The Sad Case of Thomas Diggory of the Gloucester Hussars

Almost eight million men (ref PCS) were left disabled after WW1 and my Great Uncle Tom was one of them.

I never met Tom, or Thomas James Diggory to give him his full name, as he died before I was born but I knew he'd served in the war and had been injured. His photograph took pride of place on the mantelpiece in my grandmother's dining room. Tom was her older brother.

Tom was born in 1894 in Sedgley in Staffordshire where the family lived in the lodge of Park Hall, now a hotel. Tom is in the centre of the photograph, standing behind his little sister, my grandmother, Edith Alice.

Before the war, Tom worked in service, as a footman, as seen here in his uniform (he's the one on the left).

Tom joined the 7th Battalion of the Gloucestershire Regiment opting to become a cavalryman in the Royal Gloucestershire Hussars, and serving in Gallapoli in 1915.

According to the account on the "Glosters" website, The Royal Gloucestershire Hussars arrived in Alexandria, Egypt in April 1915, a mounted force of 537 men. In August, after a period of training, they landed in Gallapoli where the rest of the 7th battalion had already sustained heavy losses. 

Ordered to leave their horses behind, they spent the next six weeks in battle around Chocolate Hill and the trenches around Cator House. By 17th October, with casualties and, more significantly, disease, having taken a severe toll, they were down to an effective strength of only 95. Tom had been badly injured in the leg, having stepped on an explosive.

Tom wearing his "hospital blues", the uniform that injured servicemen were required to wear during WW1, 

a practice first introduced during the Crimean War.

Tom remained in hospital for some considerable time, and I have yet to establish where, though it's been suggested it may have been in Birmingham. But Tom failed to thrive and continued to have problems with his injured leg.

 In 1932 he married Beatrice Wood (Betty). You can just make out his walking sticks in the photograph below, taken at their wedding. He was aged 38 by now and you can see from the photo that he doesn't look a well man.

A short time after this photograph was taken, Tom's injury became troublesome again, the wound refusing to heal, leaving a gaping hole in the flesh. 

But despite medical advice, and the support and encouragement of his family, Tom refused to agree to the offending leg being amputated.  "I came into this world with two legs," he's reported to have said, "and I shall leave it with two legs."

He remained bed-ridden, nursed by his wife Betty, until his death in 1954, aged 60.

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Post update February 2017

I received a comment on this post explaining that Thomas was not in the Hussars, as my grandmother, Thomas's sister always maintained, but in the Infantry. 

Unfortunately, as he/she commented anonymously and left no contact details, I wasn't able to go back to them to clarify matters (I'm confused that Thomas is sitting on a horse in the photo above but allegedly was in the Infantry – I'd love an explanation!).

But if anyone else can unpick the information below and get in touch, I'd be delighted to hear from you!

Sorry to say that Thomas was not one of ours, Gloucestershire Yeomanry, but Gloucesters (Infantry) 7th and 8th Battalions

He was at Gallipoli with the Infantry at the same time as his County cousins in the dismounted Yeomanry.

Name: Thomas James Diggory 
Military Year: 1914-1920 
Rank: Lance Corporal 
Medal Awarded: British War Medal and Victory Medal 
Regiment or Corps: Gloucestershire Regiment 
Regimental Number: 22240 
Previous Units: 7th Glouc. Regt. 22240 Pte., 8th Glouc. R. 22240 

Mystery motorbike

The photo of a woman on a motorcycle amongst the mystery 138 photographs has generated some speculation as to the make of bike.

My dad said he thought that someone on the side of the family from where we believe the photographs came, used to work for Sunbeam and he wondered if that was a clue. 

Sunbeam started out making bicycles but when they did begin to manufacture motorcycles, they gained a reputation for quality and did well in the famous TT races on the Isle of Man. 

Another proposal was that the bike was a James, dating from around 1921- 27, because of its chain drive and not the earlier belt drive. It was suggested that this actual bike might have been modified in some way.

To settle the matter I contacted the National Motorcycle Museum in Birmingham to ask for their thoughts. James Hewing very kindly responded to my email and identified the bike as an Royal Enfield 500c, from around 1927.

