Dr George Robertson Mill R.N.V.R.

The name on the memorial was Dr G.R. Mill, there was only one result on CWGC for this name and he was a doctor so I am certain it is the correct man.

Dr G.R. Mill RNVR photo courtesy of Wrig

George Robertson Mill
Staff Surgeon RNVR
died 11/2/1918 aged 37
Surgeon and Agent Birkenhead, Mersey Division
Birkenhead Cemetery

Son of James Cellars Mill and Helena Valentine Mill nee Finlayson. Husband of Ada Mary Mill nee Ashton of 14 Buckingham Avenue, Birkenhead. Born at Watford. MD Edin Hon. Assistant Physician Birkenhead Borough Hospital. President Birkenhead Medical Society 1912-1913

G.R.Mill was christened in Watford on 22 Aug 1880.

The 1881 census shows they lived at 1 Home Cottages, Pinner St, Watford
James C Mill was a railway clerk and born in Scotland
"Elena" (Helena) Mill was born in Germany, British subject
George R was 9 months old. (The census was taken on the 3rd April so George was born around July 1880)

His mother's death was registered in the 2nd quarter of 1883, she was 36 years old.
His father died in October 1883 aged 39 leaving George orphaned.

21 Nov 1883 Admin of the personal estate of James Cellars Mill, late of Fernside Villa, Bushey in the county of Hertford. Commercial clerk, a widower who died 18 Oct 1883 at Fernside Villa was granted at the principle registry under the usual limitations to George Mill of 59 Priory Place, Perth in North Britain, cattle dealer, the uncle and guardian of George Robertson Mill an infant the son and only next of kin.

The amount left by his father was £136 8s 4d

In the 1901 census George Robertson Mill was a medical student in Edinburgh and boarding at 32 Rankeillor St.

He was married in 1910 in Cheshire to Ada Mary Ashton and in 1915 lived at Ballavale, Park Road North, Birkenhead.

Entry in the Medical Register 1915

In the 1911 census, Ada Mary Mill, married less than a year, was a boarder at the Westminster Hotel, Shaftsbury Rd, Portsmouth. I assume George was busy with the RNVR.

Entry in The Navy List 1911

The Navy Lists 1910 - 1912 show George Robertson Mill as Surgeon, date of seniority as 8 April 1909
In August 1912 a symbol appears by his name which shows he was 'passed for staff surgeon'

November 1914 shows he was posted to 'Rewa'

Entry in The Navy List 1914

August 1917 honorary staff surgeon.

Entry i n the Navy List 1917

There is also an entry which has his date of seniority as 8 April 1917 and lists him as a Surgeon Lieutenant-Commander but this listing also appears in 1919. It does, however, match the rank on the only medal-index I can find for him.  I'll ask some experts about this as I really don't know about naval ranks etc



Mill, George Robertson of Ballavale, Park Road North Birkenhead. Staff Surgeon RNVR died 11 Feb 1918 at 7 Chetwynd Rd, Oxton, Birkenhead. Probate London 5 June to Ada Mary Mill, widow, effects £1930 8s 5d

click here to open the CWGC entry for Dr G.R. Mill

Holy Trinity Industrial School Census Returns 1901, 1911

Hopefully, I've learnt how to do something very useful, and this post will contain an embedded excel file. The file is a transcription of the 1901 and 1911 census returns for Holy Trinity Industrial School, Toxteth. I'm a bit impatient so I'm putting it up before I've investigated the names that were hard to make out (the handwriting on the 1901 is poor)

If I've done this correctly, there should be some links in the grey bar under the spreadsheet which enables you to download or view full-screen. If anyone does have a go at this please leave a comment to let me know if it works!

The research commences

I have started researching the names on this memorial following my usual practice of exhausting online sources before tackling the archives (besides, the Liverpool archive is closed for another month) and a few interesting details have come up.

I already knew that a lot of the names were men who had attended the Industrial School, and Capt. Chavasse's name is there due to his link with the school. It would appear that several of the other names are of men whose work in some way connected them with the school. I am hoping that the records of the industrial school will show whether they were patrons, volunteers or worked there etc. At the moment  I have one man who worked as an Assistant Medical Inspector (Health) for Liverpool, a doctor with the RNVR Birkenhead who was himself orphaned at a young age - he didn't attend this school but I can imagine he would have been interested in helping such a charitable institution, also a school master who in the 1911 census was working in a similar type of school for disadvantaged boys. Did he work at Holy Trinity Industrial School also? I hope that further research will clarify their connections to the school (or the church)

The connection with the school means that many of the names I have identified so far came from very disadvantaged backgrounds. Court housing was common in the streets around Upper Parliament Street and the appalling conditions in these places were well documented.  Quite a few of them were orphaned at an early age or lost one parent leaving the remaining parent with several children to look after. The census returns for the school show that not all the boys were from Liverpool. There are one or two from other parts of Lancashire, and a few from Derbyshire but, to my surprise, I found that quite a few of the "inmates" were from London. This is another puzzle that I hope the records will solve - why were boys from London attending a charitable church school in Liverpool?

