A funeral service was held at the East Riding Crematorium on Monday February 22, for Mrs Violet May Wilson who died at Riverhead Hall Residential Care Home on the February 5. She was aged 96 years.
The service was conducted by Father David White and the organist was Mr Steven Westaway.
Violet was born in 1919 at Kirkby in Ashfield, near Nottingham. She had three sisters and two brothers. She attended junior and senior schools in Kirkby. She really enjoyed her school days and did really well. At the outbreak of the World War Two she joined the WAAF’s. Due to her English and Arithmetic skills from school she was selected to go for training as a Pay Accountant so had the further education she missed in earlier years.
She was posted to RAF Leuchars in Scotland where she met her husband-to-be, James (Jimmy) Wilson, who was already working in the Pay Accounts section there. They married in Edinburgh in 1942. After the war she was demobilised from the WAAF and her husband stayed in the RAF. They went on to have two children, Tony and Ian. Jimmy was posted to Egypt in 1949 and Violet and Tony followed him out there. After two years they returned to the UK. In 1963 he was posted to Australia (near Adelaide) and Violet and Ian went with him, although Tony had already joined the RAF himself and was unable to go. She really enjoyed her time there and obtained a job as a receptionist at a local GP surgery. She was also involved in the accounts and bookkeeping. After two years they returned to the UK.
Jimmy left the RAF in 1968 and they settled in Doncaster. Violet worked at the Maternity Unit at Doncaster Royal Infirmary. In 1972 they went out to Cyprus to see Tony and Mary and their first grandchild, Alistair.
They were planning for their retirement when in late 1975 Jimmy was diagnosed with lung cancer. He sadly died in June 1976, at the age of 54.
Violet tried to get on with her life as much as possible and carried on working at Doncaster Royal Infirmary until her retirement at 60. She was also a volunteer for Age Concern in Doncaster for over 25 years and a member of WAAF Association for many years.
Since retirement she has been with her family on holiday to the Caribbean and Florida as well as visiting Tony and his family in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, several times during the 80s. She had lots of friends in Doncaster and went on several holidays with her closest ones.
After a number of mobility problems she moved into Riverhead Hall Residential Care home in Driffield in February 2012 to be close to her family.
Family mourners: June and David Ledger (sister and brother in law), Tony and Mary Wilson (son and daughter in law), Ian and Sue Wilson (son and daughter in law), James and Alistair Wilson (grandsons), Lynsay Wilson and Mario Nowak (granddaughter and fiance), Kieran Wilson (great grandson).
Others present: Shirley Dowling, Bernard Watts, Andy and Teresa Coleman, Betty Jenkinson, Derek and Anne Steeper, Pam and Gary Breedon, Linda and Colin Mclay, Violet Basford, Peter and Bradley Coleman and Kirsty Duffield also rep Riverhead Nursing Home.