Interestingly, while watching the new BBC drama, The Crimson Field, about a field hospital in WW1, one of the characters arrived on a motorcycle which looked suspiciously like the one above with its distinct box-like petrol tank. Whoever chose the 'props' obviously did their homework. Apparently Enfield supplied the British War Department with a large number of motorcycles in 1914.

But having identified the bike, I'm still no further on in identifying the lady sitting astride it. Any suggestions? 

(For the background read the original post here.)

The school cat?

This school photograph of my husband's mother, Eunice Irene Saunders is one of my favourites from our photo collection.

Eunice is the fourth from the right, on the front row. (I love the little mop cap of the girl two places away from her and the big bows in the hair of others!)

Eunice was born in 1914 and lived in Langthorne Street, Fulham. We think she's about 6 or 7 years old in this photograph which would date it at around 1920.

There are several schools near Langthorne Street but the closest, and likely to be the one Eunice attended, is Queens Manor Primary School. 

An imposing three storey brick building, Queen's Manor School was built in 1903-4 as a 'board' school. School boards were set up nationally, following the Education Act 1870 to provide primary education, although it would be another ten years before school would become compulsory across the whole country. 

The School Board of London, responsible for Queen's Manor Primary was the very first board to come into existence. By the Edwardian period, many schools in the Queen Anne style of Queen's Manor had been built across London and although there was some criticism of the expense lavished on the build, the board's supporters were unapologetic, seeing their schools as beacons to the vision of education for all.

So was the photograph above of Eunice and her class mates taken for a special occasion? Is the cat in the arms of the older girl standing against the partition (we think she's too young to be the teacher) an official "school cat" or just visiting? 

Perhaps one of your ancestors attended Queen's Manor School. They might even be in this photograph. 

If so, I'd love to hear from you!

From Hall to Hovel

One interesting part of family history is discovering the places where our ancestors lived, using the census records.

A few years ago a family historian visited our village researching his Devon family who had lived in our cottage during the 19th century. He was delighted to discover the present inhabitants were fellow enthusiasts and we were similarly intrigued to hear about his family. He left copies of the census returns of our house with us, listing the people who'd lived there and he was able to take away a contemporary photograph of the 'old family home' for his records. Later he sent us a photo of our cottage taken in the 1890s, with the family dressed in their Sunday best standing outside.

One of my favourite old family photographs is this one of my great-grandparents, Thomas and Eliza (nee Roberts) Diggory in front of their home, with my grandmother, Edith Alice, aged about 14 years old. The architecture of the house has always interested me, as it's very industrial in style. So where is it?

The Wergs, near Wolverhampton?

On the 1911 census, which would be about the time this photograph was taken (if that wonderful hat of my great-grandmother's is any guide!), the family were living at The Wergs, near Wolverhampton. According to information I've come across online, it was an area which apparently attracted wealthy Black Country industrialists who made their homes there. Could it be this association which influenced the building style?

Another house, photographed below, again with my great-grandmother standing outside might be Nursery Walk, in Tettenhall, where she lived some years later. But the number on the door is 39, and her address was number 19. So where's this? The house next door has the word BREMALL carved into the lintel above the front door, though the photograph cuts off the word after it, which might have helped in its identification.

I've been lucky when visiting places where ancestors have lived to find many of them relatively unchanged, making it easier to imagine what it was like in their time. These have included a variety of housing from the lodge of big country house (Park Hall, now a hotel), to tiny workers cottages, rambling farms, a mill, a flat above old stables, a terraced house in a London street, a house in Bath and almshouses in a Suffolk village.

But whether the brick built house with the industrial style windows still exists, I haven't yet discovered. Is it, or was it, in The Wergs? Anyone recognise it? Suggestions please!

The mystery of 138 photographs

Meet Nellie, photo dated 9th June 1918. Unfortunately I have no idea who Nellie is. I found her photograph, along with another 137 others, crammed inside a small leatherette pouch (see below), which my sister had once passed on to me along with some family history notes she'd made. Neither of us were really sure from which side of the family they'd come.

