Search our records : Thomas William Russell

Thomas Russell was born in Beer on 13^th September 1892, the son of John Russell and his wife Ann.  He joined the Royal Naval Reserve on 12^th March 1912.  HIS RNR record card shows him as 5ft 4¾ ins tall, with brown eyes and a fair complexion.  At the time of joining he was fishing from Beer in a boat called ‘Violet’, but by the outbreak of war he was using a boat called ‘Sapphire’, E14.

He was called up on 3^rd August 1914 and joined HMS Majestic the same day.  He remained with Majestic until 27^th May 1915, when he went to HMS Vivid, a shore establishment at Plymouth.  He spent three months there before joining HMS Carnarvon on 14^th August 1915.

For a few months in early 1918 his parent unit was recorded as HMS President III, whilst he spent a period on Defensively Armed Merchant Ships (DAMS), but the names of the individual ships on which he served in this period are not recorded.

He was demobilised on 7^th August 1919.  For a year after his discharge he received a disability pension of 6s 1d per week as a result of having contracted dysentery during his service.  He must have moved away from Beer at around this time, as by June 1920 he was working as a dock gateman at Cardiff docks.