my grandfather Philip Goffey was awarded the OBE (order of the british empire)
i want to know the year of his award and the nature of his
achievements for which he was given the award. Are there any documents
on the subject and where can I find them?

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Request for Question Clarification by leli-ga on 21 Jul 2004 09:04 PDT

Hello hiddendip

I wonder if you could give us some idea of the right era. Could it be
the 1950s? And do you know your grandfather's middle name?

There's a Philip Goffey who's been listed with a double "LL" in
Philip/Phillip, and I want to check whether I've found the right
person.

If this is your grandfather, the award was related to his career, but
there isn't much information given in the official record - just a job
title and government department. Would this be enough to satisfy your
wish to know the "nature of his achievements"?

Let me know what you think - thanks - Leli

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Clarification of Question by hiddendip-ga on 22 Jul 2004 09:09 PDT

Leli

the award could have been any time between 1930 and 1953. There would
have been only one Philip goffey, whatever the spelling, with an OBE,
as it's an unusual name.

I was hoping there would be some way of finding out why they awarded
the OBE to him. There are two theories. Either it was because he was
so effective in his job at the ministry of supply during the war; or
else he was a talented engineer who did some significant work on the
development of the Turbo-prop before the war.

thanks

hiddendip

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Request for Question Clarification by leli-ga on 22 Jul 2004 10:30 PDT

Thanks for getting back to us, hiddendip.

Unfortunately, I don't think everything you're hoping for is available
online, and the paper records we could refer you to are an unknown
quantity.

What I could offer is a way of viewing the OBE announcement over the
internet, with the date and the reference to your grandfather's job at
the Ministry (apparently the official reason for the OBE).

You might possibly discover more about his wartime work if you can get
to an office in the Greater London area which keeps records from the
Ministry of Supply. You would be doing original research, so it's hard
to predict whether you would find anything really interesting about
your grandfather.

His Ministry job may well have used his engineering expertise, and may
even have had some link with the turbo-prop work. This is mostly
speculation, but I could point out one or two reasons for making a
connection.

Since any answer we offer is probably going to be less than you were
hoping for, you could change the price you put on the question to
reflect this. If you decide you would like to do this, choose 'edit
question parameters' to change the price, and leave another
clarification message if you wish.

Leli