"Name Sake"

During the war the sailors were stationed at Instow, North Devon doing trial wading prior to entering Europe - they were consigned to Barracks. I had recently started my own School of Dancing - Mainly Royal Academy Ballet, tap and aerobic and a small amount of ballroom dancing.

The sailors were getting rather bored so I was approached to take them for ballroom dancing. Imagine my alarm when I arrived at the hall to confront nearly 100 sailors! - I was only in my teens. However one of the Chief P.O's took pity on me and offered to help!

The outcome of this was that a Bay City Crane was named - "Joan of Instow" - and my photo was in the cabin. I saw the convoy move out early one morning and then forgot about my namesake.

Sometime later, after getting married, my husband and I saw a Bay City in the sand hills of Instow and to our surprise it was my name sake - complete with photo - but also full of bullet holes. It had been used, we found out on the Rhine crossing.

My dancing school did weekly troop shows at the then Strand Cinema, mostly Sundays and Christmas Day.

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