Wednesday, April 8, 2020

Key West 1948? & Birthday Party

Via Nephew Bill

Left to right Brock and Brother Henry. I walked straight out to sea until I became tired. :)


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My birthday party and I'm not sure of the year.  Left to right around the table: Teddy Sharp, Winston Huffman, the Baptist minister's daughter whose name I can't recollect at the moment, Daddy, Mother, Henry, Michael Peters and Georgia Whitford.

Michael was the son of Reverend Harold Peters, minister of Grace Episcopal Church in The Plains.  He and I were going to room together at Randolph-Macon in the fall.  I was working for my father in his office that summer and remember when my mother told me of this while at my desk.  I got up, walked to the front door, peered through the screen and was dumbfounded as to why there were cars still traveling on the street. He and I had double dated some that summer with two cousins, Jaque and Courtenay Green and I believe it was the next day that I picked up Jaque. She said that the last thing she remembered was playing with his big toe the night he left her to travel to Fredericksburg, but never made it as he evidently fell asleep and crashed into the front of a tractor trailer full of watermelons.  He loved his Jaguar and was buried with the gearshift knob in his hand. Michael's brother, Peyton was killed in a wreck after this and his sister Polly was horribly mangled in a wreck also, but survived. (My first daughter born in Saigon was named Emily Michael Townsend)

6 comments:

  1. Brock those are lovely family photos. Isn’t it a Godsend to be able to have memories, the good and the bad?

    Xoxo
    TeresaSue

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    Replies
    1. It certainly is sweetie and thanks. :)

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    2. Michael was so young. Reverend Harold Peters Baptized me, Emily and Virginia in June 1997 in his back yard.

      ~~Thuy

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    3. I have a picture that hangs with the paintings he gave me.  He, Mother, Virginia and Emily are walking up from his study at 'Tenby', Spotsylvania Court House, Virginia. I have more pictures  of that day and should post them. Polly was with him and she lived a long life even after the horrendous accident. Mother said that Mr. Peters' faith never faded even after Polly's accident and the death of both Michael and Peyton.

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