Heidi's Story
Part 3: Germany to the UK
Around two months after Karen was born they moved again. This time to Hamburg, where Alan was now stationed in the barracks there. They found an upstairs one bedroom flat "in a nice chalet style house" close to the barracks. They had the upstairs and the owners lived downstairs. Alan was allowed to leave the barracks at night to stay in the flat. This was outside the main town of Hamburg in a nice small suburb. Heidi thinks it was close to an area called Altona. While they were there Alan was sent back to England for three months. Heidi thinks this was because the army wanted him to have a break to be sure he wanted to marry her in Germany before they allowed this. They were married at the end of August (30th or 31st) in 1947 when Karen was seven months old. It was an army wedding that took place in the army camp and present at the wedding were the couple who owned the house (and lived downstairs) where they were living, some soldier army friends and girlfriends (the best man was a Scottish soldier friend from the Outer Hebrides who had also married a German girl, Hannalore. She was Heidi's bridesmaid and she lent Heidi her own wedding dress), Auntie Joyce (Alan's sister who was also in the army, but not stationed in the same area, and was Karen's godmother "She was the godmother but she never did anything for her"), Hildegard and her husband (Hildegard is Heidi's cousin from Hagen) and "Muttie Rieme" and her husband.
Muttie Rieme was a nice older woman that Heidi had met and became friends with ("she could have been my mum"). She held the reception in her house. Heidi slept there the night before the wedding and a hairdresser came in the morning to get her hair ready and put her veil on. "The reception party was upstairs at Mutte Rieme's house and they made it so nice for me. My mother wasn't there but it was lovely. Lots of wine, beer, drinks and a lot to eat and a lot of cake that they had to give away later on, there was so much of everything. It was so lovely. It was upstairs and they had flowers all around the stairs. It was lovely. Karen was kept by neighbour overnight. She wasn't around for the wedding so that we could have peace". Heidi doesn't know how everything was paid for. Alan arranged everything and Heidi thinks the food might have come from army supplies or if there was any money involved it might have come from the black market in army supplies. "He did a bloody good job". "We were very much in love actually, for a long time. Thirteen years of happiness I had with him. After that it was shit" - she said on 2nd October 2018 in Olhao. Heidi wore her wedding dress until 12 midnight and then went upstairs to the floor above to change into a new dress that Alan had bought for her in England and brought back to Germany for her for the wedding. "It was very pretty. A colourful sleeveless dress, fresh looking and lovely. Nice material as well. He had good taste, I will give him that". "We danced a nice dance as well in the evening and we all had a drink. He wasn't very good at dancing. Hahaha."
Alan was demobbed from the army and sent back to England in November 1947. Heidi waited to get her English passport and left a week or two later to join him there. Heidi was obviously well liked in the area and had lots of friends. When she left for England many of them were at the station, singing a German song on the platform in Hamburg as she left on the train, waving to them out of the train window. "I was crying my head off. It was horrible. Good gracious, I can feel it now". It was early in the morning, 6 or 7 am and still dark. Heidi didn't expect it but they all came to the station to surprise her and were all singing on the platform "Muss Ich Den" as the train pulled out. "I cried my heart out. I felt funny and I thought where am I going? What am I doing? Leaving my country alone with a baby to a strange land where I couldn't speak the language. It made it very hard for me to leave". A translation of the lyrics to the song they sang together as they all waved on the platform "Must I then, must I then, leave this town, leave this town, and you my dear stay here? When I�m back, when I�m back, When I finally come back, finally come back, I�ll return to you, I swear". It must have been very filmic and picturesque in the early morning light, like a tear-jerking scene from an old movie.
