See also
| Husband: | Godfrey Midgley Chassereau TAYLOR (c. 1885-1983) | |
| Wife: | Edith GRANGER (c. 1887-1958) | |
| Marriage | 1915 | |
| Name: | Godfrey Midgley Chassereau TAYLOR1 | |
| Sex: | Male | |
| Nickname: | Granger-Taylor | |
| Father: | - | |
| Mother: | - | |
| Birth | c. 1885 | Kingston, Surrey |
| Title | MC,OBE | |
| Occupation | engineer | |
| Census | 1891 (age 5-6) | Estrella Surbiton Kingston, Surrey, ENGLAND |
| Fanny S Chassereau wid 53 head reigate surrey Gotfred M Taylor wid 29 son in law civil engineer and analytical chemist london st georges godfrey M taylor 5 grandson kingston surrey isabel G 2 granddtr kingston 3 servs |
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| Census | 1901 (age 15-16) | Cranleigh School Cranleigh, Surrey, ENGLAND |
| 15 pupil | ||
| Census | 1911 (age 25-26) | Kingston, Surrey, ENGALND |
| TAYLOR GOTFRED MIDGLEY M 1862 49 Kingston Surrey TAYLOR GODFREY MIDGLEY CHASSEREAU M 1886 25 Kingston Surrey TAYLOR GLADYS ISABEL F 1889 22 Kingston Surrey TAYLOR MARY MAUD F 1861 50 Kingston Surrey TAYLOR MAUD DOROTHY MARY F 1893 18 Kingston Surrey |
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| Military service | 1917 (age 31-32) | |
| London Gazette 1917 T./Lt. Godfrey Midgley Chassereau Taylor, R.E. (late R.M.L.I.). | ||
| Residence | btw 1922 and 1923 (age 36-38) | 16 Abingdon Villas, W 8, London, ENGLAND |
| Residence | btw 1931 and 1958 (age 45-73) | 18 St Mary Abbots Terr, W14, London, ENGLAND |
| tel WEStern 4994 | ||
| Military service | 1949 (age 63-64) | |
| LONDON GAZETTE, 1 JANUARY, 1949 To be. Ordinary Officers of the Civil Division.'-'of the said Most Excellent Order: - ÉGodfrey Midgley Chassereau TAYLOR, Esq., M.C., M.I.C.E., Senior Partner, John Taylor and Sons, Consulting Engineers. |
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| Death | 1983 (age 97-98) | |
| Honors | ||
| military cross MICE | ||
| Residence | Great Milton, Oxon, ENGLAND | |
| commuted to work daily tho had flat in Kensington he sometimes used. | ||
| <Custom Event> | ||
| see indiv note | ||
| Residence | ||
| tel bk Godfrey MC Taylor Chosely Cott Tiddington Wheatley Gt Milton 28 |
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| Residence | Kensington, London, ENGLAND | |
| Name: | Edith GRANGER1 | |
| Sex: | Female | |
| Father: | Edgar Bridden GRANGER (1853- ) | |
| Mother: | - | |
| Birth | c. 1887 | |
| b grassington yorks b jul-s 1887 reg Skipton talentewd and successful artist |
||
| Census | 1911 (age 23-24) | |
| various possibilities | ||
| Death | 1958 (age 70-71) | |
| not anc 1957-62 as result of road acc |
||
Godfrey Midgley Taylor
Godfrey was a lieutenant in the Royal Engineers. His letters home were in the form of a diary and some have been preserved. In 1915 he was sent to the Dardanelles and his diary describes mundane events on the journey, but events that paint a picture of life.
27.6.1915 The start of the journey out, from Blandford Camp. ÒWe marched down to the station headed by the Depot Company Band and nothing worthy of note happened except that I tripped over a stone, knocked my spurs together, and found on my arrival at the station that I had lost one of them; luckily I have a spare pair.Ó
18000 men and baggage embarked at Keyham. ÒThe number of postcards written by the men just before they left was phenomenal and even just after we had left the quayside men were flinging cards over the side to dockers and others to post and many of these were carried by the wind into the water.Ó
1.7.1915 They were off Spain. ÒSpent a very large part of the afternoon censoring letters which we hope to get off at our first natural port of call but we hear that we may go straight on and have no chance of getting letters on shore. The censoring business is very tedious and takes a long time to do properly.Ó [He cannot name places but the prot was presumably Gibralter.]
