Love in Later Life: Old Age, Marriage and Social Research in Mid-Twentieth-Century Britain

Abstract

In January 1955 Alfred Harvey delivered an expressive and thoughtful account of his relationship with his late wife to the social researcher Peter Townsend, who was investigating the family lives of the ageing residents of Bethnal Green, East London:¹

She’s always been something different from other people to me. She was always kind when you were queer. You can’t tell how you miss someone until they go. Death’s a terrible thing, to lose someone you love. She never grumbled, all the times when I was walking and walking, trying to get work. She was exceptional, what you would call exceptional good. My son misses his mother. He went into his room and he cried that terrible. And I cried too, especially when I heard one of those dramas on the wireless where there was a husband and wife rowing. Just to think of all the happiness we’ve had.

Sometimes I get lonely. I think of her. There’s not a day passes but she’s in my mind. When she died I don’t know how I stood on my feet. You don’t know what it is when you don’t have a wife. Sometimes I think I hear her calling in the new room.²