Brian Minchin was born in London in 1912 and was educated there between the wars. (His previous recollections can be viewed under Streatham Hill in the London section of this website.)

'The school I went to was Dulwich College, but before that I was at a very small private school earlier on. They used to teach us a bit of French and I was taught very badly; and my father who hadn't learnt much French at his own school was nevertheless interested in the French people and France generally.

Contradictions arose between what the school said and what my father said. What my father said was much more accurate, for my father and a neighbour had been having their own tuition.

Our next-door neighbour was Jack Rian, a father of two, and Manager of a Book Shop in London, not so very far from my father's office. They met in London, I don't quite know how the introduction came about, and when two Frenchmen from Paris were over they arranged to meet in a Lyons Café, and my father and Jack Rian would teach English to these two Frenchmen, and they in return would spend a lot of time teaching French to my father and Jack Rian.

They got on very well. My father, of course, as an Irishman was particularly interested in correct pronunciation in contradiction to the slum of the English, particularly the Cockneys who spoke very badly, and I later on, when I was in Paris before the Second World War, I visited them.

Jimmy Dupris, one of the Frenchmen concerned, my father kept in touch with. After the second war they had some correspondence but my father died at the end of 1946 but I kept in touch with Jimmy and I still exchange Christmas Cards and am happy to say that he is still alive today. He's about 94 but still writes very good English and when I spoke to him he spoke very good English indeed because not very many Frenchmen do.

In fact my wife Marjorie (nee Robertson), whom I married soon after the World War II in December 1946, and I did go over to Paris, 42 years after I had seen Jimmy and people would say that's a life time, which It was, but we had many discussions. His wife, I think his second Wife, didn't speak English so we all spoke French. Marjorie could get along in French although I later become an expert in French. The other Frenchman, George Perriau, my sister somehow managed to keep in touch with until he died.

My one Sister, who was younger then me, lived until 1993.'

Brian Minchin's further recollections can be read under Cambridge in the East of England section of this website.