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Joyce Mary Keenan 1922 - 2022

Joyce Mary Keenan 1922 - 2022

The following information is taken from the Eulogy at her funeral, written by her daughter Karen and grandson Gavin Keenan.


Joyce Mary Keenan (nee Tabbitt) was born on New Year’s Day 1922 in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire to parents Jack and Lily. She spent her early years in Sussex and had a happy childhood, often helping her Dad prepare his pigs for agricultural shows. At the age of 14, she left school and began her working life when she took a job in service as a parlour maid.


At 17 she began a nursing career at the Kent and Sussex hospital. This coincided with the outbreak of World War 2. During the evacuation of Dunkirk, injured servicemen

were brought into the hospital by the truckload because there weren’t enough ambulances to cope. She also treated airmen shot down during the Battle of Britain. This included Germans as well as RAF personnel. Despite what the Germans represented she would be as dedicated to their care as she would to anybody else’s. Sometimes she would even have to help protect them if word got out among the other patients that a German pilot was in the hospital.


When her Mum sadly died she sacrificed her career so she could return home to support her Dad and look after her younger sister Mavis.


Joyce met Jock Keenan in the Five Ashes pub in Kent in 1945. They later married in Sudbury and had 4 children, Neville, Roger, Karen and Lyn.


In 1952 the family moved to Borough, although that house isn’t there anymore and in 1954 they moved to Micheldever and lived at 96 Winchester Rd opposite the Half Moon and Spread Eagle from where Joyce was known to hand sandwiches out of the window to the regulars at chucking out time as they made their way home the worse for wear.


In 1957 they moved to Southbrook Farm in Rook Lane. She loved that house. It was a happy

family home, the location for many large family Christmases. There would be Joyce & Jock, their children and grandchildren plus Alsatians everywhere. No matter how busy it got though, if ever anyone else came calling Joyce would always invite them in and offer to feed them.


Over the course of 50 years, Joyce became woven into the fabric of the village and was the very definition of a pillar of the community. She was first call for the District Nurse to lay people out when they died and she kept a bag under the stairs ready to be called out whenever needed. She worked in the village shop and post office for 38 years, well into her 80s. 


She was an amazing fundraiser and in 1963, formed the Micheldever friends of the mentally handicapped inspired by her disabled daughter Lyn. Along with her small army of volunteers, she would spend months organising their bi-annual Christmas sales and over the years raised more than £100,000 for charity.


When the great storm of 1987 struck, Micheldever was left without power. Joyce and her neighbour Mrs Cumberland had wood-fired Agas and were able to knock up stews and soups and fill flasks with tea and coffee for those who had been cut off.


She threw herself into the social side of village life too, including annual fancy dress parties on New Year’s Eve at the Half Moon.


Joyce was well-known in the village for her beautiful garden. Joyce didn’t like anything to go to waste and would re-purpose or up-cycle. For example, a pair of outgrown wellies would be turned into a hanging basket. Or if a new toilet was fitted, in no time at all the old one would be outside with flowers growing from it. No matter what it was she’d find a way to plant something in it.


Unfortunately, in 2003 a burst water pipe caused massive flooding so Joyce had to leave Southbrook Farm and move to Sutton Scotney. Although she left Micheldever at that time her heart never did. She became a regular attendee of the monthly Village Lunch held at Northbrook Hall, driving herself there well into her 90s! Her charitable activities also carried on after the move and she would knit hats and garments for premature and stillborn babies.

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