There is something missing from here. 
Nothing in front of our gates and nothing behind it. 
Waiting for the grey nomadding to begin.

Life Rocks but
Patience is an embuggerance!!!

Improvements

 There were a few things that needed attention with our new home.

• Pathways that were missing or made up of loose white quartz gravel and weeds.
• A small veranda comprising of poorly laid cement pavers. 
• An elevated area of often muddy grass the ran between a retaining wall and the house.
• The desire to have some gates to the sides of the property to provide security and privacy
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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  Before and After
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Goodbye Dad

 

Our family would like to thank you for being here today to say farewell to my dad, Thomas Cresswell Anslow, or as we all know him: Tom.

Whilst his passing was not unexpected with his illness over the last few weeks, it is still difficult to come to terms with losing a father and a grandfather.

As you know, my dad after much convincing and after a setback in August last year, moved with us to our new home in Largs. 

While resistant to change, once here dad, Heather and I were looking forward to spending more years together as a family. 

The time he spent with us were happy, filled with sport, music and watching the magpies.

This is quite a different lifestyle to the one dad was born into. 

Dad was born at home in 1929 in a two up two down terrace house in Walsall Wood, a small mining village in the Midlands. His mum Annie was the village midwife. It was a tough life with low income to barely make do after his father died of ‘black lung’ from mining, when Tom was six. Tom however thought it was one of the best times of his life.  It was a simple life with minimal school attendance and tagging along after his older brother Dennis, scrumping for apples from the ministers yard, football and roaming the village and surrounds. 

Speaking of football, Dad’s favourite team is Wolverhampton Wanderers so dad was thrilled last year when his team finally made it back into the First Division / Premier League and almost to the semi-finals, after so many years. He definitely made a point to see that game! 

Dad absolutely loved most sports, football, soccer, cricket and motor racing so he had his entertainment covered for the entire year. Whilst these were not always popular with mum, he did seem to find time for them. 

His love of sports however was completely overshadowed by his passion for classical music. He was introduced to classical music by my mum’s father Norman, whilst dad was waiting for my mum to get ready for their date. 

Well…..when I say introduced, it was more like “you are not leaving here until you listen to this…” type of introduction. Suffice it to say, the way to a future father-in-laws’ approval is paying attention to the music.

Not only did this courting lead to mum, it led to a life-long passion for classical music with Beethoven and Liszt being among dad’s favourite composers. The music selected today came from dad’s collection. 

I know it was dad’s great passion and he wanted to share his love for music with those around him. In fact, I can imagine him saying, “Do you really want to speak? Can’t we replace this with another piece of music?” 

My childhood memories are of a father who was devoted to his family. The centre of his life was my mother, Ann, to whom he was married for 62 years. During this time, we emigrated from the swinging 60’s in Lichfield England to late the 1940’s in Launceston Tasmania. 

It was a real culture shock for both mum and dad and is one of dad’s favourite recollections. The Tasmanian people had strange accents and strange ways such as the women wearing a hat, gloves and ball gowns to work functions. Dad was not one to conform or be dictated to.  Instead he encouraged mum to wear a provocative ankle-length dress slit down the side and stood up to those who would criticise. Whilst what mum wore is conservative by todays’ standards, it really was something shocking to those ladies wearing tiara’s and furs. 

There was a lot of pressure on dad at Repco when he first joined as the company culture was for the men to spend each afternoon at the pub instead of going home. There was no way my dad was going to leave his young family at home to adhere to peer pressure. 

In today’s world where only the common or popular opinion is believed to be the correct opinion, where differences are to be criticised and ridiculed, I prefer to look to dad’s example in not following the crowd. They are not always right as he repeatedly demonstrated throughout my life. 

The last 4 years since mum’s passing have been the hardest for dad. Mum was the centre of his world and his hobby was to make life easier and happier. They rarely spent time apart. Not a day went by when he did not mention her. In his last days he was dreaming of her. So, while it is such a difficult thing to have to say goodbye to dad, it my great hope and belief that he is now where he will be happiest; in heaven with mum and enjoying his music. 

We will miss you dad.

New Home

Tree Change - We are (slowly) moving

Just 8 minutes north of Maitland 

Open Plan

 Nice Views

 Large kitchen

The Bird Avery (Budgies) repurposed 

Heather's Future Office

One Hundred Years Ago

One Hundred Years ago, on the 21 April 1916, my great Grandfather on my Mother's side, Private Edward John Taylor, was Killed in Action in what is now known as Iraq. 



Mum had a badly creased and faded photo which she successfully Photoshopped and on the back in pencil his name and date of death.

