Air Mechanic (2nd Class) ALBERT VICTOR GAMBLING
Hope Villas, 16, Western Road, Winchester
Service number 24215. Royal Flying Corps
Honourably discharged because of illness, 19 April 1917
Died, Winchester, October 1919
Family Background
Albert Victor Gambling, known as Bertie to family and friends, was born in Winchester on 16 November 1888, the son of John and Sarah Gambling. John had been born in Preston Plucknet, Somerset, and baptised there on 11 August 1857. John’s father, George Gambling, born around 1831, also in Preston Plucknet, was a leather dresser. His mother, Emily, whom George married in 1857, worked as a leather glover. Emily died in 1862, aged 25.
On Christmas Day 1863 George Gambling remarried. His second wife, 19-year-old Jane Raison also lived in Preston Plucknet and she went on to give birth to five sons: Thomas, George, Mark, William and Walter. Jane died in 1876 while giving birth to Walter, who survived. Just a few months after Jane’s death, George married for a third time. His new wife, Eliza Eglen (Eglon), was John Gambling’s second stepmother but by this time he was 19 years old. Eliza died in 1896 and George in 1899.
On 11 September 1882, John married Angelina Ann Young in Preston Plucknet. A trained tailor, John had already moved to Winchester to work and he brought his new bride to live in the city. Winchester offered good prospects to tailors as there was a strong sartorial tradition among the Army officers, Winchester College boys, cathedral clergymen, lawyers and doctors who made up the city’s elite. Also, the population increased sharply in the late 19th Century, further raising demand for tailoring among Winchester’s burgeoning middle classes. However, it is unlikely that John Gambling ever ran his own business: the 1911 Census recorded him working at home, but for an employer.
In 1883, at the age of 27, Angelina Gambling tragically died in childbirth. The following year John remarried in Winchester. His second wife, Sarah Hallett, had been born in Thorncombe, Dorset, in 1857 and was the daughter of a glover in Chard, Somerset.
In 1885, John Gambling was recorded in Warren’s Winchester Directory for the first time, living at 20 (now No. 3) North View, Fulflood. On 17 April that year, Sarah gave birth to a son, Ernest John, followed by Percy George on 2 October 1886 and Albert, known as Bertie to family and friends, in 1888. All three boys went to Western Infants School, then in Elm Road. At the age of six or seven, the boys moved on to St Thomas Higher Grade National/Senior Church of England School, an elementary school in Mews Lane - Ernest in 1893, Percy in 1894 and Bertie in 1895. Their address on admission was 18, (now No. 5) North View. By 1896 the family had moved again, to Hope Villas, 16, Western Road (the house has the same name and number today) where Bertie’s only sister, Ivy Louise, is believed to have been born in 1898.
Ernest left school in 1899 to start work as an apprentice to a cabinet maker while Percy later became a tailor’s apprentice. Bertie was still at school in 1901 but would have left shortly afterwards. His sister Ivy would probably have started at Western Infants in about 1903 and then gone on to Western Elementary School for Girls on the same site at the age of seven. The 1911 Census shows Ivy still at school (she would have left soon afterwards) and living with her parents at 16, Western Road, along with her eldest brother Ernest, by then a qualified cabinet maker.
Meanwhile, Percy and Bertie Gambling, had both moved to London. Percy, aged 24, was in lodgings and working as a military tailor while 22-year-old Bertie was boarding at 36, Fitzroy Street, off Tottenham Court Road. The 1911 Census recorded him working as an accountant in the automobile trade. It is possible that he met his future wife, Eva Goodchild, in London in this period.
Great War Record
On 27 November 1915 Bertie attested (registered his willingness) to serve in the armed forces, probably under the Derby Scheme. His enlistment papers give his address as 394, Uxbridge Road, Shepherds Bush, London, and his occupation as an insurance broker. He was placed on the Army Reserve list the following day and mobilised on 29 February 1916. Bertie joined the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) at South Farnborough, Surrey, on 1 March as an Air Mechanic, 2nd Class, with the service number 24215. His enlistment papers reveal that he was 5ft 10ins tall, with blue eyes and brown hair.
Bertie embarked for France on 9 November 1916, but just a month later he began to fall ill with a cough. His medical reports and discharge papers record that in January 1917 he was diagnosed with tuberculosis in the left lung after coughing up blood. On 28 February, it was decided to send him back to England. After being discharged from 10 Stationary Hospital on 1 March, he embarked on the hospital ship Princess Elizabeth on 13 March. Bertie probably disembarked at Liverpool as he was sent to Windsor Street Military Hospital there. The Army doctor who signed his medical report on 22 March confirmed the tuberculosis diagnosis. Bertie’s illness had been brought on by his war service – the winter of 1916-17 was exceptionally bitter – and being on guard duty had further worsened his condition. The doctor concluded that Bertie should be discharged from the services and that he was permanently disabled and entitled to a military disablement pension of 40s (£2) per week.
