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Pte. James "Longfellow" Rathbone
Britsh Army Motor Company Army Service Corps
from:Bromborough, Cheshire
My Grandfather, James Rathbone, was chauffeur to Lord Leverhulme prior and after the War. I have a letter written from John Roebuck of the Star Works, Coventry, written in July 1915. It relates to a bus that my grandfather was to collect, but it does not specify what it was required for. The letter states that if asked, my grandfather was only to say that Sir William (Leverhulme) required it for a very special purpose and that he was not to give away any information to anyone about any other vehicles that Sir William had in use. Very mysterious!
Grandfather spent the war years in the East Africa Campaign as a Motor Driver, but what action he saw I was never told. He embarked at Devonport on the HMAT Beltana on 19th August 1916 and arrived in Kilindini on 3rd October 1916. He contracted malaria on 30th March 1917 and was admitted to hospital in Mombasa, but transferred to Nairobi on 4th April 1917. He was discharged on 9th April 1917 when he returned to duty. He also seems to have passed through Dar es Salaam, but how long he spent there is not known.My grandfather died during WWII, not as a direct result of enemy action, but he was repairing a roof, possibly as a result of bomb damage, when he fell and sustained head injuries. He was in the Home Guard in WWII and carried out Fireman duties. I still have his fireman's axe. Sadly I never met my grandfather as I was born after he died.
