~ Chapter Twenty-Six ~
Elizabeth's Favourite Child
Sydney Ethelbert Gisby Holmes, Charlie Gisby’s fifth son and his second by Elizabeth Holmes, was born in Margate in June 1909, almost two years after his brother, Walter. His birthplace was recorded on his birth certificate as Churchfield Avenue. Since we can find no trace of that street in both early and current maps, we have concluded that the more likely address was Churchfield Place, just round the corner from Addington Street, where he would be brought up.
Despite being registered with the surname Gisby, no name for the father was recorded on the birth certificate. But that omission would not matter to Sydney in later years; by the time he became an adult, he would exist under an entirely different name.
In the year of Sydney’s birth, King Edward VII, in the final months of his life, opened the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, which had been named in honour of his parents. Edward’s Government, led by the Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith, became embroiled in an expensive naval arms race with the German Empire. And the mass-circulation Daily Mail of London hysterically informed its readers in a series of reports that “Germany is deliberately preparing to destroy the British Empire”.
The hysteria over Germany would continue for another five years, until the “war to end all wars” finally erupted in 1914. Sydney’s schooldays, like those of Walter, would have been overshadowed by the events of that war, both abroad and at home.
Despite being registered with the surname Gisby, no name for the father was recorded on the birth certificate. But that omission would not matter to Sydney in later years; by the time he became an adult, he would exist under an entirely different name.
In the year of Sydney’s birth, King Edward VII, in the final months of his life, opened the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, which had been named in honour of his parents. Edward’s Government, led by the Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith, became embroiled in an expensive naval arms race with the German Empire. And the mass-circulation Daily Mail of London hysterically informed its readers in a series of reports that “Germany is deliberately preparing to destroy the British Empire”.
The hysteria over Germany would continue for another five years, until the “war to end all wars” finally erupted in 1914. Sydney’s schooldays, like those of Walter, would have been overshadowed by the events of that war, both abroad and at home.
|
We know little about Sydney’s early years, other than that he was said to be Elizabeth’s favourite, perhaps not surprising since he was her youngest child. This picture of him as a boy has survived. Recently restored by Dustin Skidmore, a great-grandson of Sydney’s from Amarillo in Texas, it is thought, in view of the spruce outfit, to have been taken on the day of Charlie and Elizabeth’s wedding in August 1920, when Sydney would have been eleven years old.
Nor do we know if Sydney followed in Walter’s footsteps, entering into gainful employment as soon as he left school. What is certain is that by the time he reached his eighteenth birthday Sydney had chosen the life of a soldier. Perhaps that life appealed to him as far more romantic and exciting than working in Dowlings stores, like his brother. Or perhaps he needed to escape from something. |
|