Bridesmaids: carried at back – Shirley Tapp,                                    Back row – Jill Robinson, Janet Tapp & Jean Tapp                         middle row – Pat Greenhalf & Rita Tall;                     Front row – Shirley Brittain

                                    Best Man: Percy Hulatt        Harry & Nancy       Frank Nichols

Six weeks before they married Nancy bought a second hand Singer sewing machine for £6 (It is interesting to note that £6 is equivalent to £232 in 2001) – a worthwhile investment considering the extent she subsequently used it.

Harry took out whole life assurance for £34:8 shillings on Nancy’s life when they married costing 4d per week. When Nancy died £42 had been paid in premiums and the return was £152.64. (£34:8 in 1940 equivalent to £969 in 1990)

No costing is given for food, probably because food was provided by the family, but it is possible war rationing made providing a meal impractical.

Initially Nancy and Harry lived with her parents but they soon rented a house in Cannon Str. From the amount of decoration Nancy did in subsequent homes, it is evident that the house was in a poor state to justify the large amount of paint and wall paper she bought.

On the 15^th of May 1941, Nancy and Harry’s first child David was born at Woodfield Nursing home. With no National Health Service having a baby in a nursing home was not cheap. The mother would "need" a couple of weeks in hospital to recuperate hence the bill for the nursing home was £11.17.01 (£405) – this did include the 4d Nancy paid for two Sunday newspapers (Either the Sunday Dispatch or the Sunday Pictorial, see invoice below). The day after David’s birth Nancy arranged its announcement in the local Evening Telegraph.

Whilst at Woodfield, Nancy ordered a Navy ‘Travelkot’, from a mail order firm, for £1.13.06 (including 6/- purchase tax), asking it to be delivered to her mum’s home. Within days of leaving the nursing home Nancy paid £7.11.00 for a leeway pram with bag and canopy. She also obtained a ration book and an identity card for David:

Cannon Street was in easy walking distance of both Nancy’s and Harry’s families. It was a tiny terraced house, with a living room, kitchen, two bedrooms and a big enough rear garden to grow vegetables. When Harry and Nancy moved to Cannon Str., see earlier road map, water could only be obtained from a communal tap in the path running between the terraced houses and their back gardens. With a young baby Nancy clearly found this impracticable, and on November 7^th 1941 she paid £6-11-09 (£225) to have cold running water fitted into the kitchen. To pay for these expenses Nancy only had the money Harry earned, their savings and what and she could earn:

During the Second World War, I found out I could renovate Prams and did many for my friends and became quite well known for it, earning quite a lot of money. Nancy writing on 30^th March 1973

Although Woodfield nursing home was ‘heavily booked’ when Nancy asked for a place on 23^rd July 1943 for Graham’s birth, they said that they would get her in somewhere. With no National Health Service, the G.P.’s bills between Graham’s birth on the 31^st of January 1944 and Rosemary’s on the 14^th June 1945 were:

The birth of a daughter in 1945 was fortunate for Nancy's boys! Nancy clearly wanted a daughter and initially curled the hair of each of her sons in turn!

David Graham Rosemary.    The three children shared the smaller upstairs bedroom at the back of the house.

		Harry’s comrades in armoured cars. Harry was awarded the two medals shown on the right. The 1939-45 Medal and the Defence Medal.
	The message was written on the back of the photograph, and was taken, in NW Germany, at RECKLINHAUSEN. Left: Sherwood Foresters Cap Badge

It is interesting how relatively high some prices were during the war. On the 18^th May 1944, whilst staying with her parents, Nancy paid £4-10-00 (£124) for a used green pushchair. Just before Christmas 1945 she bought a gas ‘Ascot’ water heater and had it fitted above her kitchen sink, for £9:07:06. (£250).

In the spring of 1946 Nancy paid her brother-in-law Reg to enlarge her chalet at Overstone

(See Nichols family history book). Combining the original chalet (outlined in red - the future living room area), with the aviary Harry had used to breed canaries in (future bedroom) and adding a verandah and kitchen. Materials cost just £3:10:07 and the total cost was under £20. The Chalet was crucial to the life of the family, every weekend and all holidays during the spring and summer were spent there. As is evident from the plan, Nan & Pops chalet was also built over a period of time.