Muriel Joyce Marion Flach

b. 14 Jun 1920 d. 24 Apr 1963

Muriel was educated at Our Lady'.s Convent and was hoping to take up medicine but the War intervened and she was called up to join the ATS. After the war she worked for Brigadier Huxley at the Nuffield Foundation and met many famous people, including Barnes Wallis, the designer of the `bouncing bomb', which was used to destroy the German dams.

She moved into a flat in Coram Street in the fifties and stayed there until she became ill. It was used by Laurie and his student friends as a meeting place while he was at college. Muriel studied for a degree part-time in Classics at Birkbeck College - a great achievement while still working full-time, especially as colleges were not so geared to part-timers as they are now.

Shortly after obtaining her degree, she became ill and Parkinson's disease was diagnosed. She agreed to have a brain operation but it was unsuccessful and left her paralysed down one side. She had to give up work and moved back home to Park Hill, until she became too ill to nurse at home, when she moved to a nursing home in Kensington until her death aged 42.

She never married but had many good friends with whom she went on holiday. She owned a boat which was berthed at Maldon in Essex and she went sailing most weekends.