The honour of being the 1950 St Mary of the Angels May Queen went to Catherine Heaps, daughter of Ernest and Mary Heaps (formerly Rush).
The ceremony took place on Sunday, 7 May and was described as follows:
So numerous were the people seeking admission to St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church, Batley, for Benediction on Sunday that many had to remain outside. The occasion was the annual May Queen procession marking the beginning of the year of office of 13-year-old Catherine Heaps,1 who succeeded Moya Hill.2
After an impressive service the procession wound its way round the church to the accompaniment of the hymn “O Mary we crown Thee with blossoms to-day.” The Queen’s attendants, in snow white suits, were her brother, Edwin, and Denis Mann. Others in the procession were the retiring Queen and her attendants, the Children of Mary and the Guild of St. Agnes, with a choir, the beautiful attire of the young people making the procession a striking sight.
It was the children’s day, and they knew it. Devotion, reverence and an almost adult sense of the dignity of the great occasion seemed to possess the various bodies of boys and girls who went in procession to pay honours in this her month, to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and incidentally to pay honour to radiant though very nervous little Catherine Heaps, their duty appointed May Queen.
An image of the Blessed Virgin was carried in the procession, and amid a reverent hush was crowned with a wreath of blossom.
In his sermon Father O’ Brien stressed that Jesus was man as well as God, and that he owed so very, very much to His Blessed Virgin Mother. He drew a vivid word picture of the angel approaching Mary and humbly waiting for her answer after he passed on to Her the most stupendous tidings in history, the fact that She had been chosen to bear in Her womb the Christ, the Son of God.
The Spread of Communism
Communism, said Father O’ Brien, had spread its evil tentacles over more than half the world, and it was the duty of Catholics to pray earnestly to the Blessed Virgin Mary, beseeching her to intercede with Her dear Son, our Lord, that war might be averted, and that our young men, especially those we knew here in Batley, might not be called upon to undergo the horrors of another war. “God is merciful, but He is also just, and He cannot fail to be moved to wrath at the evil and wickedness in the world to-day,” declared Father O’Brien.
Among the Children of Mary, who played such a prominent role in the procession and service were Mary Heaps, Delia Heaps, Josephine Senior, Margaret Travis, Moria Kelly, Rita Kelly, Patricia Kilbride, Winnie Rowan, Kathleen Gooder, Renee Kelly, Jean Gooder, Kathleen Lyons, Kathleen Brennan, Rita Mulcahy, Mary Evans, Mary Healey, Kitty Ryan, Connie Sharp, Emmy Sharp, Agnes Moran, Rita Harkin, Kathleen Brahoney, and Bernadette Senior.
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Footnotes:
1. Catherine’s reported age was incorrect, it being 12 not 13.
2. I have corrected this spelling with the report incorrectly stating Moya’s name as Moira.
Past To Present Genealogy 