Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

George Osborne Fox was born on Sunday 11th May, 1919 the last of 5 children born to Ruby Florence Morrell and Arthur Percy Fox.  His brothers and sister was William Arthur born 8th March, 1905, Audry Elizabeth born 16th December, 1906, Albert Owen born 27th February, 1909 and Arthur Percival born 16th December, 1912

He was born in Goodwood, South Australia and lived there for 2 years before moving to the family home at 345 Torrens Road, West Croydon.  A happy child he enjoyed playing with his siblings who thought of he as their darling little brother.

At 4 years of age he started his schooling years at Miss Shakleford’s Jnr School and found her to be a rather forbidding teacher.  From Grade 3 he went to the Challa Gardens Primary School in Kilkenny where the teachers agreed he was a good but quiet student.  However, he surprised them all and went on to win Dux of the school. 

It was recommended he went on to Woodville High School where he studied hard.  However, his interest in sports – in particular boxing - began here and he ended up in a fight where he got his nose broken.  At this time his mother was in hospital so no one took any notice of he and he ended up with his trademark boxer’s nose which added to his handsome, rugged good looks. 

Before the famous Fox’s Gym was built, brothers Owen and George used to play badminton there and they weren’t too bad at it according to George – and even won a competition!

George and his brother Bill was both keen wrestlers and weight lifters and used to enter tournaments in their youth –They had squads filled with the members of their famous Fox’s Gym and was very successful.

At 16 years old he left high school after having passed his intermediate exams and started work as an apprentice tailor.

In fact, he made a suit for his next door neighbour Mr Leahy! He was 4 years into his 5-year apprenticeship making the princely sum of one pound a week when Australia declared war on Germany on 3rd September, 1939 and so he decided to join the navy immediately. His decision to join the Navy was because his family was all seafaring folk. His mother’s uncle was a Naval Captain.  On the first day war broke out he went down to the recruiting office and in hindsight said he was “rather foolish” to sign up for 12 years.  In two months’ time on 29th November, 1939 he was called up and sent to Flinders Naval Depot in Melbourne and when he was arrived he was greeted by a group of blokes who was looking out of the window yelling “You’ll be sorry!”.  He stayed at Flinders for six months getting his initial training and then he was given the role of Supply Assistant.

And what of the rest of his family. His oldest brother Owen worked in the railways and was excused from fighting due to this most vital job during these times. His sister Audry drove trucks to help out during the war. Brother Bill joined the air force. His brother Art was already in the air force before war broke out (2and was living in Melbourne before he was sent to Darwin. In fact it was Art who was fundamental in he becoming a Footscray football supporter as he moved to the Western Suburbs and started barracking for them so he decided to join he in 1940.

His first serve was a shore berth in Darwin although he didn’t know why he wasn’t being sent to sea.  He was quite cross at the time however later realized his luck when he found out his mates who was sent to sea wasn’t so lucky and went down with their ship.  He was in Darwin for about two years from 1940 to 1942 with bombs going off all around he. Darwin was known as Australia’s Pearl Harbour. At one point he was told to take cover and took refuge under a house.  The houses on either side was destroyed in the bombing but he survived.  It would have been terrifying and as we can imagine, his hearing was greatly affected. 

Another incident occurred after the Americans had left Australia to defend Pearl Harbour and he and his fellow sailors was given guns to defend themselves and Darwin. He was given 15 bullets each. He was stationed at the famous Don Hotel and walked along the main street to defend it and was told to shoot as many Japanese as he could if they landed. Fortunately, they didn't land. The important fact is that there wasn't many left to save Darwin, but he was one of them. In his family’s eyes and I’m sure most people’s, he was definitely a hero.

Whilst in Darwin he was given some holidays and he went to Adelaide to see his family who was overjoyed to see he.

Upon return he was sent to the HMAS Lonsdale in Port Melbourne but once he got there he was then sent to HMAS Echuca (where he met a chap called Laurence Costello who was the Chief Engine Room Artificer (ERA) and he was the Engineer of the ship. When he heard his name he expected an Italian chap and was surprised when he met he.  They became firm friends, visiting each other in his different departments – George in stores and Laurie in engineering.  The reason he was working in Stores was due to his poor eyesight as he wore glasses. When the war ended his rank had risen to Chief Petty Officer.

