Pilot Officer George Ashplant, C.G.M., R.A.F.V.R., 166 Squadron

Izzy

Yes you can pay for them but if you can get them FOC then why pay for them. If they dont have his service record they can get that via a form from Service records and that will tell you exactly what is due.

I hope you can get them replaced....

Dee

 

Dee,

Thats the wrong form. The SAR is for when you apply for your own records after you have left the forces.

 

I thought I recognised the name


Pilot Officer Ashplant

 

Drew looking at both threads on Ashplant i checked the local press to see if there was a mention of his parents receiving the award but nothing doing im afraid.

 

Pilot Officer Ashplant would have been my uncle had he lived. He was my father's brother. He died before he could receive his CGM, which was presented to his father and my father - Michael Ashplant who served in the Fleet Air Arm Volunteer Reserve as navigator/wireless operator in Swordfish mostly in the Far East. Michael died in 1961. Happily my mother was wrong and the medals were not stolen in the burglary. They are in the safe keeping of my brother. I have a replica of the CGM along with copies of the citation given to me by friends for my 50th birthday. My mother died some12 years ago.

 

Hi, did anyone ever have any further contact from Anthony Ashplant, the nephew of George Ashplant CGM? I tried to pm him a couple of times but got no response. I have information on the crew that Anthony would probably like to have. Izzy, do you know the whereabouts of the family? B

 

Just to add that no one seemed to have picked up on the one killed in the Wellington collision was Sgt WBH Smalley.
Sgt Smalley was also part of Ashplants crew when the Blenheim they were ferrying ran out of fuel and crash landed in Portugal.

 

Yes, thanks for that Kevin. You are quite right. I would really like to contact Ashplant's family and obtain a photo of the crew.

 

With only one post, the PM system won't work for Anthony.
You might try contacting the Mods to see if they have any details or alternate email contact for him.
He also mentioned his brother, so try various Ashplants.... you never know!
Otherwise try Googling, or facebook or Linked In, he might come up on those sites......

 

Thank you Kevin, I was wondering why I did not get any reply from Anthony! Very frustrating as I have been trying to contact the family for years. There are Anthony Ashplants on the net but the problem is which one is he?? Thanks for your suggestion, I will try the moderators.

 

I know that this is an old thread but I've only just come across it. Regarding WBH Smalley, he was to become my late maternal Granddad - I don't know very much about him (I came across the thread when trying to research a little about his life) but it saddens me deeply to think that he died at 22 after a very sad childhood (as the illegitimate son of a young girl, he was adopted into a loving family. Sadly, his adoptive father later passed away. His adoptive mother re-married, but her new husband apparently wanted the whole family to have nothing to do with him).

My late Grandmother only really discussed him with me once and she was already a little confused by that point, him having died over 40 years previously. She told me that George Ashplant had visited her after Smalley's death and she really appreciated it. I can't remember if she knew that the rest of her late husband's crew were subsequently killed in a later mission She never re-married and my mother was an only child

I hope that this adds a tiny bit of background to the wider story in which you expressed an interest; it was thoughtful of you to extract my Grandfather's name as of interest...