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Name: GOODWIN, John Hudson

image of individual

Birth Date: 9 Sep 1893 Watford

Death Date: 8 July 1961 Nairobi

First Date: 1922

Profession: Coffee farmer

Area: Chania Bridge

Married: Marion Leslie b. 24 Feb 1912, d. 2001 Hampshire

Children: son

Book Reference: KAD, Hut, Red 22, Gazette, Old Africa

War Service: EAMTC

School: Charterhouse

General Information:

Barnes, Langata Cemetery, Nairobi: in loving memory / of / John Hudson / Goodwin / died 8th July 1961 / R.I.P.
Gazette - 7/4/15 - Liable for Jury service, Fort Hall - J.H. Goodwin, Muthuri, Chania Bridge
Old Africa 8 - John Goodwin - "My father, John Hudson Goodwin had arrived in Nairobi in 1912 after completing his education at Charterhouse in England and then attending a one-year course at Cirencester Agricultural College. His parents sent him to Kenya with his brother Noel to farm. They purchased land in the Donyo Sabuk area close to a White Sisters Mission and began developing a coffee estate. Two years later when the First World War commenced, my father joined up by signing on with the East African Mechanical Transport Corps (EAMTC) which was based in Voi. Noel, his brother, returned to England and entered the Royal Flying Corps. My father arrived at the EAMTC camp at Murka in the Tsavo West area on August 25 1914. …………..
On August 29 1914, only a few days after signing on with the EAMTC, my father, a new Cyclist Scout, was sent on an  early morning patrol with 2 others to observe what was happening around Salaita Hill area and to look for any German activity near Murka. Hearing gunfire, his colleagues sent my father ahead while they followed some way behind. From their vantage point they saw 3 German askaris near the road. Another askari and a German officer appeared very near my father and the European opened fire, hitting my father twice. He fell from his motorcycle. The other 2 cyclists, having seen my father hit in the chest, left him for dead and whirled their motorcycles around and fled to Maktau, where they reported the incident and the loss of Cyclist Scout John Goodwin.
Later that day Captain Philips and his men searched for my father. Circling vultures alerted them to his prostrate body hidden in the long grass. To their surprise they found my father was still alive. Apparently my father's pipe and tobacco tin which he had carried in his shirt pocket, had deflected the bullet away from his vital organs and saved his life. The bullet still left him badly wounded, concussed and unable to move. Captain Philips and his men transported my wounded father to Voi where they put him on a special train to Nairobi. With good medical care my father recovered from his injuries and later joined the French theatre of the war in a tank division.
After the war my father returned to farm in Kenya and he often told people he was the first British European casualty of the 1914 East African Campaign.
Gazette 17/7/1918 - Dissolution of Partnership between Alan Rhodes Cuninghame, John Hudson Goodwin and Noel Goodwin under the name or style of Cuninghame and Goodwin dissolved by mutual consent. Business will be carried on by Alan Rhodes Cuninghame
Hut - 1922 Posho Ltd
1939 England and Wales Register living in Hove, married (but no wife with him), as 'independent'

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