HAS Jersey ever seen a family gathering like it?
When Barbara Lee reached her 100th birthday, the party provided an opportunity for the great-great-grandmother to pose for a picture featuring five generations of Jersey girls.
The guests included Mrs Lee’s daughter Joan Le Roy, her granddaughter Sarah Perez, great-granddaughter Jade Bellamy and four-year-old Amelia Bellamy, one of four great-great-grandchildren.
Not only that, but the day also marked the 101st birthday of Mrs Lee’s older sister Dorris Bisson, who also lives at St Ewold’s residential home in St Helier, where the gathering of friends and relatives was held.
Mrs Bellamy said her great-nan had lived independently until April 2024, when she had decided that she’d prefer not to have to cook for herself, subsequently moving into the parish-run home alongside her sister.
“She is still very independent and likes to get about and come out with family,” Ms Bellamy said. “She was asked about her secret and said she’d always tried to stay active, rather than just sitting in a chair.”
Born Barbara de St Croix in Jersey in February 1925, Mrs Lee had eight siblings and her family was evacuated to North Yorkshire during the Second World War before returning to
the Island after Liberation Day.
In 1946, she married Gordon Collas and the following year the couple’s daughter Joan was born, followed by her sister Sheila, who died in 2022, and brother Gordon jnr. Mrs Lee held several jobs, including working in a canning factory, and on Saturdays she and her daughter sold cakes at the weekly street market held in St Helier.
Mr Collas, a former prisoner-of-war on the Burma Railway, died in 1974 and in 1988 his widow married Jim Lee, whom she had met on Archirondel Beach. The couple subsequently moved to Mr Lee’s native England before Mrs Lee returned to Jersey around ten years ago following the death of her second husband.
Mrs Lee has always been “crafty”, her great-granddaughter said, using her skill in knitting, crochet and decoupage to make presents for members of her family, which in total included three children, six grandchildren, 12 great-grandchildren and – so far – four great-great-grandchildren aged from six years old to 15 months.
The family took the opportunity to take plenty of pictures of the birthday party – definitely an occasion to remember.
