| Administrative History | Stuart, known as Ivan, Tudge (born 1925) joined the army aged 18 on 20 May 1943. Conscripted during World War Two, just three months after his 18th birthday, Ivan served with the Royal Artillery and took part in the D-Day landings in June 1944. His primary role was to man one of the gun turrets in anticipation of an air attack. His army service took him to Ardennes, the Nijmegen Bridge in the Netherlands, across the Rhine and into the ruins of Hamburg. Demobilised in London two weeks after his 21st birthday, Ivan caught the train back to Matlock via Derby and walked back to the Hooley estate in Darley Dale telling his mother “I’m home”. In the 1950s and 1960s, he worked as a driver and later a mechanic at the Derbyshire Stone Company. Ivan lived at Rockview Cottages in Matlock Bath with his wife Kathleen (nee Bird, married 1955) and their son. Shortly after Kathleen died in 2006, Ivan moved to Underhall, Darley Dale. He died in April 2016 aged 91. |
| Custodial History | This records were donated by the recorder of the oral history in February 2020. |