The World War of Henry Herbert Pawsey....
Left, Joan, ca 1933, in Kampala,
Uganda
We continue our story of Joan Pawsey Shoucair,
born 1921 in England, and whose life has encompassed England, Uganda, Egypt and
lastly England again. It is a story that begins when Henry Herbert
(Bert) Pawsey fell in love with Elsie Ward Newton. He was born 4
September 1896 at Newcastle upon Tyne. She hailed from Hartlepool,
b. 24 September 1899. They married 12 October 1919 in West
Hartlepool, the year the Treaty of Versailles was signed ending the Great
War. They had one child, Joan...our story continues.
Young Bert Pawsey's terrible war years brought out this
leadership qualities. By October 1915,
the young enlisted man was sent to France with the Durham Light Infantry
Regiment. The next summer the ghastly
Battle of the Somme occurred with 60,000 British casualties on the first day of
the battle of whom 20,000 were deaths.
He survived years in the trenches, and by the spring of 1918, after the big push of the Kaiser's Armies, he was commissioned a 2nd lieutenant and transferred to the Northumberland Fusiliers. Evidently he served the remainder of his service in England. He survived the war. Almost 900,000 other British service men did not. A whole generation of European leadership had been extinguished.
Below, the May 1915 enlistment and commissioning papers of Henry Herbert Pawsey of West Hartlepool, County Durham. He was almost 20 years of age and a tailor's cutter when he joined His Majesty's Army. Three years later, he would be an officer in the legendary Northumberland Light Infantry. Click on the pages and they will enlarge.
Henry (Bert) Pawsey, center front,
with his staff near the end of the war. Matured by the experiences of the
conflict, he married in 1919 and began a life in business. That career
would take his family and him to Africa and into service with the British
Empire.
Next
Posting, the love of his life....
