Jean Longstaff has submitted the following:-
Born in Gateshead on 6th May 1898 George William was the son of Newcastle labourer David Frisken and his wife Edith Brown, whom he had married in January 1897. He was the middle of the Frisken brothers coming between Frederick and James. At the time of the 1901 census the family were living at 39 Arthur Street and ten years later they had moved around the corner to Lichfield Street.
13th August 1915 saw 17 year old shop assistant George travelling alone to Canada, sailing from Liverpool to Quebec on board the SS Scandinavia. George made a home in Toronto and found work as a machine operator. On 26th March 1917, having previously been rejected due to having a hernia, for which he had an operation, George enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force becoming Private 528082 in 2nd Training Depot, Canadian Army Medical Corps based in Toronto.
Private Frisken sailed with the 3rd Reinforcing Draft on board the SS Justicia, arriving in Liverpool on 5th July 1917 when he was posted to the CAMC Depot at Westenhanger, Kent. Transferred to the 2nd Reserve Battalion based along the coast at East Sandling near Folkestone in September, this itself became part of the 8th Reserve Battalion in February 1918.
Posted to the 116th (Ontario County) Battalion at the end of March he went to France and became part of the 9th Infantry Brigade, 3rd Canadian Division. After time spent at the divisional reinforcement camp he joined the 116th at Le Quesnel on 10th August 1918.
On 27th August during an attack in front of Boiry-Notre-Dame, near Arras, Private George William Frisken was hit in the stomach by a machine gun bullet and died shortly afterwards.
Post war George’s parents David and Edith and his younger brother James moved to Toronto. James was killed fighting with the Pioneer Corps at Anzio in 1944.
George William Frisken is remembered in Gateshead on G39.004 page 95 and as George Friskin on G39.051
In Canada he is remembered on their Virtual War Memorial and in their Book of Remembrance.
Canadian Book of Remembrance
Canadian Virtual War Memorial
The CWGC entry for Private Frisken
