大象传媒

We were a large family, a loving Mom and Dad and six boys and four girls, we lived in a house in Great Brook Street in the 1920s when times were hard, but we were happy. We played our games of Hop Scotch, skipping and I spy, from Mrs Williams sweet shop. My Dad, like many Ex-servicemen was unemployed for some time, before getting a job at Fort Dunlop, which my Mom was forever grateful, so we felt the benefits, as the years went by the three eldest got married and then in 1936 we moved to a house on the Tyburn Road, close to the Appollo cinema and then came the war, Sept 1939.

The next story is a tribute to my Six brothers who were all in the services during that time.

1.) Bill Gasgoine was in the Fire Service at I.C.I Witton.
2.) Jack Gasgoine was a regular soldier, he was stationed in Scotland with the Gun Testing Battery.
3.) James Gasgoine joine the R.A.F and was posted to Sagos in Africa.
4.) Harold Gasgoine was in the army and after serving in gun sites in England, he was sent to Africa and their unit, was at the Anzio Landings in Italy, after suffering heavy losses. During the battle, the rest of the men were taken prisoner and sent to a German P.O.W camp.
5) George Gasgoine was only 17 years old when he joined the Army and in 1949 his regiment were sent to the Island of Crete and he was taken prisoner. He also spent the rest of the war in a German P.O.W. camp.
6.) Alan Gasgoine joined the Navy at 17yrs and was on those Russian convoys, which needed a lot of courage at his young age. So when war ended they all returned home safely, to a grateful Mom and Dad, to tell of their experiences, and to hear how we too had stories to tell of the bomings in the Autumn of 1940, when we spent most nights down the shelters in the garden, but we still turned up for work at Fort Dunlop for 7.30am. My youngest sister worked on tyres for the Spitfire. Myself did a spot-welding and on our way to work we would queue in the Hut of the bridge for Woodbines for Dad. Mom had the hard work of coping with rationing and feeding us as well as she could. Eldest Sister was a clippie on the buses, her children were evacuated Scotland, the other sister had a young baby and was evacuated to to Coalville for a time. So you can see we all gave our services to our beloved country.

After the war, James and Family and Harold and wife emigrated to Australia, coming to England on visits and Jack and family emigrated to Rhodesia as it was then.

Sadly now, five of my brothers have all passed away, leaving just Alan the youngest of the family and one sister has also died, so out of the ten children only 3 women and 1 man are left. I have treasured photos of my 6 brothers in uniform.

I cant tell you the ranks of my brother, both Jack and Harold were commisioned officers during the war. Harold also wrote a booklet about his war days titled "One Mans War", it was published in Australia which makes very sad reading.

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