16 Western Road, home to Bertie and Eve Gambling and
to Bertie’s parents.
Bertie was officially discharged on 19 April 1917. His address on discharge was Hope Villas, 16 Western Road, Winchester - his parents’ address - and his trade listed as storeman. On 7 May 1917 he was issued with a Silver War Badge, signifying that he had been honourably discharged because of a wound or illness. The badge, worn on civilian clothing, was intended to deter ‘white feather wavers’.
Bertie married Eva Goodchild in Camden, London, in early 1918. Eva had been born in St Albans, Hertfordshire, in 1896. Her father was a gardener, but the rest of the family worked in the clothing industry with Eva herself listed as a silk worker in the 1911 Census. After the marriage, she and Bertie made their home with his parents in Winchester. Bertie appears in the 1918 Winchester electoral records at 16, Western Road and as the householder for the same address in the 1919 Warren’s Directory even though it was his parents’ home as well.
Bertie Gambling died in Winchester on 27 October 1919, aged 30. The cause of his death is not known but may well have been linked to his tuberculosis. He was buried on 1 November 1919 in West Hill Cemetery, Winchester. There is an intriguing reference to Bertie being mentioned in the London Gazette which would only happen if he had carried out an action that was above and beyond the normal line of duty. His name does not appear in the Winchester War Service Register (WWSR), presumably because he did not live in the city at the beginning of the war.
Family after the Great War
After Bertie’s death, his parents remained at 16, Western Road for the rest of their lives. Sarah Gambling died in 1930 and John in 1935. Bertie’s widow Eva remarried in St Albans in 1929. Her husband was Charles Almond and by 1939 they were living in Bletchley, Buckinghamshire. The couple had at least three children. Eva died in 1968 in Leighton Buzzard, aged 71.
Bertie’s eldest brother Ernest served in the war as an Air Mechanic, 1st Class (service number 211240) with the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). He enlisted in February 1916 and served on the home front. He would have been transferred to the RAF in April 1918 when the RNAS and the RFC merged. His address in the WWSR is given as 9, St. Catherine’s Road. According to the electoral records he must have been married by at least 1923 as his wife Agnes joined him on the electoral list that year. Ernest’s name and trade (carpenter), appeared in a National Union of Railwayman membership list for 1926, the year of the General Strike. He joined on 10 May 1926, the day before the Trades Union Congress called off the strike. It is possible that he worked at the Eastleigh railway carriage works. Ernest and Agnes remained at 9, St. Catherine’s Road until their deaths within a short time of each other in 1963.
Bertie’s other brother Percy also served with the RFC as an Air Mechanic, 1st Class and he, too, survived the war. Percy appears to have been based at the No.1 Aircraft Unit at St Omer, near Calais, which was the RFC’s main repair and maintenance base. After the war, Percy seems to have returned to work in London. In 1939 he married Mary Smith in Kensington. At 53, Percy was considerably older than his 31-year-old wife. The couple are not believed to have had children and both died in London, Percy in 1957 and Mary in 1987.
In 1924, Bertie’s sister Ivy married William A. White in Winchester. In the WWSR there is a William A. White who enlisted as a Private in September 1914 and went on to become a Staff Sergeant in the Royal Army Service Corps. He served in Gallipoli, Egypt, France and Salonika. His Winchester address was 9, Cathedral View. Ivy and William appear in the 1939 National Register, with William listed as an architect’s chief clerk. The couple lived at Hill Crest (unnumbered then, but now No. 137), Greenhill Road, one of the inter-war semi-detached houses. There were six in the household so Ivy and William possibly had four children, but the records that would confirm this are still closed. They were still living there by 1973. Ivy is believed to have died in Basingstoke the following year. She was the last person to die who would have known Bertie.
Medals and Memorials for Albert Victor Gambling
Air Mechanic (2nd Class) Albert Victor Gambling was entitled to the Victory Medal and the British War Medal. His grave in West Hill, Cemetery, St. James’ Lane, Winchester (GR. 2183), is not maintained or listed by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission as he died after discharge. Nor, for reasons not known, is Bertie on the St Thomas School War Memorial, now held at Kings’ School, Winchester. However, he is remembered on the memorials at St Paul’s and St Matthew’s churches, Winchester.