Promise is kept - after 18 years

A promise made to a Bideford family has been kept - more than 17 years after. When, following VE Day, Mr Frank Willanneuva, a member of the United States Forces, returned to his home country, he promised Mrs M J Durant and her daughters Phyllis and Margaret, at whose home, 'Darracott', Abbotsham Road, he had been billeted for nearly a year, that he would 'write soon'. But then Mr Willanneuva, who hailed from Mexico, could write little English. Now, writing from 700 South Street, Tulare, California, he has invited Miss Phyllis Durant to visit him. Said Miss Durant, 'Naturally I am unable to make the trip but I was very pleased to hear from him'. By a strange coincidence, less than a month before the family received Mr Willanneuva's letter they received a letter of gratitude from Mr Harold Crawford, of Brigg, Lincolnshire. He thanked Mrs Durant for having looked after his wife for three years at the end of the war when he was a casualty and in Bideford Hospital. 'It was certainly strange that after so long these two men should have been thinking of us at the same time.' said Mrs Durant.