“YOU had a picture of me on your page,” said Ipswich Speedway promoter John Louis when I saw him a few days ago. The Victory in Europe party in Cemetery Road. I am the little lad in the front row” .

PEACE AT LAST: The VE day party in Cemetery Road featured in Kindred Spirits recently which brought memories to many readers including Joyce. Click on image to see larger version
John’s mother Vera is on the left of the group holding her other son Tony. Joyce Leighton, of Woodville Road, Ipswich, was delighted to see it published in The Star.

Joyce said: “There was excitement among our family because so many are in the picture.”

“My grandparents, Mr and Mrs Taber, of Cemetery Road, had thirteen children. My mother is now 88. I am sitting on the left table, embarrassingly putting my finger up my nose, with my sister at the end of the table.

“Behind me is my mother holding my brother Dougy. Next to me is my cousin Michael with my aunt Winnie next to my mother. On the right are my Aunts Vonnie and Jean. Can you believe it, there are ten of us in the picture, all alive!”

 

Joyce Leighton (nee Shemming), of Woodville Road, Ipswich, asks: “I wonder if you can help me? My aunt used to have an old photograph, until it got lost in the post when returned to her by my mother. It was a photograph of me and my sister at a VE party in Cemetery Road after the war and I wondered whether out there somewhere, there is someone who actually has this same photograph which I might be able to have copied, to be handed down the family line. (See photo above)

“My grandparents, Mr and Mrs Taber, used to live in Cemetery Road and we grandchildren were invited to the street party.

“There were two parties going on at that time, one at the corner of Suffolk or Norfolk Road/Cemetery Road, where a bomb had been dropped and one up towards the cemetery gates.

“We two girls were sat down at the Suffolk Road party and handed pop and sandwiches and we started to tuck in. Suddenly these were taken away from us and we were told we were at the wrong party and should be ‘up the top of the road’ towards the gates.

“We were sitting right at the front of this party when we were finally settled and the photograph taken.

Reader Stephen Smith said: “I am trying to find out where I can obtain photographs of 161 Cemetery Road, Ipswich dating back to 1888. Can you please help me”?

Borrowed, with thanks, from Dave Kindred, Kindred Spirits, Ipswich Evening Star.