George [GFE]And Ellie's [ECP] memory of significant Family Dates
Born 19 April 1943 at High St Bonnybridge in tenement at back of Wull
Smith the butcher’s shop
1943 to now [JAN-2006]
GFE
DIARY OF EVENTS IN AN EVENTFUL
LIFE
My history is Scotland’s and Australia’s
history, not that of the rich, powerful lords and masters, but that of the
common folk. Their parts collectively
sum up to more than the whole!
Believing in our personal, means
we contribute and to the public good as Robert Burns might have said.
Born 19 April 1943 at High St
Bonnybridge ina tenement at back of Wull Smith the butcher’s shop. When I was
about 4 ½ we then moved to the new public housing estate at 15 Gateside Ave
where I lived until my marriage in 1963. Maw lived there until she migrated in
1971 after Dad’s death. Brother John and his wife, Anne then lived there after
Maw moved away to Australia.
I owe all of what I have written
to Maw and Ellie. Both have encouraged, loved and supported me all of my
life. Maw’s stories and Ellie's continual
championing of my English language skills are the means to this. I haven’t
exactly been a saint. It was and still is hard work living up to their
uncritical expectations!
Thankyou both.
Why have I put pen to paper? Because it is my firm belief that the
peoples history is important. Every person has a story to tell that enriches
the planet, builds self-esteem in not only the person but also their own
family. We are the sum of our endeavours and our environment. People’s oral
history is the nation’s history, indeed world history. We are not the product
of the media - much as they’d have us believe!
I have written this Diary over a
few years, but mainly since I retired in Feb 2005. This diary is only from my
perspective and no doubt my siblings and relatives might have a different view
of events.
My dad, George Reid Ellis, born
1904, and my Maw [Eliza Ellis ms Forrest], born 1911, shaped me in the way I
am. Dad was very hard, a product of WW1, the Great depression of the ca1930’
and WW2 as well as a hard drinking and smoking environment. Maw was also
brought up in those times but had more of a get and go spirit under great
adversity – mainly Dad’s cavalier attitude to the drink and his smokes. He
eventually paid the price; suffering most of the years I have memory of. But
Maw had to suffer more, looking after Dad and with very little resources after
Dad drank or smoked it away. I am more like my Dad in looks and temperament,
but would like to be more like ‘oor Maw’, uncritically accepting life’s fate!
Much of what I did was also in
conjunction with older brother, Billy [William Ellis], our late younger brother
John [Kerr Ellis] and our younger sister, Linda [Eliza Linda Forrest Ellis] I
have been fortunate to have had our Maw living with us, my wife Ellie and our
two daughters – Lisa and Dianne - from 1971, after Dad's death in Jan 1971 to
her death in 2000, with my wife. Ellie Ellis [ms Polland] and our two
daughters. Lisa Maree Nash [ms Ellis] and Dianne Lynne Ellis, Lisa’s and her
husband, John and their daughter, Megan Eleanor, and son, Cameron William.
Maw, in her gentle way inspired
many people. She was always supportive of all of her family. She told us many
stories, which got me into family history. This being an extension of that. How
I miss her. I often think of her and the questions she could answer. But as Maw
would say time and again, ‘Nothing lasts for ever!’ Our late brother, John
dying in Dec 2001, was another hard blow. But with Maw I was extremely
privileged to have both of them together in Australia where our family took
John all over in the 6 months he spent here.
Knowing both were dying as we all
did due to their illnesses, allowed all of the family time to love them all the
more. It certainly makes their deaths more bearable but none the less still
painful. Maw with her wit, wisdom and hearty laugh was a true Christian, not in
the religious bigotry sense but by her biblical, ‘deeds ye shall know them’,
and I believe she lived.
John was trying to set himself
and his family up by looking at Australia as a means of supplying some of the
wherewithal to enhance his dreams. Possibly of working here and at the same
time being based in Scotland. His dreams maybe never came true, but he had
them, thanks to his family.
|
YEAR
|
DATE
|
PERSON
|
EVENT
|
|
1904
|
JAN??
|
George Reid Ellis & mother
|
Birth & Death
|
Dad is born in Bo’ness. His mum
dies 11 days later. He would go to School at age 4 ½!! At Stewart Ave Infants!!
