now long gone.