Oxford to Liverpool 1919-1930

In 1918, Henry Thomas was in Oxford training to be an officer with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force at Balliol College. When the war ended he stayed in Oxford and married Kitty Martin. However, before they could set up home in England, Henry had to return to New Zealand to demobilise. And then sail back to England when they moved to Henry’s hometown Liverpool. And this just when Kitty was pregnant.

This book tells their story…one of great love, hope and then having to face up to the economic depression that hit England at the and of the 1920s.

SAGUS the biography and social history of a single family, a potentially never ending series of volumes that covers my life, my families life and my descendants life.

SAGUS is everything and anything: diaries, essays, books proper, notes, jottings, photo albums, long and short-form. However, it is largely linear in its chronology. 

Almost all of SAGUS is taken from contemporary writings; all the photographs were taken by me or my family. Most of the other images are from items in our possession. This is a true record rather than relying on faulty and revisionist memory, or items imported in an attempt to recreate a period. In short it is reality: for good or bad and as comprehensive or incomplete as it may be.