Here are another couple who were at Fontainebleau together. Cpl. Brian Hill was a Typist/GD in the Orderly Room in the RAF Support Unit. After working 3 months in Caserne Damesme from March 1952 Brian transferred later to Camp Guynemer.
Seeing an advertisement for civilian staff
on the base he sent application forms to his girlfriend Barbara Haynes who was
accepted as a civilian Bilingual Personal Assistant in the HQ in May 1952
working for USAF and the French Public Relations. Prior to enlisting in the RAF
Brian was a commercial artist. The couple were married in Wanlip Church,
Leicestershire They have 2 sons and a daughter. After leaving AAFCE in December
1953 Brian saw out the rest of his 3 year engagement at RAF Cottesmore before
returning to his civilian profession as Artist/Printer at the East Midlands Gas
Board followed 10 years later by a move to Coventry College of Art as a
Graphics Technician. Two years later he relocated to Scotland to take up his
first teaching post at Glasgow College of Printing for 5 years following which
he took a post as Lecturer, Higher Education at The London College of Printing
for 19 years. He took a teacher/lecturer exchange for one year with his
counterpart in Sydney, Australia. He then sat a 3 year “in service” graduate
B.A. course in Photo Media Studies at Middlesex University. In 1990 Brian
retired and moved home from Kent to Norfolk where he is a volunteer with the
National Coast Watch Institution at Gorleston.
In addition to bringing up their 3 children Barbara had an equally illustrious career firstly working in hospitals before joining Chrysler UK as Personnel Officer rising to Personnel Manager. During the 10 years they have been retired Brian and Barbara have refurbished their 1890 cottage. Barbara is now a member of the Cancer Information Service at her local hospital.
Cpl Geoff Morgan, introduced by Peter Goldsmith, was
another member of the International Motor Pool from April 1957 until October
1959, where he served as a statistics clerk. He was a member of the AFCENT
Sailing, Hockey and Rally clubs. Geoff completed his service with the RAF CRO
in Bromyard Avenue, Acton, where he says he was surprised to discover the
amount and variety of crime that occurred in the RAF. In March 1960, he returned
to Fontainebleau to marry someone special, whom he had fallen for some months
before he left. That was Michele (nee Le Texier), a civilian who worked for the
Civilian Personnel Office on Camp Guynemer. Since then, they have returned to
Fontainebleau regularly to visit family. On leaving the RAF in 1961, he joined
the Finance Department of the Board of Trade, moving on a few years later to
join the International Treasury Department of Barclays Bank, with whom he spent
30 years. In early retirement, he worked as a Treasury Consultant for the World
Bank, advising banks in the Baltic States. He also took a four-year Winchester
diocesan theology course and was licensed as a C of E Reader in Nov. 2001. Now
in official retirement, having recently acquired his free bus pass, he says
life continues to be busy with many commitments and interests. Geoff says he is
looking forward to renewing acquaintances at the next UK reunion with ex-AAFCE
colleagues some 40 years on, and remains grateful to the RAF for setting him
up, finding his wife and for happy memories of old friends and colleagues some,
alas who have passed on. Now that we are all in the firing line, we must make
the most of our health, time and opportunities, he concludes.