I am pleased to say that despite my early misgivings about being able to identify these men without their first-names, the first routes of enquiry have shown a good number of them to be identifiable, either through unusual surnames or service papers surviving showing them living within a few streets of the church. I plan to finish this first stage myself then open up the other names to the local family history society forum for help. When I get to the archives I have a long list of things to look up but I will get around to the Holy Trinity records as soon as I can.

Tracking the journey of the memorial

The Churches Conservation Trust files for St James Church have been extremely helpful in tracing the journey of this memorial from Holy Trinity to the Slaughterhouse Pub. I can now say for sure that the memorial was in St James.

In 1978 a group of people visited the church and one of them noticed a wooden war memorial board laying on the stairs. They took a closer look and saw that it bore the name of  Capt. Noel Chavasse, MC & Bar. They contacted the CCT and the Liverpool Echo. Co-incidentally, the Echo had recently run some stories about Noel Chavasse.

Once their attention had been drawn to the memorial, the CCT arranged for it to be cleaned and returned to the church, they didn't know where it had been sited (It may never have been affixed to the wall) so they chose a spot for it and by Feb 1979 it was on the wall of the organ loft, facing the aisle.

There is no other mention of the memorial until a report from the architect in 1992 that whilst inspecting the damage from a break-in and arson attack, they noticed that the war memorial board had been stolen.

There were no photographs of the board but the fact that it had Capt. Chavasse's name on it, and the description of it as 'a framed wooden board' seem conclusive.

I assume that after being stolen the board was sold or dumped and made it's way to the wall of the Slaughterhouse Pub. Where did go after that? Is it in another pub somewhere, or in a private collection of war memorabilia?

The memorial in Holy Trinity

I tried to find a picture of Holy Trinity Church and was surprised to hit a brick wall. There just don't seem to be any pictures of it around. Then a member of the Liverpool and South West Lancashire Family History Society forum shared this image with me, the interior of Holy Trinity.

The image is a scan of an old photograph that has been downloaded from ebay... I was a bit concerned about copyright before posting it on here but then realised that as the church was demolished in 1940 the photo is at least 70 years old and therefore in the public domain.

Anyway, if you look to the right of the photo you will see a memorial on the wall. It has a carved figure of Christ on the cross but other than that it matches the 'unknown memorial' very well. A local historian who is researching St James informed me that the church records show there was some discussion as to whether they should receive a memorial from Holy Trinity in 1940 as it had a prominent cross (as an evangelical church, St James does not have any crucifixes on display) so it would seem likely that they removed the figure before accepting the plaque.

Later records, after St James was closed, refer to the plaque from Holy Trinity and mention that it has the name of Dr Noel Chavasse on it... another corroboration.

So there you have it, proof that the memorial plaque is from Holy Trinity church... I will add the documentary evidence that I have referred to once I have suitable images of them.

The inscription on the roll of honourf panel refers to the chancel screen being part of the war memorial, it is too blurry to really be made out on this photo but I wonder what happened to it? Unless the diocese kept records I guess we'll never know.

Holy Trinity War Memorial

This project has been gathering pace lately so I thought I'd better get started on recording it...

The war memorial in question was photographed in 1996 by the late Major David Evans for the United Kingdom National Inventory of War Memorials. At this time the memorial was part of the decor in a Liverpool pub (the Slaughterhouse on Fenwick St). It was listed on UKNIWM as from an 'unknown Liverpool Anglican Church.' Sometime later the pub was redecorated, sold and the memorial vanished. I know that enquiries were made at the time but nobody seemed to know where it went.

The Holy Trinity Memorial in the Slaughterhouse Pub, Liverpool circa 1996

Photo courtesy of UKNIWM

The memorial was brought to my attention last year when my St James memorial project got some publicity, a lady contacted me to ask whether her relative was on the memorial I was researching. It wasn't but I did a bit of detective work and found out that his name was on this 'unknown memorial' and I decided to see if the unknown memorial was linked to St James, it wasn't directly linked but I kept coming across connections to Holy Trinity Church, which was demolished in 1940. I finally realised that Holy Trinity had been amalgamated with St James. 

Recently I have come across evidence that the memorial was definitely moved to St James, it was displayed there until after the church was closed down. Apparently the memorial was removed from the church for restoration then forgotten about and ended up in the pub! 

So, I have succeeded in naming the 'unknown memorial' and proved that it belongs to St James' Church. Now comes the hard part... finding it!

I am trying to get the local media interested in the story and at the same time hope to get a group of local WW1 history enthusiasts together to help research the men on this memorial.  Their names, any information we find about them , and progress in the search will be posted on this blog.

Thanks for visiting!

If you have any suggestions for our search, please leave a comment or email me at thewarmemorial@gmail.com

Amanda