Wartime sweethearts get their happily ever after...
HE was her first love... and her last.
In the 1930s, seven-year-old Elinor Spencer and Norman Stewart, aged eight, played marbles and hide and seek in Tully Street, Salford.
But he moved away and they lost touch.
Some ten years later at a dance hall in Salford their paths crossed again. It was 1947 and he was now a handsome strapping soldier on leave and she had blossomed into a beautiful young woman.
He walked her home during a blackout and they parted with a kiss. They vowed to meet again soon.
But within weeks, Norman was sent abroad to serve with the Royal Engineers. That was the last time they saw each other for 64 years.
Elinor married a Royal Navy officer and Norman too married, then emigrated in 1969 to Canada,
But he could never forget the stunning red-head who danced away the post-war gloom with him one night.
He sent a letter from his home in Ontario to the M.E.N. asking for help to locate Elinor saying “she used to live near Manley Park, Higher Broughton”, and our readers ended up helping him trace her.
It rekindled a friendship and they became penfriends. And yesterday the fairytale had the happiest of endings with Elinor, 86, and Norman, 87, marrying at Bury Register Office. Elinor, a former nurse, from Radcliife, said: “I guess there was always a spark there and it never went out.”
She added: “I lived in a terraced house in Tully Street and Norman lived a few doors down. He moved away, but then in 1947 we met at Dyson’s Hall in Devonshire Street. I saw this tall, good looking lad. I went up to him and said ‘are you Norman Stewart.’ He said ‘who are you.’ He didn’t recognise that red-haired freckle-faced little girl. We had a chat and a dance.
“He walked me home and said ‘see you soon.’ I waited for three weeks and heard nothing. Then I heard he had gone abroad with the Army. I never heard from him again.”
Elinor met Royal Navy warrant officer Clifford Williams, and married having two children.
Norman met his wife, Hilda, and they had three children.
In 1991 Clifford died, aged 71. Norman was living in Ontario, but had not forgotten his old flame.
Norman said: “I used to say to my wife, I wonder where Elinor is now? I said it so many times that she said why don’t you try and find her.”
He placed the appeal in the M.E.N. and Elinor’s brother-in-law and sister saw it while she was away on holiday abroad. Elinor continued: “When I got back my sister asked if I knew someone called Norman Stewart and I said ‘gosh, yes that was my first sweetheart’ and she said ‘well he’s looking for you and he lives in Canada.’ I wrote to him saying I thought I was the Elinor Spencer he was looking for. We wrote to each other for four-and-a-half years. I wrote to his wife too.
“Then one day in 2011 he phoned me and was very upset. He told me Hilda had died. I told him I knew exactly how he felt. When you lose a partner the loss never leaves you. We phoned each other a few times and I suggested we meet again and he could visit his family, who still live over here.
“When he arrived in Radcliffe I felt quite insulted. He said ‘God you’ve changed’ and I said to him ‘and do you think you haven’t.’ But he came in, we had a cup of tea and a real old natter.”
Norman said: “I was meant to be visiting my nephew. I phoned him and said I would be delayed a few nights as I had met an old friend and was staying a few nights. I didn’t mention it was a woman.”
Elinor said: “We had so much to tell each other and it sort of blossomed from there. He stayed for a month the first time, then three months, then five months. He said it’s getting very expensive and tiring, let’s do something about it.”
Norman then sold his home in Canada, and moved permanently to the UK to be with Elinor after they became engaged at Niagra Falls.
Elinor said: “Norman said to me he had asked me 23 times to marry him, I said ‘ok, I tell you what, I’ll ask you next time – well it was leap year, last year and I asked him.
“However much time we have got left we are going to make the most of it.”