Researching The Great War

At the moment I'm on a steep learning curve, researching military records for my Great Grandad. It's delving into the unknown for me, but with the help from the fab people at Rootschat I'm getting there. I've hear a lot of stories from my Grandad about how terrible the First World War was. My Great Grandad was in the trenches and was injured, loosing his best friend. I want to learn more about what it was like, and what those men, and my Great Grandad went through. I'm hoping to learn more about which regiment he was in and therefore where he was in the grand scheme of things, and find out what happened to him and his regiment.

First stop was The National Archives (TNA) where I found his Navy records. From there I think I have now located his Medal Cards. He served in the Durham Light Infantry, and looks like he rose quickly through the ranks from Private, to Acting Warrant Officer, and then to Seargent. I'm not sure if there was anything in between as the medal cards tell me he was a Private and Acting Warrant Officer, and a picture of him during the war tells me he was a Seargent.

I hope to learn more soon!

Alfred Bell Taylor 1896-1994

Alfred Bell Taylor

Alfred Bell Taylor was born on 21st June 1896 in Sunderland, Durham England. He had one brother Frederick and a sister called Nellie.

His father was Frederick Taylor and his mother Elizabeth Ellen Bell. In 1906 Elizabeth died in childbirth along with their fourth child, a boy called John Robert. Alfred and his brother and sister went to live with their grandparents Jonathan and Hannah Taylor (nee Black) as Frederick went on to (possibly) marry again, and have more children.

Frederick Taylor

Elizabeth Ellen Bell

In 1901 Jonathan and Hannah lived at 29 Nile Street in Sunderland, Durham, England. With them at that time were their son William, their daughter Elizabeth and her husband William Douglass with their children James and Stanley. Also living with them was their granddaughter Florence Taylor, born in 1889. Florence was their son George’s daughter. They also had three boarders as they ran a boarding house.

At some point around 1906 after the death of his mother, Alfred went to live with Jonathan and Hannah. Jonathan died in 1910 and as Hannah went both deaf and blind Florence stayed on and helped run the boarding house and look after Frederick and Elizabeth’s children, they called her Aunty Florrie.

In 7th October aged 17 he joined the Royal Navy where he served upon the Victory I, in the Empire of India, on the Fearless, Victory VII, Victory I and then lastly the Fearless. Whilst serving on the Fearless during an attack Alfred lost some of his hearing and was discharged from the Navy in 1916.

Alfred and Daisy's Wedding Day
On 14th August 1915, whilst serving in the Navy during WW1, Alfred married Daisy Eugenie Murrell, the daughter of Margaret Georgina Coutts and William Murrell. They married in Weymouth where Alfred was serving at the time.

After being discharged from the Navy he went to the Army and enlisted. He signed up with his cousin Stanley Douglass, with whom Alfred was close friends. He served in the trenches and reached at least the rank of sergeant as pictured below.

Alfred was serving in the trenches when they were blown in and his leg was trapped. He lost his best friend and his leg was injured and he was sent home to recover. He came back home with Stanley Douglass.

Alfred and Daisy had ten children the first of whom was born in 1916, the last in 1932.

Around the 1920’s Alfred ran a fruit and veg shop called the Nut King and Universal Fruit Store in Sunderland Market. He then ran a record shop and then a bike shop.

Alfred then got a job working for the Sunderland District Omnibus at the Newbottle depot and the family moved from Sunderland to Shiney Row as it was difficult for him to get to the bus depot for a 4.30am start from Sunderland.

He also opened a shop called ABS Libraries, which started off life as a lending library, but which Alfred introduced sweets, tobacco, home made wine and home made ice cream to. His son, my grandfather, would work in the shop and cycle around a push bike with a box attached to the side in which the ice cream was sold from. The shop was shut when Daisy said it was too much for their son to run.

Shiney Row was primarily a pit village with several pits in the area, and with the closure of ABS Libraries their sons found work on the top of the coal mines, sorting through the stones which were brought up on a conveyor belt. After some time in this job it was expected that they would go down the mines and they were given training on the pits training tunnel where they had to learn to control the pit ponies going down the mines. When Daisy found out that her sons were to go down the mines she went to their manager and took their cards and ripped them up, leaving the boys unemployed. Daisy didn't know that her eldest son was already working down the mines.

The family moved back to Sunderland and lived in Murton Street in a large house with a basement and an attic room. The Taylor’s lived in the basement, although their bedrooms were in the attic. Ted and Barbara Taylor lived on the next floor, Margaret Coutts her third husband and daughters lived another floor up. On the next floor lived the Lisle family.

Alfred worked at J A Joblings (who also made Pyrex glass) polishing television tubes until 1936 when he hitchhiked South looking for work. Employment was hard to find in the North and the government was offering a grant to families who could find employment and housing in any part of the country for all family members of working age. Alfred found a job for himself and his two second eldest sons and the family moved to the South of England. His eldest son had work and had moved out, but came back home as the family were preparing to move, and came with them. The government paid their moving costs and for their furniture to be transported and the family all moved.

Alfred had no trade when he left Sunderland in 1936, and worked as a servant for the RAF. When one day my granddad won a chicken in a raffle, and brought it back on the tube from London. Alfred decided to make a chicken shed for it. When the chicken laid eggs, he decided to make a proper coup, and chicken run, and bought more hens. He carved the whole thing using a penknife and my granddad told him to get proper tools and work on the bomb damage as war had now broken out. He worked as a carpenter on the bomb damage and then went on to work at Heathrow airport and helped construct the first building on the site in 1942.

In 1952 aged 56 Alfred and Daisy cycled from their home in Middlesex back to Sunderland on a motorized tandem after their children had said they wouldn’t be able to do it. This was reported in the local paper, the Sunderland Echo.

In 1965 Alfred and Daisy celebrated their Golden wedding anniversary with their friends and family.

Daisy died in 1979, and Alfred in 1994.

~*~

I was born in 1972 and don’t really remember Daisy, but will always remember Alfred, known as Gaga or Poppy with a pipe in his mouth. I can remember visiting as a small child and sitting in his living room with him lighting his pipe in his green chair. Even today I love the smell of a pipe burning reminds as it me of him.

Meet Severus

The latest addition to the family!

Leon was 6 on Saturday and this was part of his present, he is his fathers son - at least it wasn't a lizzard LOL