Derek Cunningham and his wife Pauline at the Braye Beach Hotel in Alderney after winning a Guernsey Press/Blue Islands competition. It was his first visit to the island in 20 years, having previously lived in Alderney after his parents moved there from Liverpool.

VISITING Alderney for the first time in 20 years brought back many happy memories for Guernseyman Derek Cunningham.

Derek, 71, and wife Pauline, 65, spent a night at the Braye Beach Hotel after winning a Guernsey Press/Blue Islands competition.

The visit took Derek back to his childhood in the 1940s, when his parents decided to move to Alderney from Liverpool.

‘I can remember my mother and father saying, “Right, lads, we’re going to live in Alderney” – wherever that was,’ he said. ‘They said we could swim in the sea until October and it never snows. So we came over and the swimming was fantastic, but 1947 was one of the worst winters on record.’

Derek and his parents, Charlie and Dorothy Cunningham, as well as his younger brother Clifford, boarded a seven-seat de Havilland Dragon Rapide aircraft and took off for the Channel Islands just a few years after the Second World War had ended. They lived in Connaught Square before moving to the top of Longis Road. Later, they lived in Newtown.

‘My dad was a hairdresser and he must have thought there was an opportunity in Alderney,’ said Derek. ‘He started a salon, but it didn’t go that well and he became a milkman. That was good because I used to get up early, before he churned the milk, and get a pint of cream and have it on my porridge. It was lovely.’

Derek also remembers his grandmother moving to Alderney.

‘I can remember her coming down from Liverpool. She found it difficult living in Alderney and didn’t last long.

‘One day she went out and brought back two cabbages. When my mother asked where they were from, she said there were loads of wild ones growing in a field. She didn’t realise nothing was fenced off in the island.’

Alderney was a schoolboy’s playground, according to Derek.

‘It was paradise for boys, but it could be dangerous. We used to find bullets and bayonets, which had been left over from the war, and play Germans. There were hundreds of bullets and I can remember a few friends getting their fingers blown off. And sometimes people would find mines in places where we had been playing the week before.’

The Cunninghams spent about five years in Alderney before moving to Guernsey. Charlie eventually went back to hairdressing, while Dorothy ran the family’s Clifton home as a guest house.

Derek, who now lives in La Route de la Hougue du Pommier, Castel, spent three years in the Netherlands studying horticulture before returning to Guernsey. He held down several jobs before marrying and having three children. His first wife died of cancer but he found love again after meeting Pauline at a wedding in Northumberland. It was love at first sight for the pair, who recently married at Gretna Green in Scotland.

Apart from his childhood, Derek had visited Alderney just once prior to his recent stay. He said it would not be another 20 years before he returns.

‘I’m pleased we’ve come – I have quite a few memories of Alderney. There are a lot more houses than there used to be but St Anne hasn’t changed much. It’s just been spruced up a bit – it’s nice.’