With sincere thanks to Geoff Pheasant for remastering the audio.

After meeting by chance as he was returning a broom to her mother’s house, Elizabeth Wadner and her late husband Sergeant John Wadner had a blossoming relationship that survived through letters across many years of war. He was stationed at the Searchlight Regiment in her village and was later transferred to various different regiments before serving with the Royal Electrical Mechanical Engineers.

Elizabeth tells us about the worries that came after long stints without letters from him, but fortunately he return home safely after fighting in D-Day. After the war, they married in 1945 and later had 2 children in 1946 and 1947.

John was a loving husband who was eager to make up for lost time with Elizabeth by making sure she was spoilt with love and care. To save her from imagining the horrors of war that he endured, John hardly shared any details with Elizabeth of his time on the front lines. Instead, he chose to share his stories of war with his grandchildren, to whom he was very close.