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September, 2013:

Wambrook’s Hero

Sep 29th, 2013
by Dorset Ancestors.
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In the spring of 1855 Simeon Vickery married Sarah Singleton, an event hurried along by the imminent arrival of their first child. By the end of the decade Simeon and Sarah had two sons and two daughters; in all during their time together they had nine children. Their last child, Samuel, was born at Wambrook on the 6th of February 1873. We know from the 1891 census that Simeon Vickery had passed away and all of the children had left home except for 16-year-old Samuel who was employed as an agricultural labourer. He and his mother lived at Bartlett Cottage in Wambrook.

Samuel moved to Dorchester, where in 1893 at the age of 20 he enlisted in the army and did his training at the Dorset Regiment’s Depot at the Dorchester Barracks. He served at home until 1897, when he went to India as part of the annual draft and joined the 1st Battalion of the Dorset Regiment who, at the time, formed part of the Tirah Field Forces. Within weeks Sam Vickery was facing hostile Afridi tribesmen at the North West Frontier.

On the 20th October 1897 he was part of a group attacking the Dargai Heights. Here he displayed great courage while rescuing a comrade; his actions won him the Victoria Cross. The citation reads: “…Private Vickery heroically ran down a rocky mountain slope and brought a wounded soldier back to cover under extremely heavy small arms fire… “  Later in the Waran Valley he became separated from his company and killed three tribesmen who attacked him.

He returned to England for treatment to a chipped bone in his foot and was in the military hospital at Netley near Southampton when Queen Victoria personally presented him with his Victoria Cross. His award was announced in the London Gazette on the 20th of May 1898. When he left hospital the towns of Chard, Dorchester and Cardiff gave him civic receptions. On arriving in Dorchester he was greeted by bands and cheering crowds.

But this was not the end of his military career. Vickery was now a Corporal and was soon off to South Africa with a mounted infantry section to face the Boers. He was captured by the enemy but after four days in captivity he managed to escape and rejoined his unit. He was wounded in the guerrilla war that followed the defeat of the Boers. He retired from the military and joined his mother, a married sister and one of his brothers who had moved from Dorset to Cardiff.

At the outbreak of the First World War he was back in service as a Regular Reservist and served as a Sergeant with the 1st Battalion at Ypres Salient. At the end of the war Sergeant Samuel Vickery V.C. returned to Cardiff, where he died in 1952.

The Dorset parish of Wambrook was transferred to Somerset in 1895.

Gundry

Sep 18th, 2013
by Dorset Ancestors.
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Life for the agricultural labourer in the 19th century was difficult. Low wages, little job security and large families made it a struggle for a man to feed, clothe and keep a roof over the head of his family. Some Dorset men moved to Wales to work in the mines, allowing better pay but worse conditions. It was not until the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th that young men in any numbers were able to seek out a better future for themselves.
 
It would have been difficult for Thomas Gundry to support a wife, six children and his widowed mother-in-law on an agricultural labourer’s wage but he does appear to have enjoyed a measure of job security, for he was able to live out his life in one area: Walditch near Bridport in West Dorset. He and his wife Harriet had several children; his son Walter was born at Walditch in 1849 and later, in 1871, he married Emily Hawkins who he met while living and working at Bothenhampton.

Like his father, Walter was an agricultural labourer and like many other men working on the land in the 19th century he had to take work wherever it was offered. Through out their married life Walter and Emily, with their growing family, were constantly on the move. At the time of his marriage Walter was living at Bothenhampton with his uncle who was a Dairyman; the couple’s first child was born there. Two years later they are at Bradpole and from there they moved back to Walditch before going to Bradford Peverell; then it was onto Portesham, where they stayed for five years before travelling onto Piddletrenthide. Here their last child, Leonard, was born on 14th of October 1889.

From Piddletrenthide Walter and Emily moved to Dewlish, where Walter was working as a Thatcher. Two sons, Frederick and Joseph, were working as Carter Boys and their youngest, Leonard, was still at school. In their sixties Walter and Emily lived at Compton Valence. After 47 years of marriage Walter passed away in 1918 aged 68; Emily passed away early in 1923 aged 76.

At the age of 17 the youngest son, Leonard, was working as an agricultural labourer like his father and grandfather. He wanted more out of life so he left home and took a job with the Eddison Steam Rolling Company of Dorchester and soon found himself driving a steam roller for the Newton Abbot Rural District Council in Devon.

In 1913 Leonard Gundry left Dorset for London, where he joined the Metropolitan Police and served for 26 years; for the last eight years with the police he held the rank of Inspector. His time with the police saw him working in Camden Town, Whitehall, Kensington, Stepney, Bethnel Green, Hackney, Islington and Shoreditch. As a Constable in ‘A’ Division he saw duty at Buckingham Palace, St. James Palace, Marlborough House and No 10 Downing Street.

In 1918 he married a London girl, Ethel Brabham, and had one son, Alfred, who had a career in banking. Leonard Gundry was a man who broke free and secured for himself a better standard of living and a better life.

The Sinking of HMS Formidable

Sep 4th, 2013
by Dorset Ancestors.
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Everyone has heard of Lassie the super-intelligent ‘doggy’ film star. Few realise that the part was originally based on a rough-haired collie owned by the landlord of the Pilot Boat Inn, Lyme Regis. That Lassie has always been credited with saving a sailor’s life. An enduring Hollywood serial has indeed a Dorset ring to it.

It was the first day of January 1915, in the early hours. The battleship HMS Formidable had been training and exercising in Lyme Bay with other ships when she was struck with two torpedoes. The magazines blew up.

Two hours after the first strike her crew of 780 was ordered to abandon ship. Only 233 were to survive the savage, ice-cold water. It was a major disaster not long after the opening of the First World War. A lifeboat capsized in the swell, but other ships in the squadron took off 114 men. Then the big ship went down, deep by the bows.

An empty boat was found at Abbotsbury and another came ashore at Lyme Regis with some sailors dead from exposure. One other man was to have his life saved by the dog Lassie. He had been taken into the Pilot Boat Inn, apparently dead, but Lassie kept licking his face for half an hour and he revived. The dog was awarded two animal medals. Forty-eight survivors reached Lyme Regis in all.

Hollywood got on to the story of Lassie and as a result of that her name will live forever….  But a second dog figures in the tale, for at Abbotsbury Gardens a headstone marks the grave of the captain’s dog Bruce, whose body was washed up on the nearby beach a day after the disaster.

Many sailors are buried in Lyme Regis churchyard and two at Burton Bradstock cemetery.

There are about 30 identified wrecks in Lyme Bay, most of which can be reached by divers, and some have been.

There was an intensification of U-boat activity after the sinking of the Formidable, and many thousands of tonnes of British shipping were lost off the coast of Dorset; however, six U-boats were sunk. Towards the end of the war two merchant ships were attacked in September 1918. The Gibel Hamam was torpedoed off Abbotsbury and 21 of her crew were lost. Another ship, the S.S.Ethel, was attacked and sank while being towed to Portland.