My grandfather, John Ernest Llewellyn Poulson, took a job with Barclays Bank after leaving the Royal Field Artillery around 1920, apparently helped by his grandfather, Upstanding Edwin, who offered assistance to Gamps (given his father the Wastrel, John Walden Poulson, didn’t or couldn’t).

I initially thought Ernest Izod Arundel Ellis worked with Gamps at Barclays, but he worked for a competitor, Lloyds, initially in Southsea. I have only found a little information about Uncle Ernie; his father, James Morgan Ellis, was an explorer, described in an obituary as “…pioneer of the development of the British-owned islands in the central Pacific.” – but I believe Gamps and Ernie met as young bank clerks because a boarder introduced them. They were about the same age, both just leaving the service, both tall and handsome, both cricket lovers and bank clerks – and became friends.

In 1919 (when Gamps was still in the Royal Field Artillery) Ernest Izod Arundel Ellis married Edith Maud Williams – known to everyone in our family as Sis – in Portsmouth. This is a gorgeous wedding photo of two very photogenic young people – Ernie was 22 and Sis was 25. Lieutenant EIA Ellis was in the Hampshire Regiment and served through some time in 1920. Sis’s father, Ernest Henry Williams, a Sergeant Major in the Royal Field Artillery didn’t live to see her married – he died March 28 1919 in the Royal Portsmouth Hospital.

Ernie’s unusual middle names come from his grandmother (Anne Eliza Izod) and the man his father worked for, John T Arundel. Ernie’s grandfather, George Coxon Ellis, had sailed to Australia a year after getting married, both James Morgan and his son Ernie were born in Australia; Ernie’s younger brother was born in New Zealand. Ernie chose working for a bank and living in only a few places in England – if you average him and his father out, it’s a “normal” amount of travel!

Sis was the second of five Williams children and middle sister of three. Her younger sister Lilian Melita, known as Billie, was also very pretty, and single. In the 1921 census (taken 19 June 1921) I found a clue as to how Ernie & Gamps met – and also more about how Gamps met my grandmother. Doris Marguerite Poulson – Goggie – was the head of a household of three at 89 Commercial Road, Portsea. Her younger brother (Gamps) the bank clerk was living with her along with a boarder, Lilian Melita Williams, a clerk for R Hodges & Sons, tobacconist.

That explains why there were so many pictures of Goggie, Gamps & Billie together. I now assume that Gamps met Billie’s brother-in-law Ernie after Billie became their lodger and the friendship was cemented by having so many things in common. I wish I had a complete story of how Gamps and Nanny became a couple, but on April 22 1923, they were married at St. Luke’s Church, Portsea (Portsmouth). I have to assume that Sis and Ernie were there, but the only two the marriage certificate shows as witnesses are Billie’s younger brother Joe (Ernest Henry Williams, Jr.) and John’s older sister Goggie. Sadly, I don’t have a wedding photograph for my grandparents – I don’t remember ever seeing one. This picture is of Nanny and Goggie at the beach in the mid 1920s and radiates happiness (possibly that incredibly cute puppy Goggie holds is part of it).

After John & Billie moved to Bournemouth in 1930 and Sis & Ernie moved to Greenwich in 1932 the opportunities to get together were fewer given the distance and young children. In the 1939 register (taken at the start of WWII), Ernie is listed as an assistant bank manager in Greenwich and Gamps is a bank manager in Poole, Dorset.

My father recalled Ernie very fondly and spent a number of half term holidays from boarding school with Sis & Ernie instead of going home. He didn’t remember why that happened, but I assume  when Nanny wasn’t well (she had bipolar disorder) Sis was helping her sister out. Sis & Ernie’s daughter, Betty (my other godmother) was 4 years older than Dad; they weren’t especially close.

When my father took on the lease of the New Theatre Bromley with partner Peter Goss, they needed some capital and Dad approached Gamps. Gamps told Dad to talk with Uncle Ernie who had more cash to spare and offered that Gamps would cover “the little bit Ernie couldn’t manage”. It was a point of pride for Dad that he paid them both back within a few years.

Sis & Ernie, Gamps & Nanny, along with my godparents Betty (Sis & Ernie’s daughter), Jill (Gamps & Nanny’s daughter) and Peter Goss (Dad’s business partner in the New Theatre) were at my christening in Camden Town on February 19, 1956. This picture is probably from 1959 – one my cousin had – I assume taken by Gamps. The last family picture I know of where the longtime friends were together.

Nanny died in December 1961, and Dad remembers Ernie being the person who called to say he had to come down to Salisbury right away. Ernie, not Gamps, was the one who talked about what had happened. Sis died in 1963 and Ernie in 1967, leaving just Gamps and Goggie of the original group that spent so much time together as young things in the 1920s.

In the picture at the top, from left to right: Sis, Ernie, Goggie, Gamps, Nanny