4th March 1946.

John Smedley was the eldest of three brothers from an old Repton family.   He was brought up in Main Street and attended the village primary school.   As a young man he worked in the co-op in Willington, Littleover and then in Derby.

During the war he fought on the front line in Burma but was taken ill in the far east. Repatriated to England, he spent some time in Wakefield Military Hospital before returning to Derby where he died in Derby Royal Infirmary.

Although he never married, he had a girlfriend in Scotland.