Winifred ‘Betty’ Harris

Betty passed away peacefully at Leighton Hospital Betty on the 30th March aged 93 years.

The beloved wife of John and much loved mum to Roy and his wife Rachel who will be fondly remembered and so sadly missed by all her family and friends.

Bettys funeral will take place at Crewe Crematorium Chapel on Thursday the 18th April at 1.45pm.

For further information please call our funeral home on 01270 584447.

Our hearts go out to her close family and to friends. Especially at this sad time we
think of John, faithful and loving husband for 66 years, now bereft. We are all here
in solidarity.
John honoured every wedding promise he made – “to have and to hold from this
day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to
love and to cherish, till death us do part”. These last months have called forth the
very best from John, and I’m sure Betty appreciated that and knew in her heart she
had married a good ‘un.
Betty was born on a smallholding on Moss Lane off Parkers Road in 1930. She
was an only child – which meant that all the childhood chores fell to her and her
alone. So we can imagine her feeding the chickens, collecting the eggs, cultivating
the vegetables, and so on. Those were tough times to live through for nearly
everyone. The war which started when she was 8 years old meant she and her
mother were left to it for most of the time.
No doubt she learned resourcefulness, graft, resilience, determination, thrift –
characteristics which shone in her subsequent life. She also picked up something
significant from her father who had won the Military Medal for gallantry in WW1.
All the while as a youngster she was attending Bradfield Green school at the far
end of Moss Lane on Middlewich Road. She must have shown promise at school
because when she left aged 14 she spent a further year in academic study in The
Academy (long since closed but right in the heart of Crewe by the old Library).
From there she went on to work for Pearl Insurance on The Square, where she
demonstrated the magic of adding up long columns of figures in her head. A
favourite story from those days was when an insurance agent asked her the time.
Without hesitating she said “Quarter past ten”. The agent was curious how she
knew without looking at the clock. “The such a bus leaves the square at quarter
past and it’s just gone.”

From 1948, aged 18, she was working for the Ministry of Agriculture based, to start
with, at Reaseheath. She was offered a starting salary of 47/- per week with the
promise of 62/- if she could pass a test for 100 words per minute shorthand and
40wpm typing. We are sure she passed the test with flying colours.
Working for the Ministry of Agriculture she knew the location of farms and villages
across Cheshire. She knew interesting facts like strawberry plants have to be
replaced after 3 years, about the proposed drainage scheme near what became
the 8 Farmers and the fact that a cow had to have more window light than a typist.

Being a typist Betty was good at spelling. She could spell words like ‘necessary’
and ‘committee’ without hesitating. Of course she was used to typing on a heavy
manual machine, pressing the keys with great force. Years later this was an
alarming practice when she was using a laptop.

Betty and John were introduced by a mutual friend who emigrated to Canada
shortly after! Their first date got off to a bumpy start with a car trip to Llangollen in
his 1932 Singer. We don’t believe she was actually sick in the car, but she certainly
wasn’t a good car traveller.
Things got better some months later when John was ordered by his Major in the
TA to attend a Christmas party, so he asked Betty to accompany him. In fact,
things went so much better that they got engaged and married! The memorable
date: 15 th March 1958.
Later son Roy came on the scene, and then Rachel his wife who fitted so perfectly
into the family.

Betty was a great baker and always served up home cooked food at home. Her
multi-layer chocolate cake with butter cream filling and a layer of chocolate on the
top was a legend at home and elsewhere.

She was good at sewing and made some of her own clothes. Buying trousers of
the right size for Roy was never a problem. “They’ll be ok, I can turn that down for
you”.

We pay tribute to the carers from Evolving Care. Betty had a superb relationship
with the visiting staff and they did her proud. Thanks also to the staff of Ward 3 in
Leighton Hospital who did so much to make Betty’s last week comfortable. And
let’s not forget faithful loving son Roy and his sympathetic wife Rachel who have
served Betty so well and provided support for John and continue to be there for
him.
Betty lived by enduring Christian values. She loved God and she loved people. She
was clever, and almost certainly would have gone to University if she had come
from a later generation. She was bright and creative in several ways as noted
previously.