The photographs were a motley collection, from tiny proofs to studio portraits like the one of Nellie above. Many were faded to the point of obscurity, several light damaged or torn, or of people so far in the distance it was impossible to discern their features.

On the reverse of some were places, dates (ranging from 1916 to 1918) and sometimes names. Most, however, merely had comments such as "What do you think of this one? Afraid the scenery is not very picturesque."  and "I look as though I've seen a ghost. Taken in the dining room. The book I have in my hand is the album I have got your snaps in."

On the back of one (again, of Nellie) is written "To dear old Frankie with heaps of love from Nellie, June 15th 1916" and another, "My cousin Ted. No doubt you remember him". If only! 

Some of the places were familiar to me from holidays or family connections. Colwyn Bay, Crewe and The Great Orme in Llandudno. Then on the back of one, "Rapparee beach" in a handwriting I'd seen before. I realised it had been written by my great aunt, Hilda Victoria Griffiths. The beach she referred to is a cove on the north Devon coast, not far from where I live today and a little further along from Minehead, where I knew Hilda had spent many holidays. When I studied the photograph more closely, I could see the picture was of her.

So where did all the other people fit in? Were they friends or family? With a bit of detective work, there must be some way of establishing whether there was a family connection .

I assumed the photograph of four women taken "outside the office" would be work colleagues, listed left to right as: Erica Thomas, Dorothy Baid, Gladys Peacock and Rita Thomas.

But what about the people mentioned on the back of other photos, Chris, Mabel, Dolly ("and her small brother"), Rose, Gracie, Rita, Olga, Vera.  

Some names recorded included surnames, Gladys Osborn, Else Steadman, Dorothy "Jane" Breide, Colonel Thistlewaite, Mrs J & Col J, Mabel Talbot.

The last name triggered something. Didn't we have a Talbot in the family tree a generation or two back? Before I could check, I discovered a significant piece of the jigsaw. A tatty piece of paper, tucked in between the photographs mentioning a wedding, between Mabel Talbot and J Herminan Mowels.

 Was it the wedding depicted on this faded and tatty photograph?

A search through the marriage indexes on Ancestry.co.uk gave me the official details. John Herniman Ben Mowels married Mabel Maud Talbot in Sussex on May 27th 1918.

A systematic search of on my maternal family found that my Great-grandmother's sister  Polly Benbow Baugh had married a George Talbot. Their eldest daughter was Mabel Maud. At last, a connection. Mabel and my great aunt Hilda had been first cousins.

Of course, I'm still none the wiser as to the identity of Nellie. My search will continue...

Some of the other photos in the collection:

 

If you have any information to add, do please get in touch.

Romance in the records

photo courtesy of riptheskull (flickr)

The story of how couples met and fell in love is an appealing one. My parents met at a Wolverhampton dance hall when my father asked my mother to dance.

My husband's parents met on a flag day, when they were both standing outside Westminster Abbey, collecting for Great Ormond Street Hospital.

My maternal grandparents met while treading the boards across the country [see Strictly Music Hall].

For our ancestors further back, although we can't always know the details, information in the records may give us a clue to the story behind how couples came to know one another.

My great-grandfather Thomas Diggory was a groom living in Frodesley, Shropshire on the 1881 census. At the rectory, Richard Gleadon the rector had in his employ, a cook called Eliza Roberts, my great-grandmother. She and Thomas would marry 5 years later.

Thomas James Diggory b 1857

As I discovered last week [Great Witley Gives Up its Secrets], my great-great grandmother, Eleanor Williams's future husband James Hick, was the lodger!

While tracking Susan Sawyer, wife of the unfortunate Charles Gabriel Baker [Ancestors in the Spotlight] I found her on the 1851 census, aged 18, working as a milliner in James Smith's establishment in 58-59 South Audley Street, Mayfair. Amongst the other 30 milliners, drapers, haberdashers and silk mercers, also residents of 58-59 South Audley Street, was another milliner called Ellen J Baker.

Ellen Jane Baker was Charles Baker's sister. At first I thought it likely that Susan met Charles through her fellow worker. Perhaps the two girls were friends? Perhaps Charles visited his sister in London?