The war took he to New Guinea where many Japanese was stationed. Whilst all of this was new and frightening, the ship mates managed to have a bit of fun and a laugh when they put a native up to sailing his boat past he saying “Hello George”!  

He also went to West Timor at the end of the war to accept surrender of his Japanese opponents at a ceremony. He was given a Japanese soldier to look after.  He was in charge of the stores and he was sent to assist he. He couldn’t speak English but they communicated somehow. His foremost way of communicating was through numbers.  

Number 10 being bad and number one being good. When George asked about the quality of a samurai sword he had been given the Japanese prisoner said it was a number 10! Timor’s mountains were filled with the remnants holes where the Japanese was hiding. It was a war torn country. George was 26 years old when the war ended.

In 1946 his good friend, Laurie Costello, invited he to Melbourne to meet his family and so he cycled his bike from his brother Art’s place to meet them in Yarraville after travelling from Sydney, where he had been stationed after the war, by train.  He left his bike sprawled near the back door and went inside to meet Laurie’s parents – Patrick and Christina Costello. After a while Laurie’s daughter came back from playing tennis and shouted through the door “What fool left their bike here”.  But when Betty saw this handsome young, tanned man she soon shut up.

So George and Betty met and fell in love. When he returned to Sydney he wrote to her every single day so she wouldn’t forget him.  Soon after Betty thought of a reason to go to Sydney for a holiday!  Betty’s previous suitors soon realized she was no longer available and snidely commented her new beau looked like a “prize fighter”.

He was sent to Melbourne by the Navy and lived with his brother Art, however on 25th January, 1947 he and Betty were married for 68 years They have 3 children –Janice, Alan and Suzanne.

Married life began in Betty’s family home in Anderson Street, Yarraville. George and Betty were living with Betty’s father affectionately known by all as Paddy Costello.  Due to the small size of the home, George decided to add an extension.  His brother Art helped with the guttering. Teddy Jordan, Betty’s cousin, also helped out.  They were hammering until after 10pm at night when a neighbour shouted at he to shut up.  They all promptly told them to come over and say that! 

They had a very happy life in Yarraville with some fine friends.  Roy Evans (who was captain of the Footscray football club in 1938) and his wife Emma was good friends as was George and Edna Strong. 

It took 12 years to get out of the Navy as he had signed up for far too long.  He then got a job with the naval office in Williamstown where they were building ships and commenced work in the cataloguing department. He was a naval store officer – head of the unit.

After a number of years there he moved on to Albert Park in the Department of Defence.  The buildings were put up on the parklands and were across the road from the St Kilda football ground.  These buildings are no longer there as the department was moved eventually to Canberra in 1988. He worked up to the role of an Administrative Officer.

He used to be in a car pool when he worked at Albert Park Navy Barracks and when it was his turn to drive, woe betide if anyone was late arriving at the designated spot, as he didn't wait for them because he didn't want to be late for work!! Needless to say they soon learned to be on time.

He met some famous films stars during his years with the defence department. There was Ava Gardner who he met when she came to visit during the filming of On the Beach in 1959 when she made the infamous comment “'On the Beach' is a story about the end of the world, and Melbourne sure is the right place to film it.".  He also met Lawrence Olivier and Vivien Leigh.  It was a great moment when he met Charles “Bud” Tingwell when he was filming a movie called “Always another Dawn” – a very bad movie actually, filmed at the Flinders Naval Depot. Frank Sedgman the tennis player also came down to visit.  At the time he was just beginning his career.

He applied for a number of jobs during his working career.  One of these was for the Weather Bureau. His brother in law Laurie said to him at the time “Please get that job George and you can ring me up every morning and tell me whether I should bring my umbrella or not”.

Time moved on and soon it was the 1950’s.  He had a good job and two lovely children.  He was still living in Yarraville.  Life was good. In fact, he was the first people on the block to buy a television and all of the neighbour kids would come over and watch Lassie in his tiny lounge room.  A friend of his brother Owen came over to the house from Adelaide, as Melbourne had TV before S.A. and he was interested to see what it was like. He came over on the train, watched Zig and Zig (which was the only show on when he came over) and went back home that night! His name was Bill Ballard. Another milestone in this decade was he attending the 1954 grand final when his beloved bulldogs won with Charlie Sutton in the lead.

