Peggy & John - A Wonderful Life - Hardcover

John Skelton was born in 1924 in Felixstowe but his father soon left his family never to return. So John and his siblings spent much of their childhood with their grandparents in rural Suffolk. Eventually though, John and his brother returned to live with their mother and stepfather in Dagenham, Essex. The contrast between the rural childhood and life in the Essex suburbs is finely drawn. John left school at 14 and went to work as an office boy where he met Peggy, the woman who was to become the love of his life. At 17, in the early years of the war, he joined the navy and spent time in Iceland installing radar sites. He also sailed to Malta to relieve the wartime siege there, and gives an emotional and startling first-person account of a little-known aspect of the war. After his demob John and Peggy married, and they shared sixty-six extremely happy years together. The memories of their holidays and travels, and the stories of their four children growing up, form the beating heart of this touching memoir.