4.7.1915 They were in the Mediterranean. [The men] Òare now allowed to sleep on deck if they like and many take advantage of this although the nights are fairly cool.Ó
7.7.1915 They did not stop at Gibralter and after a brief call at, presumably, Malta they departed again. ÒThe first piece of news we had made us boil. For some absolutely unknown reason the mail had not been sent ashore.Ó
At the end of that year he played a major part in the evacuation of the Dardanelles. In Dec 1915 it was decided to retreat from Dardanelles. The challenge was to withdraw an army of considerable size from positions in no cases more than 300 yards from the enemy's trenches, and to embark from open beaches, every part of which were within effective range of Turkish guns. This had to be completed without leaving troops vulnerable to attack, in other words without the German and Turkish forces realising an evacuation was in progress.
On 21st Anzac and Suvla were evacuated, taking the Germans by surprise. When it was decided to evacuate Cape Helles the only way to deceive the Turks a 2nd time was to complete the majority of the evacuation in one night. The plan was to withdraw some men gradually, but leave 17,000 men to be evacuated on night of Jan 8th, in order not to arouse suspicion. Enemy aircraft paid frequent visits to the peninsula, so preparations had to be halted when they were in range, animals and transports approaching the beaches were turned and marched in the opposite direction, and stores and horses already in lighters were even unloaded on to the beaches to give the appearance of a disembarkation.
Parties of Engineers, led by Godfrey had to remain till the end in case of damage to the piers. ÒLast days at HellesÓ described the final night. By 9pm the wind had increased to 35mph and worked up angry seas. ÒThe engineer party, under Lt G M C Taylor, working in black darkness with the waves dashing over them, were hard put to it to make the necessary repairsÓ [to the piers]. By 3.45am the evacuation was complete and the main magazine was blown up. Barely a single life was lost.
Godfrey gave a more personal description.
12.1.1916 ÒMy dear Father,
I have not written for some time to you because no letters were allowed to leave the Peninsula for a fortnight before the evacuation.Ó There followed a detailed description of his work. In November a terrific storm had washed away all the piers on the west beach so he and his men were asked to build a new breakwater and pier. This meant quarrying 15 cwt blocks of stone and carrying them out to form the breakwater. The plan was to join the breakwater they built to two sunken boats to extend it. While working they were under fire from shells day and night. Ònot in spasms which allowed one to take coverÉ but 3 or 4 one minute, then 1 twenty minutes later, then perhaps none for an hour and so on Émerely a matter of luck who was hit.Ó
This work was not completed by the time the decision to evacuate was made, so the Navy sank an old Greek ship in a well meaning attempt to fill the gap. However this did more harm than good as its position diverted the waves straight on to the pier. It was decided to build a floating bridge of steel tanks and barrels - floating so it could be built beside a pier and disguised from the Germans. The evacuation got under way, but the wind and sea were rising, lighters drifted into the bridge and Godfrey and his men had a full time job trying to hold it together till the men were all safely over.
Eventually they too embarked and were taken by lighter to a destroyer, with very difficult transfers in the rough seas. Godfrey had reached the destroyer when the Captain realised that the fuses on the main magazine were about to blow. He warned those men remaining in the lighter to go below but Godfrey was able to watch. ÒI have never seen such a marvellous sight. The beach was in flames, cliff high, from end to end, everything as light as day. And then this terrific explosion, it shook the sea and the ship and one saw a huge red mushroom spurt up into the air with huge lumps of black rock in the flamesÓ A master of understatement he added Ò[We] consider ourselves very lucky to have got off safely as we had a rotten job on the beach, working on a pier that was one of the enemy's targets.Ó
Once they landed he was reunited with his baggage and commented ÒOf course living on the beach was a great advantage as one could personally see the kit onto some old ship or other. I had one valise opened and an odd lot of stuff stolen - 2 pairs of shoes, 1 pair of garters and my Sam Browne belt! Someone must be making a corner in leather goods I should think only they left my spare pair of boots.Ó
This was not by any means the end of the War for Godfrey as he was then posted to the Western Front. One letter describes a retreat there.
29.3.1918 They were billeted on an old couple who decided that they too would clear out ahead of the Germans and frantically started packing. ÒIn spite of this the old lady insisted on cooking a lunch and dinner for us, killed a rabbit and brought up a bottle of wine (the only one they had) and made coffeeÉ They left about 4 o'clock, leaving furniture and crockery and everything with the remark 'All that remains is yours.'Ó Godfrey took a few rabbits so they fed well for a day or two.
