SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT: Among the thousands of young men who passed through the gates of the East India Company’s Addiscombe academy in the 19th Century, one Scot rose through the ranks in a career that has been carefully traced by DAVID MORGAN
Family service: Elizabeth Gordon, who died when a volunteer nurse in World War I, was one of generations of her family who served
An entry in the marriage registers of Croydon Minster has opened a window into the life of a family who served their country in various parts of the world, and in quite different ways.
Tuesday April 9 1907 saw the wedding of Dora Gordon to Frederick Hill. The officiating minister for the wedding was Henry Mainamara and the couple were married not by the reading of banns but by special licence.
The groom, a solicitor, was living in Great Finches Park, Crawley Down, Sussex and the bride at 9, Tavistock Road, Croydon. The most interesting part of the information in the register is to do with Dora’s father, William Gordon. He was recorded as General, Indian Army CIE – Commander of the Indian Empire.
General William Gordon’s house in Tavistock Road was named “Arradoul”, to reflect his Scottish heritage.
Arradoul is a small village in what was Banffshire, now Moray, and was part of his family’s estate. He was born in 1824, the youngest son of Adam Gordon, of Cairnfield, who was a Deputy Lieutenant of the old county.
The Gordons were one of the historic families of Scotland and, in his later years, William Gordon spent a great deal of time researching and drawing up his family tree. He was the great great grandson of Robert Gordon of Lunan, of the parish of Speymouth, nearly opposite to Gordon Castle.
General Gordon’s first association with Croydon was when he was sent to Addiscombe Military College, before he joined the army in 1841. He arrived in India that year, joining the 49th Bengal Native Infantry in 1842, part of the East India Company’s military wing. He gained his commission as a lieutenant three years later.
Private army: cadets posing in front of the Addiscombe Military Academy, which in the 19th Century trained officers for the East India Company
His military career in India was a reflection of the colonial history of that time. He was present during the siege of Multan in 1848-1849, part of the second Anglo-Sikh War. After the collapse of the city to the British, Punjab became part of the British Empire.
During the Indian Rebellion between 1857 and 1859, Gordon held the rank of Brigadier Major and acted as Deputy Assistant Quarter Master General.
In 1860, he was promoted to be the District Inspector of Musketry. He then became Chief Inspector of Musketry at Army Headquarters in 1863, being reappointed in 1868 and 1873. He spent so long in musketry that he became known among the troops as “Gunny Gordon”.
In 1872, Gordon, by now 48, was married to Harriet, the eldest daughter of Andrew Stewart of Auchlunkart, one of the villages on his family’s estate. She was 27 years younger than him.
He continued to progress up the chain of command and was made Brigadier General in 1878, also receiving the CIE the same year.
Siege of Multan: the Anglo-Sikh wars of the mid-1800s were significant imperialistic events, conducted by a company’s private army
Gordon commanded the Rawalpindi, Gwalior and Peshawar districts before his final promotion to Major General in 1882. He retired in 1883, returning to England.
The family first lived in Acton, west London, before oving to Tavistock Road.
The 1901 census provided the answer about where the family had lived in India. The four children listed as living in the family home were born in Simla (now Shimla), nestling in the foothills of the Himalayas, where temperatures were cooler and the rainfall higher than further south. The Gordons lived in a fine house named “Chapslee”. Gordon eventually sold that property to Mr JM Macpherson, the Secretary to the Government, for 27,000 rupees. The building today is a luxury hotel.
In 1901, William Gordon’s name appeared in the Croydon press. A woman, Jane Wilderman, of West Croydon was accused of fraudulently obtaining funds from the Croydon branch of the Soldier’s and Sailor’s Association. Gordon was the treasurer of the association and gave evidence in court. Wilderman was given a lenient sentence, as her friends agreed to pay back the money. The total sum involved was about £39 – worth almost £6,000 today – which had been paid to Wilderman in weekly installments of between four and 10 shillings.
