Denis Aloysius W. Santler was born in Bexley Heath, Kent in
1895. His parents were Henry Dutton Santler, born 1858 in
Islington, a Solicitor's Clerk, and Ellen (nee O'Sullivan) born
1868, St. Luke, London. [1901 Census]
His Medal card has him as a Private in the 25th London Regt. The India
General Service Medal roll confirms he was in the 1/25th
battalion of the London Regt. He received the I.G.S. Medal for
service in the 3rd Afghan War in 1919. As his initial service
number of 2023 was issued Dec 1914 to Jan 1915, he would have
gone to India with the 25th in 1916, and most probably served in
the 1917 Waziristan campaign, and possibly in the Amritsar
uprising (only part of the 1/25th took part). As per his I.G.S.M.
he also saw action in 1919.
He went back to work in the City of London (at the London
Metal Exchange, I believe) and during the second world war was a
fire warden in the city during the blitz. My grandparents had
the misfortune of losing their home during the bombing in
October 1940. They were living in Watford, a town to the North
West of London which had no military targets and suffered little
bomb damage during the war. The presumption is that a German
bomber was ditching its bombs at the end of an unsuccessful raid
and a string of bombs were dropped on Watford. My grandmother,
who was in the house at the time, was blown out of the living
room into the back garden but escaped any serious injury. She
blamed her deafness in one ear on the bombing. My grandparents
lived a quiet suburban life in Watford, my grandfather dying in
the 1970s and my grandmother in 1982. I'm sure, like many others
who served in India, he never lost his taste for curry. [This
paragraph by grandson Colin Guthrie]
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[Photo courtesy of Colin
Guthrie] |