Very little fazed him and he didn’t mind what people thought.  When he contracted chicken pox from his first born Jan, at the age of 38 he developed sores all over his face and had to grow a beard as he couldn’t shave.  He wasn’t going to miss the bulldogs’ game though and off he went with his brother in law Laurie to watch a game in Geelong.  Laurie said later that George looked like an escaped convict and George and Laurie both got plenty of strange looks but George didn’t care!

In the 60’s after a gap of 10 years his last child Suzanne was born and his family was complete.  Eventually he moved to a larger home in Yarraville. In the mid 60’s he got his licence and bought the first family car – a Holden HD in corroboree red, Registration JLU 162. On the way back from buying the car in Frankston he drove so slowly a man on a bicycle passed he!  His car gave he a sense of freedom and independence and he became a keen motorist.  Annual trips to Adelaide became a lot easier now that he could drive there!

The family as a whole played a lot of sport and he purchased a table tennis table to put in the garage and everyone thoroughly enjoyed this.  He went on to play pennant table tennis in the future.

He was quite fashionable before his time.  He used to go to Leo’s Spaghetti Bar in St Kilda for cappuccinos in the early 70’s. Whilst working for the Department of Defence, a young man was assigned to him by the name of Alex Jesaulenko and he taught him everything he knew including helping he with his “mark of the century”!

In the early 1970’s George, Betty, Suzanne and Betty’s Aunty May and Uncle Harry moved to a large home in Pascoe Vale where he lived happily. George finally retired from work in the late 70’s due to a number of heart attacks and devoted his life to his family and a few hobbies.  Being a trend setter, he thought he would develop a new look and grew a moustache and kept this until Betty told him it was either her or the moustache!  His two elder children had moved away from home by this time but his youngest Suzie was still living at home.  George drove her to and from school every day.  Every Tuesday he went to Jan’s place when she started working again part time and looked after her three boys, Steven, Mark and Chris. Time was also spent with Alan and his family including little Benjamin and Kelly.

He started making tiled tables at a frantic pace and also developed baking skills starting with coffee scrolls (which was delicious) moving on to bread, trying to perfect a style that would be okay for Alan to eat when he was on dialysis.  As he had had a number of heart attacks by this time, he went on the Pritikin diet (encouraging Betty to do likewise much to her dismay) and started walking every day to look after himself. 

A keen gardener, he spent time with Betty’s Uncle Harry growing vegetables and tinkering in the garage; he also was an avid reader and read lots of history books and novels.

His sister Audry would regularly come and spend holidays with his family and he would take her for drives with Betty.  Audry and Betty was firm friends and spent much time together.

In the 80’s he became more involved with Jan’s boys and spent a lot of time with them reading stories and playing with them.  He went for several walks a day including doing the daily messages and odd jobs around the place.  Then tragedy struck.  In 1985 he had a stroke whilst he was in hospital for other surgery.  This was quite severe. He spent a lot of time in rehabilitation and he was quite debilitated until gradually he was able to acquire his speech and movement back. After his stroke in 1985, things slowed down for a quite bit but even though he didn’t drive again he was still fairly active once recovered.

In the 90’s he moved to Ocean Grove for a while and enjoyed the sea air.  He moved back to Melbourne to be closer to the family and have stayed close ever since.

A very important addition to his family occurred in 1999 and that was the birth of his first great grandson Kyle George, who is named after he! 

He and Betty maintained their independence and enjoyed crosswords, watching The Bill, going for walks and of course, watching and following The Western Bulldogs!!!! 

George had a number of health problems and accidents over the years.  He was involved in car accidents, he had several heart attacks – one at the football, one whilst playing pennant table tennis -, a stroke, coronary artery graft surgery, he fell through 2 windows, fallen over a number of times – once on his face - and was bitten by a dog on the bum and also, by the way, he survived a World War.

In 2009 George and Betty moved in with their middle child Alan to his home in Rosebud and lived there until 2015 when George broke his pelvis and had to move into a nursing home.  Betty followed as she had poor memory and wanted to accompany George.  George had dementia and by August 2015 he was quite unwell and had no quality of life.  He passed away quietly and he received a dignified celebration of his life from his family.

Unfortunately, Betty died within 11 days of his death due to being killed whilst on a minibus excursion by a disqualified driver high on drugs.

At least they are together again…….. and the love story continues…