Fred became re-acquainted with Catherine ("Rena") Bernadette Costello in September 1962, when he was 21. He had first met Costello—who came from Coatbridge, Lanarkshire—at a Much Marcle dance hall in 1960, and dated her for several months before she returned to Scotland. Costello was pregnant by an Asian bus driver at the time of her marriage to Fred, and may have relocated from Glasgow to England due to members of her family expressing their displeasure at her being pregnant with a mixed-race child. She married Fred in Ledbury on 17 November, the sole guest being Fred's younger brother John. The couple initially lived in Fred's aunt's home, then moved to Coatbridge, where Fred worked as an ice cream van driver. Rena's daughter, Charmaine, was born in March 1963; to explain the child's mixed ancestry, Rena and Fred claimed that she had suffered a miscarriage and that Charmaine was adopted. Shortly thereafter, the couple relocated to Savoy Street, in the Bridgeton district of Glasgow.