School boards
The Education (Scotland) Act 1872 (35 & 36 Vict., c 62) created
school boards in Scotland with a statutory duty to provide education for all
children between the ages of 5 and 13. The boards had an elected membership
made up of owners and occupiers of property of the value of £4 or over. They
were responsible for the building and maintenance of schools, staffing and
attendance of pupils. They were overseen by the Scottish Board of Education.
The Education (Scotland) Act, 1901 (64 Vict. and 1 Edw. VII, c. 9) raised the
school leaving age to 14. School boards were abolished under the terms of the
Education (Scotland) Act, 1918 (8 & 9 Geo. V, c. 48) and replaced with
school management committees.
SOURCE: Falkirk Museums Archives
Education Records
|
1907
|
29 July
|
Ellen Reader
|
Death
|
Info on GGrandfather’s headstone
at Logie cemetery, on my 2005 visit, where she’s buried along with all of the
Forrests and Bastables. His wife, buried at Folkestone. Age 42. GGrandfather
then remarried – Mrs Coates.
|
1911
|
2 July
|
Eliza Forrest
|
Birth
|
Maw is born at Mrs Flockart’s
‘Rose Cottage’ in Causewayhead. She would go to Causewayhead Infants and then
when the family shifted to Baker St and elsewhere in Stirling she would go to
school there until she went to Bonnybridge with her parents ca 1915!!, where
she attended Bonnybridge Public school, repeating one of the years for a few
years. Leaving school at approx 14.
|
1928-1930’s
|
????
|
World events
|
The Great Depression
|
Dad ‘migrated’ to Canada in Sept?
1928. I say ‘migrated’, because it is my understanding that he was ‘sent’ there
as a result of a jilted engagement. The family seemingly were concerned that he
would end up like his older brother, Jim, who was jilted by ???, who became
Dad’s other older brother’s Willie’s???
wife. Dad’s sister Mary, according to Dad telling Maw, was overheard by him
‘That George will turn to drink like jim’ if we don’t get him away from bad
influence ‘, brother Jim. The story was that Dad was told, by an aquaintance,
that his Fiancee and her Mum, just back from a holiday in Canada had spent all
of their furnishings savings on a fur coat and other things. Dad was not
impressed and she jilted him. But on speaking to my cousin, Mary in
Kirkudbright????[SPELLING] some 6 years back, Mary said that it was Dad that
jilted the girl. Dad then sailed to Canada at age 24 at the start of the
depression. He had a good time, coming back to Scotland, as he told me, as a
young boy in Scotland, that ‘when I say the natives [Canadians] queuing up at
the soup kitchens, it was time to get out and go back to Scotland where at
least I would get fed and bed’.
|
1939-1945
|
3 September 1939 to 8 May and
15 Aug 1945
|
World Events
|
WW2
|
World War
Two was, as everyone knows, a cataclysmic event. But life goes on, and Mum and
Dad got married on 29 Dec of ’39. Billy was born in Feb?? ’41, I was born 19
April ’43 and John was born Sept?? ’45. Our younger sister was to follow much
later in 1951??
Sep. 3 – 1939 England
and France declared war on Germany after Poland invaded. Defeat
of Germany – 1945 May 8 - VE Day - Victory
in Europe Day was celebrated by crowds in Picadilly Square, London, and Times
Square, New York City. Aug. 15 - Emperor surrender broadcast - VJ Day – Victory
in Japan
Times
were hard for everyone. However as kids, we either were shielded from the
events or were to young to have noticed. Billy can remember the landmine
dropped by the Jerries at Greenhill. The explosion blew in windows and rattled
the doors not to menmtion the people as well.
|
1939
|
29 Dec 1939.
|
George Reid Ellis & Eliza Forrest
|
Marriage
|
Mum and Dad marry at the
Presbyterian Church of Scotland Manse at High Bonnybridge. Best man was Dad’s
older brother Jim and best maid was Miss Pettigrew??
|
1940
|
------
|
Eleanor Crayton Ellis ms Polland
|
Birth
|
My wife Ellie born at 162????Mayfield Drive, Armadale West Lothian
Scotland at ?? Second of two sisters and one brother: in order, Jeanette[b.
1938?? d.2004?? in USA], Eleanor[b. 1940], William[b.1943], Dana[b.1945?? d.
1997??].
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