paul sanford

These letters were written by my grandfather Albert Edward Thornley-Jones. He was born in Cheshire in 1890 and at the age of 19 joined Alfred Holt & Co in Liverpool who ran the Blue Funnel Shipping Line.

He went out to Singapore in March 1913 and started working for Mansfield & Co, agents for Blue Funnel. During this time, he was also a musician and the organist at Singapore Cathedral.

In July 1919, he came home to Lancashire for six months leave. It was not until almost Christmas that he met Dorothy Grundy, a 21 year old from Rainford at a dance.

In the next few days, he meets Dorothy just six times and she makes an impression on him that lasts a lifetime.

On the last day of 1919 he has to return to Singapore. From a time before airmail, when a letter took four weeks to get from the Far East to Home by steamer, his letters to her, discovered recently, tell the story of their love.