ADDRESS FOR AUDREY HOLLOW
 
Audrey was born in Hadleigh, Essex in 1925 to Clarissa and Henry Wyllie. Her sister Vera was born 20 months earlier.When Audrey was three, they moved to Teddington in Middlesex where she went to the local church school. Audrey and Vera enjoyed a happy childhood, cycling and playing in nearby Bushy Park.
 
At fourteen, Audrey started work as a silk stocking repairer, then sales assistant in Boots the Chemist, where she once served actor David Niven, much to her delight!  She also trained as a nurse for three months but was soon out of there as she fainted at the sight of blood. After that she changed to office work at the Milk Marketing Board.
 
During the war, Audrey and Vera would often go dancing,sometimes with soldiers that were billeted with them. Their home was very close to the National Physical Laboratory, a target for the German Luftwaffe.  One night 8 bombs landed in Bushy Park at the end of their road. Another night, Audrey and Vera were walking home from a dance with one of their soldiers, when a German plane flew very low along their road, firing at them. The soldier was so frightened he pushed them out of his way and dived behind a low garden wall.
 
In 1944 at the age of 19, Audrey and her sister were called up to the Foreign Office and sent to Knockholt in Kent to work at a radio station where they had to decode parts of messages. These were forwarded to Bletchley Park for further processing. They each worked on a different part of the code. Neither knew what the other’s part was, and they weren’t allowed to talk about it to anyone for the next 30 years. Their parents never knew that their daughters played such an important part in the war. After peace was declared, Audreywas transferred to the Admiralty to deal with the demobbing of naval personnel and then cared for her mother who had heart problems.
 
In 1950 she married Donald Hollow and later had their first child, Paul.  In 1955 all the family moved to Caterham,Surrey, where |Jane was born. Unfortunately Audrey’s marriage broke up and she and Don separated in the sixties. Audrey went back to work in 1974 after bringing up her family.  Working as a Cost Clerk for Croudace, a building company in Caterham, she made many friends whom she regularly kept in touch with.  In 1980 Audrey and Vera moved to a smaller house in East Grinstead.
 
Audrey became a grandmother for the first time when Emma was born in 1988, closely followed by Louisa, Adam and Robert. Audrey and Vera loved seeing the grandchildren especially at Christmas when they stayed with Jane’s family most years.
 
When she was younger Audrey sang with the Co-op choir in Teddington, performing at Crystal Palace before it caught fire. In later years, she enjoyed travelling and went on the QE2 and the Orient Express with Vera. They also visited many places in the UK by coach until Audrey was 82.
 
In 2009 Vera suffered a stroke and moved to Truscott ManorNursing Home. For Audrey this was the first time in her life that she’d lived on her own, but she coped very well, regularly visiting Vera.  When Vera sadly passed away in 2012, Truscotts invited Audrey to go there often, giving herfree lunch and musical entertainment. They were happy that she would sit and chat with residents who didn’t have any visitors and it made their day.
In 2017 Audrey was thrilled to become a great grandmother, when Louisa and Ed’s daughter Emilie was born. 
 
Audrey enjoyed watching Coronation Street, quizzes and murder mysteries, but her real passion was writing and receiving letters; she was always writing to someone or other. The first thing she did in the morning was to check if any letters had arrived. Audrey loved reading and doing crossword puzzles.  She always found something to do and couldn’t understand people who were bored.  Audrey always read the newspaper, keeping up with current affairs, ready to give us her opinion. She used to cut out articles to read at a later date, but more often than not, she never got around to reading them. In her late sixties she developed glaucoma and her eyes got steadily worse, making it more difficult to do thethings she loved.
 
When Audrey became unwell last September, she remainedstoical, witty and interested in others. She was able to live inher own home until just before Christmas, when she moved in with Jane & Geoff.  In her last few weeks she enjoyed her 96th Birthday, with lovely cards and flowers and socially distanced visits from close loved ones.
 
With the support of St.Catherines Hospice, the District Nurses and her family, Audrey was lovingly cared for in her final days.