It was a long steam train journey from Hamburg to the port in Holland and the sea crossing from Holland was "very choppy, it was a rotten journey" and it was Heidi's first time on a boat. She was sick. Karen was sick. "Eight hours I think it was on the boat". She arrived in Harwich late in the evening. We are not sure of the timings but she had to somehow get to London and from there get a train for the long train journey to Newcastle. She can't remember how she got to London. She knows she was taken somewhere with Karen's pram in the car boot and thinks this may have been a road trip from Harwich to London. She can't even remember for sure if she may have got a night train from London and slept on the train and her memories are very vague. But at some point, either in Harwich or London, she met some Red Cross workers who helped her sort out train journeys to Newcastle. She thinks that she maybe she stayed the night at a Red Cross centre in Harwich. She didn't know where London was or how to get there and she thinks that they may have driven her there and helped her get on the correct train at King's Cross Station. "I think they must have taken me because I couldn't speak, I couldn't say a word. I couldn't even ask to buy a ticket. All I could say was Thank You." Heidi says she was disappointed when she arrived at the port in Harwich that her husband was not there to pick her up and help her. "Other people had people to meet them and pick them up and I was very tired, with a pram and a kid and unable to speak English and with no idea where I was or how to get to Newcastle."
But she somehow got to King's Cross Station in London and she travelled with baby Karen on an old steam train to Newcastle, a journey of around seven hours from London. And her husband was there at the station in Newcastle to meet her. We assume that the Red Cross had either managed to send a telegram to him to tell him she was arriving (remember this was before mobile phones and at a time when almost no one had a landline - and Alan Senior certainly didn't have a phone at home), or maybe he just went to meet the train every day as there was only one train everyday, probably The Flying Scotsman, from London to Newcastle. He knew she was arriving around that date and he had left Germany only a week or two before with the army.
Alan was waiting at the station with his father, William Titus Hardman "we always called him Grandad". Grandad worked close to the station, by the big Tyne Bridge, in the Civil Service. "I remember Newcastle inside out. I haven't forgotten". Heidi was not too keen on Alan when she saw him at the station. "He looked funny when I saw him in civies (civil clothes). The army uniform suited him and he had a good figure in it, but when I got here he was wearing a big fat hairy coat and a brown hat. I thought he looked different". And that was the start of Heidi's new life in England.
Around two months after Karen was born they moved again. This time to Hamburg, where Alan was now stationed in the barracks there. They found an upstairs one bedroom flat "in a nice chalet style house" close to the barracks. They had the upstairs and the owners lived downstairs. Alan was allowed to leave the barracks at night to stay in the flat. This was outside the main town of Hamburg in a nice small suburb. Heidi thinks it was close to an area called Altona. While they were there Alan was sent back to England for three months. Heidi thinks this was because the army wanted him to have a break to be sure he wanted to marry her in Germany before they allowed this. They were married at the end of August (30th or 31st) in 1947 when Karen was seven months old. It was an army wedding that took place in the army camp and present at the wedding were the couple who owned the house (and lived downstairs) where they were living, some soldier army friends and girlfriends (the best man was a Scottish soldier friend from the Outer Hebrides who had also married a German girl, Hannalore. She was Heidi's bridesmaid and she lent Heidi her own wedding dress), Auntie Joyce (Alan's sister who was also in the army, but not stationed in the same area, and was Karen's godmother "She was the godmother but she never did anything for her"), Hildegard and her husband (Hildegard is Heidi's cousin from Hagen) and "Muttie Rieme" and her husband.
Muttie Rieme was a nice older woman that Heidi had met and became friends with ("she could have been my mum"). She held the reception in her house. Heidi slept there the night before the wedding and a hairdresser came in the morning to get her hair ready and put her veil on. "The reception party was upstairs at Mutte Rieme's house and they made it so nice for me. My mother wasn't there but it was lovely. Lots of wine, beer, drinks and a lot to eat and a lot of cake that they had to give away later on, there was so much of everything. It was so lovely. It was upstairs and they had flowers all around the stairs. It was lovely. Karen was kept by neighbour overnight. She wasn't around for the wedding so that we could have peace". Heidi doesn't know how everything was paid for. Alan arranged everything and Heidi thinks the food might have come from army supplies or if there was any money involved it might have come from the black market in army supplies. "He did a bloody good job". "We were very much in love actually, for a long time. Thirteen years of happiness I had with him. After that it was shit" - she said on 2nd October 2018 in Olhao. Heidi wore her wedding dress until 12 midnight and then went upstairs to the floor above to change into a new dress that Alan had bought for her in England and brought back to Germany for her for the wedding. "It was very pretty. A colourful sleeveless dress, fresh looking and lovely. Nice material as well. He had good taste, I will give him that". "We danced a nice dance as well in the evening and we all had a drink. He wasn't very good at dancing. Hahaha."
