In April 1937, Chick spoke about his love life to a “Radio Pictorial” journalist. Of course the journalist wasn’t interested in homely stories of canny Hartlepool lasses, so before reprinting the ‘London’ line, it is relevant to consider first of all the Hartlepool girls.
His mic is his sweetheart - Chick Henderson in full swing.
Chick courted, as mentioned earlier, Francey Sanderson, Frances died in the 1980’s. She was a dainty, petite young girl, and their relation- ship lasted quite a while. On one occasion, after a disagreement, he began courting a girl named Josie Hogg, but he claims to have ‘dropped’ her, and returned to Francey. Josie may have been the one who told him to get a “proper” job, when he applied to the B.B.C. for an audition.
Chick himself takes up the story.
“I’d been looking for work for twelve months, having served my apprenticeship as a Marine Engineer. But I didn’t want to be an engineer. I wanted to sing. And I flopped
“Get a real job” — the girl had said — “and I’ll marry you.” If only she had taken my hand before I went into that studio, and said: “Good luck - I know you’ll get through,” well, I might have had a chance. Instead, she laughed.
So I broke my next date with her, to sing in a “gig” and I never saw her again. Who cares?
I wouldn’t “come down to earth.”
The next woman I nearly fell in love with also laughed at the wrong moment. We met at a ball — she was a guest, and I’d just got a night’s job sing- mg in the band. She drove me home afterwards, and there was a full moon, and we rather liked each other. She asked me where I worked, and I told her : didn’t, whereupon she mentioned that her father owned a chain of shoe-stores.
I explained that I had ambitions to be a singer. She laughed, a social little laugh, and told me to “come down to earth.” I did.
I took my-arm from around her waist, stepped out of the car, raised my somewhat battered hat, and frigidly said: “Good-night.” What I really meant was: “Good-bye!”
One day I took part in a local talent competition, Jan Ralfini heard me, and I was offered a job in his band. Simultaneously I was offered a job at sea. A girl whom I had known for some years - a schooldays sweetheart - advised me to take the job at sea. I packed my trunks immediately and went — to Jan Ralfini.
Why wouldn’t these women understand?
Singing with Jan Ralfini one week at Birmingham, a beautifully gowned and obviously wealthy young lady came round to the stage door one night and asked to see me. Maybe she was crazy, but she was sweet, too.
She told me she had quite fallen in love with my voice. I escorted her home, and after that — well, we saw quite a lot of each other. Here was a girl who understood me all right, and didn’t laugh in the wrong places.
It was too bad that her parents were so old-fashioned. It appeared that they harboured the gravest suspicions of anybody connected with the stage and when they discovered that I was a singer, fireworks started immediately! I was told that unless I took to a “respectable job” I must stop seeing their daughter.
Did I tell you that girl was sweet? She was brave too...
We had one more meeting, secretly, and it turned out to be our last. “You mustn’t let me stop you, you mustn’t let me stand in your way,” she said. And she told me how it was with her — how she was going to hate losing me — “hate it like the dickens.” But yet, if I were to give up singing, so that I could be with her still, then I would not be the same man she had known and liked so much.
She said: “I know you are too strong to let a woman interfere with your work. You are set on an idea. Well, that’s all right with me. I understand. And I dream of the day when I shall be sitting at home, and I shall suddenly hear your voice on the air...
I have never seen or heard of her from that day to this, but I always wonder if she is still listening.
Yes, I’ve made some grand friends — and I’ve had to say goodbye to them.
There was, for instance, a girl vocalist in another band which I joined for a while. She was just a pal, but we went around together quite a lot that is, until the leader pointed out she was his girl friend.
I knew then, from the way he spoke, that if there were any “big breaks” going in that particular outfit, it would be she who would get them. I didn’t want to stand in her way, and I couldn’t let her stand in mine.
I decided to quit immediately. It was an unexpectedly tearful parting. She said: “Listen, boy, you don’t want to walk out like this, you’re a stranger to London. Suppose I come with you, and we try a double act.”
I told her she was a darling: “But whose girl friend are you, anyway?” I said, and that was the end of that.