Cranleigh Sch and St Johns Camb. Mechanical Sciences. Soccer blue.
1907 joined dads firm.
1912 partner
pre WW1 visited St petersburg to prepare designs for water and sewerage systems.
1917 MC 'for distinguished service in the field"
Acting Liet RE., late Royal marine Infantry
1918-9 Adjutant RE of 63rd RNaval Div.
mentioned in dispatches, rose to Acting Major.
tReturned to firm
advised wtr cos all over S England.
Became Chairman of the Assoc of Consulting Engineers and Pres of Inst of Water Engineers.
1941 became sen partner
1949 OBE
1965 ret age 80 having been partner 54 yrs.
Frequ lunched at St Stephens Club as member. One lunch ret late to office and apol to client "I'm very sorry I'm late, but we had great diff in potting the last red."
Obit "he made his mark as a witness before Parliamentary comms dealing with private Bills for major public health engineering projects between the Wars. His commanding appeartance and well modulated voice, coupled with his specialist skills, were in demand, and he contributed to improvements in public health in many towns and cities in Eng and Wales."
A couple of amusing quotes from GMCT's diary of 1903, which conjure up nice images of him and his father:
Aug 13th [at Hotel Elfverson, Sweden] ".... we had dinner and then found out that people thought Father was the Prince of Wales. [Danish] Cousin Ellen found someone she knew who told her so she dispelled the idea and the hotel seemed to think it a great joke and roared with laughter at him when he went to bed at 10 o'clock. ..."
Aug 14th "...we wrote our names in the Hotel book and criticised the Sanitation of the Hotel. ..."
I don't know anything about the Thomas Taylor lineage but I had a letter from my cousin Hero recently, who said she had a good deal of information on John Brough Taylor, so it may be that she can help. I will contact her again.
Here are two extracts (I have shortened the first one) from a document written by a Danish relation of ours, a great grandson of Ettie's. The comments in square brackets are mine.
The Danish family had a clear impression that grandpapa Taylor was not Ettie's real father but Ettie never mentioned it herself. However, when Ettie was very old and in bed in her apartment in Copenhagen, she gave her daughter Ellen a small portrait and said that Ellen ought to have it. When Ellen asked who the gentleman was the old lady only said: "He is a man of importance to you". In 1946 when my brother Ioachim at the age of 20 was visiting London, he stayed with Ettie's neice Dorothy Taylor [=Maud in your FT] and here he brought up the story. Quite horrified [I can imagine!!] Dorothy declined to have any knowledge of the story, but said quite reasonably that they ought to visit a very old woman who had known the family for ages. The woman said: "Yes, of course, her father was Colonel English". It is striking that Ettie both of looks and character was very different from the Taylor family. As to the young John, Dorothy could inform, that in appearance he was very much like the younger brothers and sisters and one had to assume that he was Taylor's son. [The reference to younger sister(s) ties in with William's note of a Mary]
He then goes into detail about various related bits of history, including business connections between the Taylor, English and Halkier families in Denmark. He also includes the following, which describes the Taylor household.
On 10th April 1890 Ettie writes about her brother John from Glenbuck House: ...Last Monday we went over to John, not bad! He has 13 staff members, 7 horses, 1 landau and several open carriages and everything seems swimmingly, but I have a feeling Papa (Taylor) will end up paying for it all, but they are both (John and Papa) very happy. Grandpapa (Taylor) is quite touching but naive. I have never known anyone so devoid of secularity or cleverness as him. He firmly believes everything John tells him. At least little John believes his father is a devil of a fellow. You know what they are like, while they were staying here there was a fuss you would not believe on account of a monkey the boy wanted. But now he has an adorable pony, a dog like the one Studsgaard has, a parrot and next month he will be getting a monkey. On an island in the river there is a great establishment for boatbuilders and the loveliest boats which they can use of course and besides a lift launch especially beautiful which John rents twice a week for certain trips up the river. Little John has his own little boat, it is not beautiful but good enough for him. Furthermore there is a park for ducks, chickens and pigs, in short all the wonderful things a boy can imagine. God knows what his schooling will be like, he knows absolutely nothing at this point in his life.
| 1 | "My Family Filexxx .ged". Record originated in... |