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Ralph James GoodmanRalph James Goodman was born in Hornsey, Middlesex, on 25 January 1885, the third son of William Henry Goodman and Ada née Gazeley. By 1901, the family were running the grocer's shop at the top of the village green in Frampton. In 1907 Ralph and his next eldest brother, William, sailed on the Lake Erie from Liverpool to St John, Canada, with the intention of settling in Calgary, respectively a labourer and a baker. Two years later, having returned at some stage, both brothers made a similar journey on the Empress of Ireland, this time described as Canadians, and Ralph a grocer. On 6 November 1915 Ralph, then a baker, voluntarily attested for service with the Canadian Expeditionary Force at Calgary. He was assigned to the 89th Overseas Battalion of the Canadian Army Service Corps, sailing with his unit on the SS Olympic from Halifax and arriving in Liverpool on 8 June 1916. However, he did not proceed further than England; having moved between several camps in southern England, he was found to be poorly nourished and anaemic, with laboured breathing and was classed as unfit for service. He was then one of the 1,145 Canadian soldiers who returned to Canada from Liverpool on 28 October 1917 under 'Special Authority', leading to his discharge from the Army at Calgary on 31 December 1917. On 25 September 1918 Ralph arrived in London from Montreal on the Canadian Pacific ship Corsican, giving his occupation as baker, his destination Seaford (Sussex), and his country of permanent residence as Canada. This journey was clearly for his marriage, registered in Eastbourne in late 1918, to Ethel Maud Carr. Ralph and Ethel lived in Frampton during the 1920s, but later moved away. Ralph James Goodman died in the Norton Radstock district of Somerset in 1954. His service during the war is commemorated on the plaque in Frampton Village Hall. |