A RAMSBOTTOM woman has told the story of her grandfather’s life 75 years after his death.

Carole Scott shared her family history and spoke about her grandfather’s life spent serving King George and his country.

Colonel Clement Henry Bensley served for 28 years before becoming King George’s personal physician in 1924 caring for him until his death in 1952.

The wealthy ‘high class’ general surgeon was honoured as a CIE in 1925 by the King himself.

He had three children, including Mrs Scott’s mother, Patricia Young, who grew up living an extremely privileged life before being cut off from the family after falling in love with a man of the ‘lower class’.

“It’s horrific. It was a completely different time to be alive then,” Mrs Scott added.

“We don’t have class wars anymore and families are much more accepting of people with different backgrounds.”

She was given a simple ultimatum, she would either leave and return home or choose to spend the rest of her life with him and lose all contact with her family.

She took the brave decision to follow her heart and stay with Herbert Young who she later went on to have Colonel Bensley’s first born grandchild, Mrs Scott.

Following Colonel Bensley’s tragic death in 1940, Mrs Scott’s mother, Eileen Bensley, had her chauffeur drive her from the family home in Chelsea, London to Yorkshire, where her daughter was living with her husband.

Her mother arrived when she began to challenge her daughter’s decision to marry Herbert Young and begged her to annul her vows.

It was that night that Mrs Young told her mother of her pregnancy with her first child.

In complete disapproval, Mrs Bensley took herself to the kitchen where she locked the door before gassing herself.

Mrs Scott, a mother-to-three and grandmother of six, sat teary eyed, as she recalled the tragic story her mother had relayed to her.

She spoke highly of her grandfather, who worked hard to build schools for uneducated boys in India using his own money.

The charitable father-of-three studied medicine at St Mary’s Hospital in London in 1893 before becoming a surgeon lieutenant in 1895, then lieutenant-colonel after twenty years’ service and retiring in 1927.

Paying tribute to her grandfather, Mrs Scott said: “He was an amazing man, he did so much to help disadvantaged boys in India, using his own time and money to build schools to educate them.

“The way my mother was raised was extremely different to how we were raised, she was extremely privileged.

“Growing up we never saw any of the money and I was responsible for helping to raise my younger sisters.

“I thought it was the right time to speak of the good my grandfather did, he shouldn’t be forgotten.”

Colonel Bensley was appointed to work in Indian jails in 1901 which he did until 1923 when he became inspector-general of civil hospitals in 1923.