Person    | Male  Born 20/6/1912  Died 19/3/1941

Denis Gerald Fitzgerald

Categories: Emergency Services

War dead non-military, WW2 i

Commemorated on a memorial as being a civilian who was killed in WW2. Includes mercantile marines and emergency services personnel.

Denis Gerald Fitzgerald

Auxiliary Fireman Denis Gerald Fitzgerald was born on 20 June 1912 in Croydon, Surrey, the son of William Fitzgerald (b.1886) and Mabel Annie Fitzgerald née Theobald (1887-1958). He was baptised on 8 September 1912 at St John the Baptist Church, Croydon where the baptismal register shows family were living at 50 Old Town, Croydon and that his father was a baker. His sister, Marguerite Doreen Fitzgerald (1915-2007) was born on 25 June 1915.

Electoral registers from 1920 to 1929 show his parents listed at Lake View, Oxted Mills, Oxted, Surrey and from 1930 to 1932 all four family members are shown at this address on the registers.

He married Gwendoline Emily Avern (1915-2013) and the marriage is recorded in the 2nd quarter of 1939 in the Bromley, Kent, registration district. The 1939 England and Wales register shows them living at 30 Keswick Road, West Wickham, Kent and his occupation was recorded as a bank clerk.

He joined the Auxiliary Fire Service and was attached to Coney Hall Auxiliary Fire Station, West Wickham, Kent. He was killed, aged 28 years, on 19 March 1941, together with four other colleagues who were aboard a pump, one of a convoy, that was travelling to a fire in Silvertown and that was obliterated in a parachute mine explosion in Plaistow Road, West Ham.

He and his four colleagues were buried in a communal grave in St John the Baptist Churchyard, Layhams Road, West Wickham, BR4 9HN. Administration of his estate was granted to his widow on 18 September 1941 and probate records show that his effects totalled £903-8s-3d.

He is also commemorated in the Civilian War Dead Roll of Honour 1939-1945 located just outside St George's Chapel at the west end of Westminster Abbey and his name is shown on the National Firefighters Memorial at Sermon Lane, London, EC4 and in their Book of Remembrance.

Credit for this entry to: Andrew Behan.

Comments are provided by Facebook, please ensure you are signed in here to see them

This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
Denis Gerald Fitzgerald

Commemorated ati

Beckenham Auxiliary firemen

Those killed at Old Palace School are also commemorated (not by name) on a pl...

Read More

Plaistow Road WW2 air attack

Our colleague Andrew Behan points out the following errors on this plaque: Fi...

Read More

Other Subjects

ARP Warden Edith Watts

ARP Warden Edith Watts

Edith Bacon was born on 20 January 1895 in Catfield, Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, one of the eleven children of Philip Arthur Gillings Bacon (1859-1926) and Edith Bacon née Pollard (1859-1936). Her bir...

Person, Emergency Services

War dead non-military, WW2
1 memorial
Col. Sir James Cantlie, KBE, MA, MB, FRCS, RAMC (T)

Col. Sir James Cantlie, KBE, MA, MB, FRCS, RAMC (T)

Sir James Cantlie was a British physician. He was a pioneer of first aid, which in 1875 was unknown. He was also influential in the study of tropical diseases and in the debates concerning degenera...

Person, Armed Forces, Emergency Services, Medicine, Politics & Administration, China/Hong Kong, Egypt, Scotland

1 memorial
P. G. Bettison

P. G. Bettison

District Officer in the St John Ambulance Brigade, No. 1 (Prince of Wales's) District, 1926-1947. Serving Brother in the Order of St John.

Person, Emergency Services, Medicine, Politics & Administration

1 memorial
Mrs A. Calvin Lines

Mrs A. Calvin Lines

Lady District Superintendent in the St John Ambulance Brigade, Metropolitan Corps, 1893-1923. Dame Grace in the Order of St John.

Person, Emergency Services, Medicine, Politics & Administration

1 memorial
Ernest O. Stuart, LRCP&S, LSA

Ernest O. Stuart, LRCP&S, LSA

County Surgeon in the St John Ambulance Brigade, No. 1 District Metropolitan Corps, 1909-1929. Serving Brother in the Order of St John.

Person, Emergency Services, Medicine, Politics & Administration

1 memorial