The Gordons’ eldest son, Graham, was not living in Tavistock Road in 1901. He had already joined the army. In January 1911, he was promoted to Major in the 13th Duke of Connaught’s Lancers (Watson’s Horse), a cavalry regiment. He would eventually become Lieutenant Colonel in this regiment.
During World War I, Connaught’s Lancers remained on the North-West Frontier of India until July 1916, when it moved to Mesopotamia, in the Middle East, to relieve Kut-al-Amara, now the city of Kut in modern-day Iraq. Around 8,000 British and allied troops had been beseiged by Turkish forces for almost a year.
Watson’s Horse later served Waziristan during the Third Afghan War in 1919.
The 1911 census was important in discovering another Gordon who was not on the census 10 years earlier. The 34-year-old Edward, still single, was on leave from Japan where he was working in the British Consulate at Hakodate, on the southern coast of Hokkaido. Initially employed in 1898 as a translator at the Tokyo Embassy, he was at Nagasaki in 1899 and was listed as the Vice Consul of Hakodate on various dates, the last one being 1924.
On the record: Dora Gordon’s wedding in Croydon in 1907, in the Minster’s register, showing the name of her father, the General in the Indian Army
He endured tragedy in his life as his wife, Lisa, died shortly after the birth of their first child. He and his second wife, Christine, who were married in 1915, were temporarily part of the British Consulate in Honolulu when she died in 1919.
Edward Gordon’s sister, Elizabeth Marjorie, was living at the family home in 1911. She was 37 and was supported by “private means”. As was befitting the daughter of a senior army figure at the time, she was provided with a private education at home, followed by a time in Dusseldorf, Germany.
Her service to her country wouldn’t begin until 1917. As the Great War progressed Elizabeth, known to her family and friends as Elmo, volunteered to nurse some of the many casualties.
War graves: Elizabeth Gordon’s memorial stone in the war cemetary in GReece
She sailed to Greece as a VAD, Voluntary Aid Detachment, and arrived in June 1917. Her posting was to 65th General Hospital, Salonika. She caught malaria almost straightaway and died on September 11, 1917, aged 43. Despite her brief time there, her matron had already declared what a hard worker she was.
Elizabeth was buried in the Mikra British Cemetery in Thessalonika, in Kalamaria, one of 480 casualties buried there. The inscription on her gravestone reads, “Blessed are all they who fear the Lord and walk in his ways, Psalm 128 v 1.”
Her name can be found in the book Croydon and The Grear War, one of the few women from the town remembered for their sacrifice.
She left and estate of £7,146 – worth £620,000 today – to her sisters, Mrs Dora Hill – she who was married at Croydon Parish Church in 1907 – and Miss Aymee Gordon.
Her decision to contribute to the war effort may have been linked to the death of her father. General Gordon died, aged 93, in April 1917. He was buried in the churchyard of St John’s, Shirley, next to his wife, who had died in February 1908, aged 59. Two press cuttings remembered him: “Death of noted Banffshire soldier”, “One of the oldest officers in the army”.
Probate was granted in May to his daughter Elizabeth of £3984. Freed from the family duty and ties to her ageing father, she volunteered as a nurse. She, too, has a memorial in St John’s churchyard.
It never fails to surprise how much information can be retrieved following a single entry in a parish register. But then again, not everyone signs themselves as an Indian Army general.
The motto of Clan Gordon is “bydand”, a Scots word meaning abiding, or steadfast. For this branch of the Gordon family, they could add service and sacrifice.
David Morgan, pictured right, is a former Croydon headteacher, now the volunteer education officer at Croydon Minster, who offers tours or illustrated talks on the history around the Minster for local community groups
If you would like a group tour of Croydon Minster or want to book a school visit, then ring the Minster Office on 020 688 8104 or go to the website on www.croydonminster.org and use the contact page
Some previous articles by David Morgan:
- That was the writer that was: Addiscombe girl called the tunes
- Women’s suffrage at tea with the Bonnerjees of Bedford Park
- Tufnell sparked complaints and compliments in Queensland
- The church fire that consumed a thousand years of history
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
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