Iris Waller Family

 

Here is what daughter Stevie wrote me in e-mail.

 

“I remember my mother telling me that my father joined the army and left rather abruptly because he thought he was not the right man for her. After he left, she took a nursing job in a children's hospital in Ohio where she met the man to whom she was engaged. My father was discharged from the Army; went to find my mother. Grandpa told him where she was in Ohio. He went there, found her and they were married the next day. I do not know a lot about my mother and father's relationship before he joined the Army the first time. But, I found a picture of my father that he had painted while he was in Italy. My father's picture was in pastel colors and there was a picture of my mother in charcoal which was drawn above his head and an inscription was written under her picture which stated "Today I received a letter from Iris, the sweetest girl in the world whom I hope to make my wife." He called my mother Honeygirl and the picture also said "Honeygirl you are always in my thoughts." My mother and father met when he came to Lynchburg with his mother and sister for his father's funeral. He was 21 when his father died so my mother would have been 19 when she first met him. They married when she was 25 and he was 27. During the six years prior to her marriage to my fahter; she finished her nursing; and moved to Ohio.”

 

 

Daughter Daphne says this photo is about the time Iris and Herbert got married. It is taken at the Waller home.

 

I heard this story about the honeymoon morn. When Herbert woke up he put a piece of soap under his arm. This was an old trick used by servicemen to make them have a temperature. The nursing instincts of Iris took over and she nursed the supposedly sick man all day.

 

Soon after the marriage Herbert found himself back in the service for World War II. Iris and children went to live with her parents.

 

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