But Ellen was 4 years older than Susan, 7 years older than Charles, who would have been only 15 in 1851. Later that year, Ellen married Thomas Moxon and so would have no longer worked and lived alongside Susan. If they had been friends, perhaps she was invited to the wedding and met Charles there!

But one fascinating find concerning matters of the heart came to light on the 1881 census in Lambeth. It concerns the infamous black sheep in my family called Edward Henry Coules Colley who vanished from the family home some time after 1881 "never to be heard of again". In my post, Ancestors in the Spotlight, I revealed that he had run away to Australia in 1887 with a certain Elizabeth Woolf, who he eventually married (bigamously, I believe) in 1906, after fathering 8 children.

However, it seems that the passionate affair was not a recent liaison but had started several years before. Elizabeth had given birth to a boy, Leon, in 1876. Edward's wife Frances, had had daughter Maud in the same year. In 1880, Frances gave birth to Nelly, and Elizabeth to Albert.

By the time the 1881 census was taken, while Edward was still living with his wife, Frances in one part of Lambeth, Elizabeth was living at her uncle's house a few streets away and calling herself Mrs Colley.

Abandoned wife Frances Colley (nee Ellisdon)

By the time Edward and Elizabeth sailed to the Antipodes, their son Reuben had been born in 1882 and their daughter Violet in 1884.

I wonder how long Edward intended to maintain this 'double life'. Did he finally decide it was time to leave or did Frances discover his adultery and throw him out? And when? In 1887 when they left for Australia? Or before? As always, one disclosure merely leads to another question...

Great Witley gives up its secrets

Witley Court
(courtesy of en.wikipedia.org)

BBC's Country File visited Witley Court, in Great Witley, Worcestershire, this week. The house, once a place of splendour with a reputation for grand parties on a lavish scale, is now a spectacular ruin following a devastating fire in 1937. English Heritage now manages the ruin along with its stunning gardens which are now open to the public. Find out more here.

Ernest George Shelley

Great Witley plays a part in my family history. My grandfather (above) used to be employed during shooting parties in the village in the 1920s. When the film Gosforth Park came out, it became a firm favourite of mine, not only for being a murder mystery, but because it appeared to portray what my grandfather would have experienced in his role as a member of staff at the shooting parties, allegedly at Witley Court. I even imagined that my grandmother, a parlour maid, might have met my grandfather at one of these events.

The truth of the matter is less glamorous, as the timescale doesn't quite fit the facts. My grandfather was employed as a gardener in the 1930s at a country house called The Foxhills in Wombourne, some 20 miles away in Staffordshire. On shooting weekends he, along with all the under-gardeners, would be called to Great Witley to be beaters, walking across the fields with sticks, beating the undergrowth to flush out the game for the shooters.

But by this time the famous Witley Court had been sold by its extravagant owner and so the shoots were organised from the nearby Hundred House Hotel.

Hundred House Hotel, Great Witley
(sold in December 2013 and expected to remain a prestigious hotel)
photo courtesy of geograph.org.uk

But my grandfather had another link to Great Witley. His mother, Jane Hick, grew up there. 

I discovered Jane on the 1881 census in Great Witley, working as a domestic servant. In 1891 she was a cook and housekeeper in London. But I hadn't been able to locate her on earlier censuses. So thinking it was about time for another try, I decided to track her father instead, in the hope of finding Jane in the same household.

James Hick, born in 1834 in Herefordshire, duly turned up on the 1871 census with his wife Eleanor and his step-daughter Jane Williams. This explained why I'd failed to find her under the name Jane Hick. Perhaps Jane had been the result of a previous marriage.

Wind back ten years to 1861, the year Jane was born, and there is she is, Jane Williams, aged 2 months, grand-daughter to the head of the household, Thomas Williams, living in Little Witley, with Thomas's unmarried daughter Eleanor, aged 20.

And at the bottom the other inhabitants are listed. Two lodgers. One of them, James Hick, aged 27.

So, was James the father of 2 month-old Jane? Or did he take on the baby when he married Eleanor later that year? Perhaps Jane's birth or baptism records will tell the tale!