NOTTINGHAM GI bride Edna Etzler has died in America just before her 100th birthday.

Born Edna Allen in June 1909, in Berridge Road, Hyson Green, she worked at Players before emigrating to the USA in 1946.

Her first husband, Squadron Leader William Fletcher, was a highly-decorated bomber pilot with 158 Squadron. But on a raid in February 1943, his Halifax was shot down and he died with his crew.

He is buried in the Jonkerbos War Cemetery in Holland.

Heartbroken, Edna picked up the pieces of her life and married again.

With second husband Stan Shipman, she had a daughter, named Geraldine – now aged 75 – but their joy was to be short-lived as Stan died soon after.

Edna was alone again, but one night in a Nottingham pub she met a handsome American soldier named Leroy Etzler.

First Lieutenant Etzler, from Fort Wayne, Indiana, was serving with the 316th Trooper Carrier Group and would shortly be heading for Normandy.

But there was time for the two to fall in love.

They got married in London. After the war, Lt Etzler was shipped back to the States and a job with the International Harvester company.

In 1946, his new bride and her daughter set sail for America to join him, leaving the rationing and austerity of England behind.

As she waited at a transit camp at Tidworth, Hampshire, ready to embark, she penned a note to her parents which her niece Judith Gamble, of Bestwood Lodge, has preserved.

"The only time I felt miserable," she wrote, "was when I was settling down to sleep and I began thinking of you and Dad."

She finished her letter with news that her great adventure was about to begin.

"Just had our cabin numbers and found out that I am in the lower berth and Geraldine in the upper. I shall have to learn to duck in case she is sea-sick!"

Edna and Leroy settled down in Fort Wayne and had one son who was named William after her first husband. He is now in his 50s.

"She always loved her first husband," said Mrs Gamble.

Leroy Etzler died about ten years ago and soon after Edna moved into a care home in Fort Wayne.

In her younger days, Edna made several journeys back to Nottingham, travelling on board the Queen Mary on at least one occasion.

Mrs Gamble, daughter of Edna's sister Joan, said: "I took my mother to see her in 2007. A cousin brought Edna down to Geraldine's home in Florida where we all gathered.

"Right to the end, she was alert, very vibrant and colourful. She could tell a good story."

The funeral of Mrs Edna Etzler, aged 99, took place in Fort Wayne, Indiana, on Monday.