SEVEN is a lucky number and for the 'Fighting Wallaces' it turned up trumps.

"Seven of us went away to the war and - very much to our mother's relief - seven of us came back," said Herbert Wallace, one of two surviving brothers.

"Us brothers never made a big thing of the fact that there was seven of us in uniform at the same time, five in the Navy and two the Army. I suppose we didn't want to tempt fate."

The story of the seven brothers who went off to fight in World War Two was told in a wartime edition of the Argus.

"At that time there was another family in Pill, the Heaneys, who sent six boys off to the war. I think there was an element of rivalry between us," says Herbert recalling far-off days.

"When I told my mother that I wanted to join my other brothers and make it seven in uniform she was against it but our dad had been in the Great War and said 'If the boy wants to go let him go.'"

Herbert was born in a terraced house which stood on a site now covered by the sprawl of the Kingsway Centre and went to Holy Cross School in Emlyn Street, one of 14 children by John Wallace, a docker, and his wife, Euphoebia.

"I always had a thing about the sea. When I went off to do my basic training at Malvern I had no idea of the adventures that lay ahead. I was more interested in following in my brothers' footsteps."

The desperate hunt for German submarines shadowing the Atlantic convoys, the killing cold of the Russian convoys and a leading role in the D-Day invasion of June 1944 lay ahead, but as he threw his kitbag on his bunk in HMS Rupert, the young seaman could not have foreseen such events. At the time George was on the battleship the Prince of Wales and had survived her sinking, Henry was on HMS Orion, a cruiser, Charles was in combined operations and had taken part in the landings at Anzio and Wilfred had been on the Rodney and had been in on the battle against the Bismarck.

"Tom had been with the Eighth Army in North Africa and Willliam had been taken off the beaches at Dunkirk.

"Aboard HMS Rupert I was being sent out into the Atlantic to guard our merchant vessels against attacks by German U-boats. All around us merchant ships were being hit by torpedoes while we tried to catch and kill the submarines.

"It was a frightening experience and you were always wondering whether you were going to be next. There was nowhere to run and you couldn't hide." As 1943 turned into 1944 a buzz began when everyone realised that D-Day was afoot. "I was down in the engine room. We were firing our three-inch gun and the shells from the big ships were whistling right over our heads," Herbert recalls.

"Somebody called me up onto the bridge and gave me binoculars. I looked towards Omaha beach and saw American soldiers falling to the defenders' guns. We all felt terribly sorry for them but there was nothing we could do other than play our part in the grand plan."

No sooner had the Rupert been withdrawn from the invasion beaches than she was directed north to escort Russian convoys, playing a cat-and-mouse game with the German submarines, frustrated when they slipped through the protective screen but savagely triumphant when a U-boat fell prey to their depth charges.

"There was a smashing re-union after the war and we all came home," Of the seven, Wilfred who lives in Gwent, is the only other surviving brother.

Bill Palmer, a volunteer with the the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association came across the Wallaces story while helping to organise a bath hoist for Herbert and his wife Peggy.

"In Newport the SSAFA has helped out over 100 ex-serviceman this year. It's not a duty, it's a privilege," he said.

"For a family to send seven men to war was an incredibly brave and selfless thing."