MISSING . . .
THE DAILY MAIL offers readers a unique opportunity to re-establish contact with long-lost relatives and friends. Each week, MONICA PORTER features the story of someone trying to find a missing loved one, as well as a tale of people reunited. This column is produced in conjunction with the voluntary tracing service, Searching For A Memory, run by Gill and John Whitley. MIKE TAYLOR is researching his family history, but there are big gaps in his knowledge about his parents’ early lives.
‘One couple who might be able to shed some light would be Bill and Helen Marshall, great friends of my mum’s sister, Rita,’ says Mike.
‘My mum, Norma White, was born in 1923 in Lambeth, South London. Rita was born in 1932.
‘Rita lived with us in Aldershot, Hampshire, in the Fifties, when she met and became friends with Bill and Helen. Bill, a Scotsman, was in the Parachute Regiment and might recall stories Rita told him about my parents.
‘Rita married Don Latimer in 1968 and moved to Wellingborough, Northamptonshire. She died in 1979, aged 47.
‘My mother and father, Ernest Withers, a policeman, married in 1947 and I was born the next year.
‘In 1950, they split up and in 1952 my mother married Robert Taylor and had three more sons, Robert, Phillip and Kim.
‘After the marriage broke down, my mother struggled to look after four boys. In 1958, we were placed in children’s homes in Hampshire, and she moved to London.
‘I have no recollection of my biological father. Before joining the Royal Navy in 1963, I changed my surname to Taylor. My mum died in London in 1973, aged 49.’