A RETIRED Inverclyde teacher with a passion for the area's history has chosen a decade "which changed everyone's lives forever" as the subject of his latest book.

Joe Gurney's new work, Greenock From 1910 To 1919, looks at a tumultuous time in history and at how the area changed in the lead up to the First World War, as well as during and immediately after the conflict.

He's completed it just in time for the annual services, in Inverclyde and across the country, paying tribute to those who died on active service.

And Joe says his latest book was his favourite one to write - as it has links to his own father, John, and is dedicated to his memory.

Joe told the Tele: "This was period of the 20th century that had the most trouble and the 'war to end all wars'.

"More than 2,000 people in this area died in the war. My father was born in 1900; he was four when the war started and eight when it ended.

"I've dedicated the book to him.

"My grandfather came to this area from Hartlepool to work in the Torpedo factory after parts of Hartlepool were bombed by the German Navy during the First World War."

Joe, of Weymouth Crescent, was a technical and guidance teacher at Gourock High School and Clydeview Academy.

He began writing when he retired 12 years ago, and hasn't looked back since.

His latest book examines the impact of the Great War against a backdrop of deplorable housing conditions, when many tenements were overcrowded, damp and insanitary, and when TB was a killer.

He looks at the lives lost and how the news that Britain was at war was initially met with jubilation with hundreds of under-aged boys rushing to sign up for the 'big adventure', buoyed up by propaganda that the war would be over by Christmas and the vision of being treated as heroes when they returned.

He said: "When it started, people were queuing up outside the Telegraph office in Charles Street to hear the announcement on the radio that the country was at war and there were celebrations throughout the country and boys as young as 14 lied about their age to sign up."

At the same time, those who did not sign up to serve were treated with shame and subjected to suggestions that they were cowards for not fighting for their country.

"At the time there was the White Feather Movement," Joe added, "and any man who was not in uniform was handed this as a badge of shame, regardless if it was on medical, moral or religious beliefs."

Joe also looks at how Inverclyde reacted to the terrible realisation that the war wouldn't be over by Christmas after all and that they'd be stuck in the trenches for much longer than they'd ever expected.

Many, suffering from shellshock, deserted the battlefield, only to be executed at dawn for cowardice. Among them was a young Greenock boy, Private John Duncan, who was shot for that very reason on March 7, 1915.

Joe saying: "I remember my dad telling me that one of his friends lived in a tenement flat and there were three families on each landing, 15 families in total - and not one of them escaped losing someone in the war."

It was also the decade when the Titanic sank on her maiden trans-Atlantic voyage, with a Greenock man, who was working in the ship's boiler room, among those who perished.

The book examines a time in Inverclyde's history when crime was rife, especially in the Vennel area, though Joe did discover one or two incidents with a touch of black humour during his research.

"The Vennel was one of the wild areas in Greenock," he added. 

"There were blackouts, too, which made it easy for crooks to mug people.

"It's recorded that a policeman found a man outside with a shirt on who told him he'd had an argument with his wife and came out to cool down.

"The policeman told him to go back in, get dressed and make it up. Then the next moment his wife poured the contents of a chamber pot over his head."

* Greenock from 1910 to 1919 costs £15 and is available by emailing Joe on joegurney@live.co.uk. Joe says he can also deliver the book personally.