PENGUINPOST29 - Flipbook - Page 19
INSIDER
Packed full of Lesley Pearse’s signature warmth, wit and
poignancy, her autobiography is the story of a woman and a
writer fighting against the odds to achieve her dreams. In this
extract from the book, The Long and Winding Road, Lesley
reminisces on her early years, which were marked by tragedy,
but which saw Lesley emerge resilient, and an optimist at heart.
“I
can remember exactly where I was
when I first heard the Beatles’ song
‘The Long and Winding Road’. It was
early June in 1970. I was twenty-five, sitting
in London’s Richmond Park, listening to a
transistor radio, and the song made me cry
because I felt I’d been on that winding road
for ever. Had I known then just how fraught
with drama and disappointment it would
continue to be, I might have wished to step
off it. But I’d always been an optimist.
I was born in Rochester, Kent, in February
1945, just as Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin
were winding up their talks on the future of
Europe after the expected defeat of Germany.
These took place in Yalta, Crimea. Apparently,
Stalin wanted to meet in Moscow, but Churchill
said it was too damn cold there in February.
Two months later Roosevelt died, and despite
the discussed plans, Stalin took over a huge
amount of Europe, including Poland.
Of course I wasn’t aware of any of that,
but as a kid I certainly felt it was a curse to
be born in freezing February. My birthday
always fell at half-term too, and I’d be shoved
out to play in the snow. I still prefer looking
at snow through a window in a warm room!
My mother, Marie Glynn, was an Irish
nurse from Roscommon, and my father,
Sergeant Arthur Geoffrey Sargent (yes,
really), was in the Royal Marines, stationed in
Chatham. My brother Michael was two when
I was born, a very pretty little boy with a mop
of blond curls. I resembled Winston Churchill.
I don’t know when my parents bought
the house in Grafton Avenue, Rochester.
It was typical of the late 1930s terraced
houses, with a keyhole-style front porch
and a large back garden.
I assume as the address was on my birth
certificate that they must have bought it in
1937 or 1938 when they got married and Dad
I could
never get
adults to
verify or
explain,
and mostly
they didn’t
wish to
discuss
what had
happened.
The Long and
Winding Road
is out now.
was seconded to the New Zealand Navy.
He was there until the Second World War
broke out when his ship sailed away to fight.
The next part of my story is legend and
hearsay. I could never get adults to verify or
explain, and mostly they didn’t wish to discuss
what had happened or really didn’t know. But
the undeniable fact, proved years later by my
mother’s death certificate, was that in early
January of 1948 she died of septicaemia following
a miscarriage. My father was away at sea, and
Michael and I were seen out in the garden in the
snow with no coats on. When Michael was asked
by our neighbour where our coats were, he said
he couldn’t reach them, and Mummy was asleep.
She’d been asleep for a long time.
She had been dead, it seems, for a few days.
Michael was five, I was three, but if my
brother remembered anything about that
time, he never said. It doesn’t bear thinking
about, two small children being alone in the
house for so long with no heating or food and
thick snow outside. I think it was possible
that Michael attempted to light the gas to
get warm or try to cook something for us,
but we were afraid of the popping sound the
Ascot water heater made when it was turned
on and of lighting the gas stove. To this day
I have an absolute hatred of gas cookers.
I don’t remember anything of this, and
in fact I didn’t discover what our mother had
died of until I got married at twenty and had
to show her death certificate. There it was in
black ink. The truth.
We had been told various stories over the
years – one was that our mother tripped over
our toys on the stairs. What sort of person
puts the blame for a mother’s death on her
children? On Coronation Day, when we were
crowded round a neighbour’s television to
watch the ceremony, I heard some old lady
ask if we were the ‘Tragic Children’.”
THE PENGUIN POST MARCH/APRIL 2024
17