George and Gladys Nugent’s youngest daughter, Joyce (previously mentioned in Antigua at War) married Tony Robertson, an engineer at Gunthorpe’s sugar factory, at St John’s Cathedral, Antigua, in 1939. Their first two children were born on the island before the war took Tony into the Royal Navy, initially to serve on minesweepers and then to an assignment in the United States. Their third child was born in the US.
After the war, Tony and Joyce settled in Britain – initially in Tony’s native Scotland (near Edinburgh location?) and later at Aldbourne, Wiltshire, where Joyce’s mother, Gladys, and aunt, Muriel Foster (see separate page), had made their homes. Tony and Joyce lived on the village green, in front of St Michael’s Church, and their children – six in all – attended local schools. Muriel Foster can hardly have contemplated how central the village would become in the story of several families when she first settled in Aldbourne. Besides her sister and niece Joyce, three more nephews and nieces, children of George and Gladys Nugent, came to live at Aldbourne with their families in due course: Monica and husband Frank Fowler stayed there on their return from Uganda, before moving to west Wiltshire; Peggy and Peter Delmé Radcliffe lived at Pond House after returning from Malaysia; and Nick and Margaret Nugent stayed there on return from Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) and Nigeria before settling in Southampton. Tony’s sister, Sheena Tailor, and her family also settled in Aldbourne. Members of the Nugent/Foster clan lived in six different village homes at one time or another.
The Robertson family at 14 The Green played a central role in village life…. [memories of their children and grandchildren]
The Robertsons, by David A. Robertson
1978ish: I was 12 (must have been in the summer). My Grandad, Tony was visiting us in Beccles and asked me and my sister, and possibly my brother to go round the Garden @ 32 Puddingmoor picking up Ciggie butts. He paid us 2p per butt. I thought this was brilliant and we soon discovered that the places where he sat on various out door days were where rich pickings were to be had. Well we collected our money and our Grandad, I guess, was pleased that the garden was butt free.
I think that it was always nice to see our Grandad when he drove all the way from Wiltshire to see us. I think I used to be concerned as my parents kept telling me how hard it was for him to drive with his leg which he hurt in a motorcycle accident early in his life. I remember how far it was as we (My parents and my brother Mark and sister, Fiona) occasionally drove down to Auldbourne ourselves to see our relatives. Auldbourne was a gathering point for the Robertsons and Nugents.
1971: I stood in the Kitchen of my Grandparents house in Aldbourne, contemplating some men. I think one was my Uncle Stephen (also my god father), one was definitely my wonderfully deaf Uncle Christopher, and my Grandfather, Tony Robertson. They said go into the garden and pick some raspberries, you can then eat them. This was a good idea, although I was unsure still as I think mischief was afoot. I would have been about 5 and quite gullible. Off I went to the garden and picked a few raspberries. I still had some in my red stained hand as I came back in to the kitchen. I held up my hand palm open offering some to the commander (my Grandfather). No he said, and I offered them around. The answer was the same, “not for us, thank you”. So I continued to eat them when I had finished my Uncle Christopher smiled and said innocently, “they are poison”. I listened carefully as Christopher’s deaf voice was hard for me to understand, as I saw him infrequently. I did not cry. But I had a huge question mark in my head. I asked how long was I going to live. Not long they said. So, as I write this now at the grand old age of 53 I remember well the lesson. Raspberries are not poison, and words are just words.
My ancestors were servicemen, engineers, mothers, children, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles and more. A family of diversity and ingenuity which created and lived and loved as much as any other family. We are still essentially the same, although I feel rather stretched, as though I belong to more than just the family I exist within. Something spiritual in nature and more connected to life than some.
