George Mottershead

George Saul Mottershead OBE (12 June 1894 – 5 May 1978) was the founder of Chester Zoo.

Mottershead was born in Sale Moor, Manchester. His father Albert Mottershead was a botanist and nurseryman. He had two brothers Stanley Saul and Charles Saul, a sister Norah and a half-brother Albert.

Mottershead was taken to Belle Vue Zoological Gardens in Manchester in 1903, as a childhood treat after the end of the Second Boer War. He disliked seeing the animals confined in cages, and was determined to create a zoo without bars. As a youth, he experimented with aviaries, and tanks and runs for pet lizards and snakes. He left home aged 16 to become a fitness instructor.

After the outbreak of the First World War, George Mottershead joined the South Lancashire Regiment. At least two of his brothers joined the Manchester Regiment, and they all served on the Western Front in France. While on leave, Mottershead married Elizabeth Atkinson at St Mary Magdalen Church, Ashton-on-Mersey, in 1916. They had two daughters, Muriel (born 1917) and June (born 1926).

In October 1916, at the Battle of the Somme, Mottershead suffered a bullet wound to his neck, injuring his spine. He was initially paralysed, and recuperated at Highfield Military Hospital in Knotty Ash. Contrary to the expected medical prognosis he eventually recovered the ability to walk (with a limp) after three years in a wheelchair.

His brothers, Albert and Stanley Mottershead, were killed in the war. Lance Corporal Albert Mottershead was killed in October 1916 and is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial; Private Stanley Mottershead died in December 1916 and is buried at Douchy-lès-Ayette war cemetery. Both are also commemorated on the war memorial at St Anne's Church, Sale Moor and the Sale war memorial.

His brother Charles served with the Royal Flying Corps's School of Technical Training.

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