From Cairo to Kokstad: Ann Stephens and Priscilla Weld

Ann Christine Kilpatrick (nee Stephens) was born in Cairo in Egypt on 25 October 1940 in the Anglo-American Hospital in Cairo. Her father, Major John Stephens, was stationed in Egypt as he was in the Royal Tank Regiment.

Her parents were Joan Margarita Stephens (nee Randall) who was born in Essex on 10 December 1909 and John Gordon Stephens who was born in Plymouth on 22 December 1902.

They had moved to Egypt in 1938 with their son, Timothy Peter Gordon Stephens, who was born on 23 June 1936 in Dorset, England.

Early in 1941, Joan, Tim and Ann were evacuated from Cairo by land and then by ship down the Red Sea to South Africa, as getting back to England through the Mediterranean Sea was too difficult and dangerous. They landed in Durban and were put up in a hotel.

Jean Weld (nee Davenport) arrived from Jerusalem where her daughter Priscilla had been born on 12 September 1940. Her father "Paddy" had also been an officer in the Tank Regiment but had learnt to fly before the war and he was transferred to the RAF. He became Squadron Leader Rowland Edmund Weld.

Barbara Mary Miller (nee Cooke), the wife of Peter Miller, a third Royal Tank Regiment officer, arrived in South Africa from Jerusalem with her son Tim, who had been born in November 1940. As the hotels were full of refugees, Barbara and Tim Miller were sent to Kokstad in the hills north of Durban. Barbara told Joan and Jean there was a bungalow to rent on the opposite corner of the crossroads to her lodgings on Main Street.

Joan and Jean moved up to Kokstad and shared the bungalow about halfway up Main Street in Kokstad for the remainder of the war. The bungalow had a living room, a kitchen, a bathroom, a covered veranda, and a good garden with peach and apricot trees. There were two and half bedrooms. Joan and Ann shared a room. Jean and Priscilla shared another room. Tim had a little room off Joan's room.

So, in a short space of time, young Tim Stephens had now gained a real sister, Ann, and a sort of sister, Priscilla, and a sort of brother, Tim Miller.

Joan, Jean, and Barbara helped each other, and kind neighbours became friends. Jean and Joan had help from a South African nanny and a gardener who managed the garden. They went to the church down Main Street. There was a post office where the mothers had to collect their letters and parcels from their letter box number 822. Tim went to the local day school when he was 5 or 6.

In April 1941, Jean's husband "Paddy" (Rowland Edmond Weld) was killed flying over the desert on a reconnaissance flight to find enemy positions. He was only 34 and was buried at the Knightsbridge Cemetery, Acroma in Libya.

Jean got a job in a bank from then on. Joan looked after Ann and Priscilla.

Memories of the time in South Africa:

One Christmas, they all went to stay at a farm owned by the Stafford family. Ann remembered watching local workers and villagers dancing, and the farm workers queuing to collect their Christmas presents.

Aged about four years old, Priscilla and Ann joined a dancing class. They went on some holidays to the seaside. One day, Priscilla disappeared and was spotted carrying a surfboard down to the sea. Joan and her son Tim had a trip to the seaside and Joan came back with a whole branch of bananas. Tim played football with friends in bare feet and twice had his shoes stolen. Priscilla and Ann both got mumps, but Tim did not. He then got mumps at school once he was back in England. Priscilla and Ann had birthday cakes with lovely pictures painted on the top copied from the illustrations by Margaret Tempest in the Little Grey Rabbit Books by Alison Uttley.

Going home in 1945:

They travelled on the liner, the RMS Mauretania which had become a troop ship. There were the four children, the three mothers and one other lady in a two-berth cabin which had been set up with four bunk beds. They embarked at Durban. They crossed the South Atlantic Ocean and travelled up the east coast of the US, perhaps as far as Halifax before crossing the north Atlantic in a convoy because there were still a lot of German Submarines which had not surrendered.

The ship was full of lots of men returning home. There were lots of lifeboat drills. Everyone wanted to be up on the deck, especially in the evening when it was cooler outside. But Ann remembers adults selfishly smoking which caused everyone to be sent below decks because the lights would make the boat visible to the enemy. They experienced many rough seas but both Tim and Ann Stephens were not seasick (and remained good sailors all their lives) and kept their healthy appetites! Ann remembers being hungry when everyone else was ill and she and Tim were sent to the dining room for breakfast. The waiters were very surprised to see the children and were delighted to serve them whatever they wanted.

They landed in Liverpool. Jean and Priscilla went to stay with grandparents in Bristol. They must have returned by September as Priscilla started school in Bristol.

Joan, Tim, and Ann went to a hotel in Bridlington in Yorkshire, where both sets of grandparents were living.

A return visit:

In 2012, Ann and Priscilla returned to South Africa to retrace their childhood in Kokstad. They had the address 822 Main Street on an envelope. They could not find their bungalow as the address was a mailbox number. They headed to the museum on Main Street, where three helpful ladies produced files of newspapers from the 1940s, but 1941 was missing, so they failed to find any reference to the arrivals of any evacuees. At the local church, they met a lady pruning roses. She was called Ingrid Elliot. By an amazing coincidence she had lived on Main Street in the 1940s and had remembered playing with them. Her mother had sent food parcels to them in the UK once they had returned after the war. Ingrid took them to see the bungalow where they had lived, and it looked almost the same. It was wonderful to meet Ingrid and they have remained in contact. Ann and Priscilla both have happy memories of South Africa during the war and on their 2012 visit.