David Mudd

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Preface

With all my precious childhood memories I had to reflect on, I decided in 1991 to put pen to paper and write an account of these times, with the intention these words becoming a book.

I want to leave in this book something of a record of the past, as I remember it. Usually, life passes on, leaving just a few photographs and memories as grandmas and grandads recollect. These sometimes are forgotten, as the older generations pass away and life flies forward, taken up with new experiences. New babies are born, the younger generations become adults, and there is not always time to think of the past.

Winding forward to the year 2021, these are unsettling times, with so many families losing loved ones to such an awful pandemic. On a comparison, I now reflect what my family faced: life hardships, fears of war, tragedies of losing children and loved ones.
I hope my grandchildren and their descendants will have pleasure in finding out about my grandparents and those who lived before them.

Photo of Elsie Lawrence (Mudd)

Me as a girl.


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Looking Back

Elsie Lawrence Mudd

A family memoir set in Finchley and Friern Barnet 1913-1953

Title page

A tribute to my mum

Preface

Chapter One – Hamilton Road

Chapter Two – Mum

Chapter Three – Aunt Lou

Chapter Four – When Mum met Dad

Chapter Five – The Lawrence family of Summers Lane

Chapter Six – Goldsmith Road, Friern Barnet

Chapter Seven – 1939

Chapter Eight – 1940-1941

Chapter Nine – St John’s School

Chapter Ten – Evacuation

Chapter Eleven – Christmas in the War

Chapter Twelve – Grandma Trusler’s

Chapter Thirteen – Home

Chapter Fourteen – The Library

Chapter Fifteen – Rationing

Chapter Sixteen – Chelwood

Chapter Seventeen – Victory: 1945

Chapter Eighteen – Our holiday in Kent 1947

Chapter Nineteen – The Bombed Garden

Chapter Twenty – Holly Park and Ealing Art School

Chapter Twenty One – 1953

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