The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
US Consulate guest among red carpet visitors to GI brides bash
The principal officer at the US Consulate in Edinburgh was among VIP guests at Montrose Air Station Heritage Centre yesterday.
Susan Wilson formally opened a new exhibition which marks the history of American weddings and GI brides at Montrose Air Station.
Many of these marriages have been traced by the heritage centre’s researchers and they are celebrated in this weekend’s programme as part of the national Festival of Museums.
The principal officer was welcomed by chairman Ron Morris.
He also welcomed Evelyn Smart, who is the great grand-daughter of Williamina Duncan, a Montrose woman who married Carl Johnsen, a member of the 138th Pursuit Squadron United States Air Service in August 1918.
Also mentioned in his welcome speech was the family of Samuel Swain and Ann Boyek, the first couple to marry in 1913, months after No2 Squadron of the RFC came to Montrose.
Other founding members of No2 Squadron to marry Montrose women were Sergeant Herbert Bullock and Corporal William Parrott.
Bullock married Elizabeth Anderson in 1914 and Parrot married Eva Mckenzie days after the end of the First World War.
Their families travelled from England to be present at the opening – a reminder that the American weddings were part of the wider social impact on the local community.
Mrs Georgiana Osborne, Lord Lieutenant for Angus, also told the story of her husband’s grandmother Enid Carnegyarbuthnot, whose future husband courted her by flying over to the Brechin family estate.