Tom survived both wars and lived to he was eighty years old, when he died in 1970. Although this novel is fiction, the family characters were real (although the characters outside of the family were made up). Tom is my Grandfather and his second wife my Grandmother. The story is centred around the dates discovered in my family history tracing, along with family stories, the events leading up to these dates had to be surmised. It is known that he was a postman, he went to war and was gassed. I felt he lived a life that was full and so I had to tell his story.