Milestones

William Blencowe of Brackley

Chris Blencowe wrote: ‘Bill Blencowe was born in Brackley Old Town in 1925. In 1943 he volunteered and joined the Royal Navy. He served as Leading Seaman and Torpedo-man, mainly on corvettes. His sea time took him all round the world: Africa, India and Burma. In peace time he did a Caribbean cruise, finally leaving the Navy in 1946. He trained as a bricklayer and worked as a builder until he retired.

In 1951 he married Heather and they had three sons (one of whom died in infancy). Bill died peacefully after a short stay in Katherine House Hospice in Adderbury. He is interred at St Peter's Church Brackley, where many early Blencowe ancestors lie at rest, and just a stone's throw from where he was born and grew up.

Gwendoline Verlie Hill née Blencowe

Gwen Blencowe was the third child of George H. Blencowe and Edith A. Parsons born in 1917 at Tamworth in northern NSW, where she spent her first two years before moving to Sydney. In the early 1920s her family moved to Leeton to join the extended family.

Gwen was educated in Leeton and pursued a career in nursing at Leeton District Hospital. In 1939 she married Albert Hill, a Leeton lad, and four of their children were born in Leeton. In 1947 the family moved to Tharbogang, a small village near Griffith, where a fifth child was born.

In 1957 the family moved to Griffith township where Albert managed the Griffith Swimming Complex and Gwen returned to nursing. Gwen later went back to retail until her retirement in 1980.

Albert passed away in 1982. In later years Gwen found companionship with George Foale and moved to Hillston where they enjoyed many years together. Her health began to fail in February 2004. She finally moved into the Pioneer Lodge Nursing Home in Griffith where she passed away on 26th September, 2004, only six days prior to the first Blencowe Reunion. Gwen is survived by her children, Norman, Errol, and Douglas Hill, Valerie Browne and Judith Saddler. She leaves 35 descendants.

Anne Burton, Deniliquin NSW
October 2004