I have been researching the family tree and was interested to learn more about my Great Grandfather and thought that the UK Ministry of Defence might hold the records. These are now held at the National Archives in Kew, Surrey, with Ancestry.com providing access to these electronically.  I searched there without success, and found out why....

It is widely known that the majority of British WW1 soldier’s army service records went up in smoke when the War Office warehouse (the Army Records Centre) where they were stored was hit by a German incendiary bomb in an air raid in 1940. It is less well known that many other records were also destroyed. For researchers of the Great War, it was catastrophic.

Dad alerted me to some folders Mum had, a collection of Genealogy records which she had started with and hadn't completed. In the collection was several documents including the following;



Edward's Birth Certificate, born 2nd of October 1875 to parents Edward and Sarah (Nee Thomas) Taylor in Lichfield, Staffordshire, England. 


A Wedding Certificate: On the 1st of July 1904 Edward and Mary Ann Tolley were married in the Walsall Registry Office.


A Medal Record: Edward was 40 years old who, according to the medal record, was Killed in Action.

Below is the Medal Record for 

Private Edward John Taylor 

This confirmed my earlier research which had been based on some assumptions. I had located this record from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, both having the same name (Very Common), but having the same unique Service Number 9742, now confirmed.

7th (Service) Battalion

records.co.uk/units/1715/north-staffordshire-regiment/

The Siege of Kut-al-Amara (1915-1916)

Major-General Townshend’s forces were surrounded by Turkish forces on 7 December 1915. He calculated that he had enough food supplies to last two months and decided to hold out until relief came. He had 10,000 men at this point, but was encumbered with 2,000 sick and wounded as well as non-combatants and the local population of Kut. The relief effort mounted by the British stalled because there were no proper roads or railways and the river levels fluctuated widely so that navigation was difficult. 

Meanwhile the conditions inside Kut deteriorated. Disease and lack of food reduced the garrison to a pitiable state and the soldiers were forced to slaughter horses and mules for food. When relief failed to arrive and negotiations by Colonel T.E. Lawrence (of Arabia) failed, Townshend had to surrender his 10,000 troops (British and Indian) to the Turks on 29 April 1916. The prisoners of war were harshly treated and 4,000 died in captivity. This was the fate of Thomas George Irons (1st Btn OBLI) who died of dysentery on 8 May 1916. Henry Grace DCM (1st Btn OBLI) died of disease on 21 April 1916 at Kut, during the surrender. He had been decorated for conspicuous gallantry at Kut-al-Amara. Frederick George Parslow (1st Btn OBLI) accidentally drowned in the River Tigris whilst transferring from one boat to another, on 31 May 1915.



The surrender at Kut-al-Amara was a humiliating blow to the prestige of the British Empire and the British government took over control of the Mesopotamian campaign from the Indians in the summer of 1916. Much investment was made in the port facilities at Basra, new roads and railways were built and modern weaponry supplied. Under General Sir Stanley Maude, British troops retook Kut-al-Amara in February 1917 and occupied Baghdad in March. 



Disease was still a major cause of death amongst the troops and Thomas William Lee (also of the 1st Btn OBLI) died of dysentery or cholera on 1 August 1917. General Maude also succumbed to disease and died of cholera in November 1917. The British effort was then scaled down and the armistice with Turkey on 30 October 1918 effectively ended the campaign, which had cost the British army 27,000 fatalities, 13,000 of whom had died of disease. 





The fulltext can be found at http://amershamhistory.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/K2.pdf

One could hardly imagine what these soldiers went through!

The 1914-15 Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal, as per the record for 

Private Edward John Taylor

The Basra Memorial 

before the desert sands did their work.

As Feargal Keane, BBC Correspondent says:



"Curiously Saddam Hussein preserved this monument. He had it moved, carefully, from the port to the desert but did not destroy it. 'Perhaps he had some feeling for the fallen warrior,' a British officer said to me..."





"Over the decades the desert winds have done their work: segments of the slate have collapsed on the ground. There are little fragments of names scattered in the sand. A large crack has appeared where the men of the Western Ontario Regiment are remembered. Nearby is a sentence as sad as any I've read in war. It says simply: For Subhadar Mahanga and 1,770 other Indian soldiers." 

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Lunch with my daughter

A foggy start to the day.

Lunch with my beautiful daughter, Samantha, at the Queen Victoria Building.

Scanning Old Photos Part 1

Me at 5 years and a Monkey at Lichfield Bower 

School onboard the Castel Felice on the way to Australia 1964

Tom and Ann Anslow leaving on their honeymoon at Trent Valley Station Lichfield 1952

Tom and Ann Anslow watching the cricket. 

Ann Anslow and I at Tascott c1990

Ann Anslow and I at Epping 1978