He was twenty when they met. He had somehow escaped from the Fall of France in the summer of 1940, more by luck than anything else, but that's a story for another time.

Jimmy Durrant, Curly to his mates, went on a blind date organised by his friend, Ace. They were young Englishmen in South Africa at the end of 1941, working as gunnery instructors in the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. Ace had hooked up with a local girl who worked at the CTC  (Cape to Cairo) department store in Pretoria and got her to bring a friend along for Curly. She brought her boss, Patricia Flaherty who, at twenty six was a little older.

After buying the girls a drink and finding them a table, Ace and Curly spent the rest of the dance at the bar, only returning at its end. Pat wasn't impressed but she let  Curly see her home and agreed to go out with him again. They had a lot going against them: the age difference; the fact that Curly was English and would leave South Africa when his tour of duty ended; the devout Catholicism of Pat's mother and family. It didn't matter. They married in October 1942 and Pat left her family behind, never seeing her sisters or brother again, to come to England where Curly became Jimmy.

They were married for 57 years, had three children, and together they weathered difficult times. Pat coped with the children when Jimmy was posted abroad. Together they faced Pat's depressions and slow slide into the fog of Alzheimer's disease.  There were good times, too. The three years they spent in Germany  were a whirl of parties and outings with friends.

After Pat died in 1999, Jimmy said that a day never went by when he didn't think about her and when asked what she was like he had only one word for her - marvellous.

This was their song: Frank Sinatra singing "i'll be Seeing You."
I hope you enjoy it and think of those who are not with you any more.

Pat Durrant 1916-1999
Jimmy Durrant 1921-2010