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Boy Robert George Matthews
Royal Navy HMS Invincible
from:London
Born in Kentish Town London, Robert lived a rather full life. His father and three generations before him had all been Blacksmiths. His Mother was a laundry assistant. He was the oldest of a family of 12.
When he was 15, Robert ran away from home and joined the Navy No. J 26013 at the beginning of WW1. After training in Portsmouth and Plymouth, he sailed on the Invincible, as a boy, to the South Atlantic to the first Battle of the Falkland Islands. It was a very hard life aboard ship. One of his duties was to take the Captains dinner to his cabin and afterwards he was allowed to eat the leftovers. One day he mistakenly ate some of the food thinking the Captain had finished, and was flogged.
After coming back to England he jumped ship and went absent without leave, staying around London for a while, working as a Pot boy in the pubs. A very wise move, as the Invincible was sunk in the Battle of Jutland, with most hands and I would not be here to put these notes together.
Robert then joined the same regiment as his father. The Royal Artillery army no. 1048820 under an assumed name, Robert G. Smith and was sent to France. He was there in The Royal Field Artillery and The Royal Horse Artillery from July 1915 To May 1919. I cannot find his Army records, but do remember him talking of the area of Loos. He was sent home to England during these years with frost bite in his feet and was in hospital in The Nunnery, on Nunnery Lane in York. My grandparents, living in Nunnery Lane, would ask recuperating lads to tea on a Sunday and this is how my mother and father met. He went back to France for the rest of the war. In 1919 he transferred to Meerut, India with The Royal Field Artillery, training as a blacksmith, which had been a family profession going back four generations at least. He was in India, moving around quite a lot until November 1925, then going on the army reserve until 1931.On leaving the Army in 1925 he lodged with a lady called Mrs Ball, in Altofts, and worked as a blacksmith at P & P Pit, shoeing the pit ponies. Later he worked as an ARP Warden during the Second World War and as a British Railways Goods Guard until his retirement in November 1967 at the age of 70.
Also from 1939 to 1963 Robert was a Special Constable in Normanton, becoming a section leader and rising to the rank of Sergeant. He was also very keen gardener, and for many years had two and three allotments. He always said food came before flowers, but there were usually a few flowers too. During the war and times of shortage he would have as many as 60 rabbits, for our own pot and neighbours too. Spare vegetables and fruit were also sold for coppers to make a bit of money for next year’s seed.
Robert had a long and happy retirement, living latterly in Attlee Street and died aged 92 in 1990. He is buried in Altofts cemetery with Rose who had died many years before.
If he had not jumped ship, I would not have been here to tell this short tale, as there were only 5 survivors from the Invincible in the battle of Jutland.
