Ralph faced horrors of war as his wife gave birth at home
Ralph Cousins wasn't there for the birth of his first daughter - although he was prepared to risk the wrath of the British Army to try to be.
Ralph Cousins
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When Gladys Cousins gave birth to their daughter Valerie on June 11 1944, Battery Sergeant Major Ralph Cousins was pinned down at Point 103 along with the rest of the Essex Yeomanry.
Surrounded on three sides, the company had been forced to dig in to ditches and weather the assault.
But Ralph had seen Gladys just days before their daughter was born and in doing so had risked a court martial.
As Allied troops massed on the south coast in preparation for the imminent invasion, with little contact with the outside world for fear of information leaking out, Ralph's thoughts were elsewhere.
“We were pretty shocked when we found out what had happened,” says Valerie, who now lives in Nash Mills: “Dad always followed the rules, and he always taught us to do the same.”
It seems that knowing that his wife was due to give birth at the end of May and also that she had moved out of London to the safety of Reading, Ralph made the bold decision to go AWOL, despite being on standby.
Luckily for Ralph, someone in authority must have been smiling on him, as he made it back to camp, ready for the invasion.
When he was demobbed after the war he was commended for his ‘Exemplary Military Conduct'.
Ralph sadly died in 2002, having brought up his five children alone after the tragic death of Gladys in 1960.
“He never spoke much about the war, but when he did he never glorified it,” says Valerie. Although he occasionally revealed little bits of information to his children, it wasn't until Valerie accompanied him to the 50th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy in 1994 that the full extent of her father's experiences were revealed to her.
As they stood on the beaches with some of Ralph's former comrades Ralph began to tell his D-Day story.
“He joked that he had been more worried about the sea trip over to Normandy than the landing itself,” said Valerie.
“He always thought presentation was important and made sure he was clean shaven before he left Southampton.”
She added: “Apparently they made seven attempts to land. He remembered losing all his kit as he waded ashore apart from a pair of binoculars which he kept. They couldn't see anything as they landed and once they were on the beach they had no idea what was over the top of the sand dunes.”
Valerie and her father continued their tour around Normandy and made a stop at an unremarkable looking field. This field was Point 103.
The point where Ralph and the rest of the Essex Yeomanry found themselves pinned down by German fire.
Ralph's exact location on June 11 1944, while back home in England his wife was giving birth to Valerie.
“While we were in Normandy dad and his comrades had a lot of friendly banter,” said Valerie. “They were all arguing over who had done what and where and who had made mistakes, 50 years after it happened!”
Valerie herself has two daughters Nicola and Karen.
By an extraordinary coincidence, given their grandfather's military background, Nicola's birthday is November 11, Armistice Day.
While Karen was born on June 6 1972, exactly 28 years to the day after her grandfather had landed on a beach in Normandy knowing his wife was expecting their first child at any point.
