Alfred-William-Tivey-of-The-Royal-Engineers
 |
Alfred William Tivey was born 13th November 1910 - he was
the only child of Thomas Alfred Tivey (1877-1935) and Emma Jane
Smith (previously Jewson). He belongs to
Group 22 Alfred's father Thomas Alfred was born in Derby, his profession of firstly Hotel Porter then Railway Porter is probably what brought him to London where he me Emma Jane who had been widowed in 1908. Alfred had half siblings from his mother's first marriage to Leonard Coe Jewson - they were Leonard William Jewson, Louisa Jewson (1901-1901) Violet Jewson and Herbert John Jewson. Alfred was a Railway Signalman and was residing in Sheffield when he married Joan Evans at Brimington Parish Church in Derbyshire, 5 months before the start of the Second World War in 1939. Joan was an enamel worker and 5 years his junior. After the war Alfred and Joan had two daughters - Sylvia J (Cluer) and Elaine A (Jukes). |
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Left: Photograph of Staff Sergeant Alfred William Tivey of the Royal Engineers who served throughout WWII Below: The medals that Alfred earned during his long service throughout WWII, a true hero. |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Commentary from Alfred's
daughter Elaine and Son-in-Law James Dukes :- "Alfred
trained as a railway signalman at Kings Cross in London. When he
was 21 he was told by the railway company that he would stay on
box boy wages unless he moved to a signal box where there was a
vacancy for a signalman. The only vacancy was up in Renishaw
which is how he came to live up north. When I asked him why he
went to war when he was in a reserve occupation he said he was
called up because he used to be in the London Rifles, their
equivalent of the Territorial Army. Alf Tivey was what I called
a gentle giant, he was 6' 4" tall and wouldn't hurt a fly so I
asked why he joined the London rifles and he said it was because
they had a gramophone and was he only form of entertainment in
the neighbourhood. When he went to war he was sent straight to
France, they were heading for the Maginoux line when they heard
it had fallen and they had got to makes their way back to
England on foot and any way they could, he eventually got to the
beach and made his way back to England. It must have been bad
because he would never give any details he would only tell us
the funny side. When he got back he was sent to Apple pie camp
at Derby where he was transferred to the Royal Engineers and
promoted to sergeant . The rest of the war is a long story first
he was sent to Singapore then India, Iraq ,Tripoli, Monti
casino , by which time they had been abroad for nearly 5 years
and the men protested, so they had to be read the riot act. What
they didn't know was they where getting ready for the big push
on Berlin. His job during the war was running the railways
through the African desert. As I said earlier he wouldn't talk
about the bad times but I could right a book about the funny
stories he used to tell." |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Alfred was not the only member of the family to help the War effort. His wife Joan (nee Evans) see photo (Below) worked on the railways in England during the war. Right: Alfred in Rome during the War, Beneath: Alf and Joan in their latter years  |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Special thanks to Alfred's son in law James Jukes and his daughter Elaine for providing the photographs and commentary for this page. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| <<< BACK TO MILITARY INDEX BACK TO MAIN GALLERY PAGE>>> |