George Edward MORRISON

George Morrison's name on column 93 of the Dunkirk Memorial, northern France.

George Morrison was born on 23 September 1919 in Banstead, Surrey. His parents Richard and Jessie (née Chatterton) were originally from Yorkshire; Jessie’s father was a butler at Halnaby Hall near Northallerton, and Richard’s was a power loom tuner and later (once the family had moved to Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire) a cycle agent and repairer.

Jessie’s father died young, and thereafter her family moved to Banstead in Surrey. By 1911, when he was 24, Richard was working as chauffeur to James Helby (a gentleman of private means) and living at his country estate, Glengariff, near Cobham in Surrey. The following year Richard and Jessie married in All Saints Church in Banstead; his occupation was recorded as “motor man”.

Jessie went to live with Richard on the Glengariff estate. Their first child Charles was born in 1913, followed by Grace in 1918, and George in 1919. In around 1920 the family moved to Chipping Norton (where Richard had spent part of his youth). In the 1921 census they were recorded as living at 8 Market Street, and Richard was working as a motor mechanic for Hartwell’s Garages in Oxford. Hartwell’s, originally an agricultural ironmongers, moved from Chipping Norton to Oxford in 1919 and opened a car showroom in an existing shop building at 22 Queen Street in the city centre. Soon afterwards the company erected new purpose-built premises on Park End Street, one of several motor businesses in the area which gave it the nickname ‘The Street of Wheels’.

Richard and Jessie’s fourth child Kenneth was born in Chipping Norton in the autumn of 1921. The family then moved to Oxford, and by 1927 were living at 273 Abingdon Road, part of the newly-built Weirs Lane council estate in Cold Harbour, at the far southern end of the Abingdon Road. It’s likely that the children attended New Hinksey School; on 13 February 1929 it was noted in the school logbook that “The two boys Morrison were marked absent but found afterwards to be at the dental clinic at 2pm”.

By 1932 George's father Richard was running Morrison's Garage, one of the two motor garages on Lake Street in New Hinksey. That same year George’s older sister Grace died at the age of thirteen. She was buried at Rose Hill Cemetery.

In 1938 George’s older brother Charles got married and moved to Abingdon; he and his wife Margery later lived in Boars Hill. In the 1939 register, taken on 29 September, four weeks after the outbreak of the Second World War, it seems that George and his younger brother Kenneth were still living at home at 273 Abingdon Road with their parents.

Soon afterwards, George enlisted as a Private in the 4th Battalion of the Ox & Bucks Light Infantry, service number 5384773. After a period of training near Newbury, the battalion sailed from Southampton to Le Havre in northern France on 18 January 1940. George was part of 'A' Company. Germany invaded on 10 May, and the fighting reached George and his battalion in mid-May, by which time they were stationed near the town of Cassel (about 30km south of Dunkirk). The battalion was ordered to march south-east, into Belgium and to the town of Ath, 30km east of the French border. The regimental diary describes events on 19 May 1940:

"By dawn all troops were well clear of Ath, our withdrawal being covered by tanks and armoured fighting vehicles, but at the point given in orders there was no sign of any transport. The troop-carrying company had been bombed on the way to the rendezvous and it was not until we had marched fourteen kilometres that transport eventually arrived and then it was totally inadequate, the men being packed like sardines. All went well, however, until the outskirts of Tournai were reached, when the leading lorries came up against an obstacle in the road. As they drew up to try to find a way round, a sapper major – subsequently shot as a fifth columnist [an enemy sympathiser] – ordered all following lorries, tanks, carriers, etc., to pack in and find a place somewhere. The result was that for a mile the road was blocked with all types of transport packed five deep across the road, the gaps being filled with refugees. Almost immediately nine Heinkel bombers appeared and dropped their load. All lorries that could be warned in time were emptied, but the bombs landed where the lorries were still full of men. At least two troop-carrying lorries packed with men, a petrol lorry, two ammunition trucks – one being loaded with 3-inch mortar bombs – and various platoon trucks were hit and all went up in an enormous blaze. After this bombing forty-eight men of A Company alone were missing, but the total number of casualties was considerably greater."

George was one of the men of 'A' Company who died in the attack. He was twenty. Fierce fighting continued throughout May and into June – what became known as the Battle of France or the Western Campaign. It concluded with the Fall of France and the evacuation of more than 338,000 Allied soldiers from the beaches at Dunkirk between 26 May and 4 June 1940.

George is commemorated on the Dunkirk Memorial, which stands at the entrance to the Commonwealth War Graves section of Dunkirk Town Cemetery. It commemorates more than 4,500 casualties of the British Expeditionary Force who died in the campaign of 1939-40 and who have no known grave. He is also commemorated on the Oxford City Second World War Roll of Honour which is in the church of St Michael at the Northgate on Cornmarket in Oxford, and in the Second World War Book of Remembrance in the Regimental Chapel in Christ Church Cathedral.

George left his estate – worth £152 11s (about £4,600 in today’s money) – to his mother Jessie. She and Richard continued to live at 273 Abingdon Road, and to run the garage on Lake Street. In 1948 Richard invented a new device for testing both a driver’s and a car’s reactions in an emergency, as reported in the Banbury Guardian.

In 1949 George’s younger brother Kenneth married Glenys Claridge in Oxford.

George’s father Richard died in 1954, aged 67. His mother Jessie lived at 273 Abingdon Road until her death in 1975, aged 90. They were both buried alongside their daughter Grace at Rose Hill Cemetery.

Research by Heather Reid; with thanks to Pete Roper for additional research.

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