Alan was demobbed from the army and sent back to England in November 1947. Heidi waited to get her English passport and left a week or two later to join him there. Heidi was obviously well liked in the area and had lots of friends. When she left for England many of them were at the station, singing a German song on the platform in Hamburg as she left on the train, waving to them out of the train window. "I was crying my head off. It was horrible. Good gracious, I can feel it now". It was early in the morning, 6 or 7 am and still dark. Heidi didn't expect it but they all came to the station to surprise her and were all singing on the platform "Muss Ich Den" as the train pulled out. "I cried my heart out. I felt funny and I thought where am I going? What am I doing? Leaving my country alone with a baby to a strange land where I couldn't speak the language. It made it very hard for me to leave". A translation of the lyrics to the song they sang together as they all waved on the platform "Must I then, must I then, leave this town, leave this town, and you my dear stay here? When I�m back, when I�m back, When I finally come back, finally come back, I�ll return to you, I swear". It must have been very filmic and picturesque in the early morning light, like a tear-jerking scene from an old movie.
It was a long steam train journey from Hamburg to the port in Holland and the sea crossing from Holland was "very choppy, it was a rotten journey" and it was Heidi's first time on a boat. She was sick. Karen was sick. "Eight hours I think it was on the boat". She arrived in Harwich late in the evening. We are not sure of the timings but she had to somehow get to London and from there get a train for the long train journey to Newcastle. She can't remember how she got to London. She knows she was taken somewhere with Karen's pram in the car boot and thinks this may have been a road trip from Harwich to London. She can't even remember for sure if she may have got a night train from London and slept on the train and her memories are very vague. But at some point, either in Harwich or London, she met some Red Cross workers who helped her sort out train journeys to Newcastle. She thinks that she maybe she stayed the night at a Red Cross centre in Harwich. She didn't know where London was or how to get there and she thinks that they may have driven her there and helped her get on the correct train at King's Cross Station. "I think they must have taken me because I couldn't speak, I couldn't say a word. I couldn't even ask to buy a ticket. All I could say was Thank You." Heidi says she was disappointed when she arrived at the port in Harwich that her husband was not there to pick her up and help her. "Other people had people to meet them and pick them up and I was very tired, with a pram and a kid and unable to speak English and with no idea where I was or how to get to Newcastle."
But she somehow got to King's Cross Station in London and she travelled with baby Karen on an old steam train to Newcastle, a journey of around seven hours from London. And her husband was there at the station in Newcastle to meet her. We assume that the Red Cross had either managed to send a telegram to him to tell him she was arriving (remember this was before mobile phones and at a time when almost no one had a landline - and Alan Senior certainly didn't have a phone at home), or maybe he just went to meet the train every day as there was only one train everyday, probably The Flying Scotsman, from London to Newcastle. He knew she was arriving around that date and he had left Germany only a week or two before with the army.
Alan was waiting at the station with his father, William Titus Hardman "we always called him Grandad". Grandad worked close to the station, by the big Tyne Bridge, in the Civil Service. "I remember Newcastle inside out. I haven't forgotten". Heidi was not too keen on Alan when she saw him at the station. "He looked funny when I saw him in civies (civil clothes). The army uniform suited him and he had a good figure in it, but when I got here he was wearing a big fat hairy coat and a brown hat. I thought he looked different". And that was the start of Heidi's new life in England.
Heidi Hardman
18 January 1924 - 25 July 2024
Visit the Hardman Institute for Science and Consciousness Studies - a venture inspired by Heidi's unwavering faith in there being "much more than we know" and launched in her memory.