Tag: Bermondsey

The Jersey Connection Part II

Linda Swinburne

I want to tell you a bit about Lily’s family. The Thatchers. And to finish Lily’s story. But first a cemetery.

My family research has generally revealed poverty. My forebears lived in dirty, damp conditions, engaged in hard, manual work. Generally living hand to mouth, day by day. When they died, they were buried in unmarked, public graves. No headstone. No memorial. After 50 years or so, the land in which they were buried, reverted to public ownership and someone else was buried there.

Rarely have I found a headstone or memorial in existence.

But not the Thatchers. There is a family plot in Mont à l’Abbé cemetery in St Helier in Jersey for all of them. And headstones. All of them together. With marked graves. It is simply a family historian’s joy to find such things (Reader – wrong word to use about death I appreciate but you know what I mean I’m sure …)

Mont a l’Abbé cemetery is in two parts. The first was opened in 1855 (known as the Old Cemetery) with the “New” part being added in 1881. It is a vast and very peaceful place which is high up and overlooking the sea in St Helier. Plots are divided into four (north and south 1 and 2). The Thatcher family has one whole plot.

Ida Thatcher was the first to be buried there in one of the graves on what is actually the East side of the plot (despite them being described as north and south) side of the plot. As I said in Part I, Ida died aged 14 in 1899 from Meningitis.

Also on this side is John Charles Thatcher, Lily’s father (and Ida’s of course) who died in 1922. Next Jane Ann Lawrens (sometimes spelt Laurens as you can see) , their mother and John’s wife, in 1924. And here they are.

You will see too, that there are two other burials on this side of the plot. Charles John Thatcher and Emily Kate Smith.

Charles John Thatcher (1883-1929)

Charles John Thatcher (1883-1929) was the Thatchers first born child and Lily’s eldest brother. Charles joined the Royal Marines in 1900 when he was only 17 (he gives his age as 18). Charles signed up in Portsmouth to the Royal Marines Light Infantry (RMLI) and went on to have a long and distinguished career of military service which ended after 22 years (and of course spans World War I) when he was “retired” in 1922. Charles achieved the rank of Regimental Sergeant Major and was awarded the Victoria Cross, the Distinguished Service Medal and Distinguished Service Cross in 1918. In addition, Charles’s record confirms the award of the Meritorious Service Medal which was given to senior non commissioned officers for long and/or distinguished military service. 

This is a magnified copy of the inscription on Charles’s gravestone where it attributes his death to wounds received in the battle of Zeebrugge in WW1.

The Zeebrugge battle was fought in April 1918 when the British Navy attempted to stop German ships and U-boats from using Zeebrugge as a base from which to launch a raid on England.  It was led by the 4th Battalion Royal Marines and the warships HMS Vindictive and Invincible.  Charles’s record indicates he served on Vindictive in 1912 but in this campaign he was apparently on the Invincible.

If you’d like to know more about the Zeebrugge raid, this link will take you to a full account  https://www.cwgc.org/our-work/blog/the-zeebrugge-raid-at-105-the-trials-tragedy-of-a-daring-amphibious-assault/

Charles was mentioned in despatches as follows “ Sergt.-Maj. Charles John Thatcher, R.M.L.I. was mainly instrumental in conveying the heavy scaling ladders from the ship [Invincible] to the Mole [The Zeebrugge mole was a mile-long seawall jutting out into the North Sea upon which several German sea-facing artillery guns were placed and had to be taken out for the plan to be a success. It was also studded with concrete machine gun posts] and throughout the operation displayed great coolness and devotion to duty” for which he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. I cannot find mention of Charles amongst the injured but when he died 11 years later several regional newspapers reported his death as a “Hero of Zeebrugge” and all the reports mention that Charles was severely wounded and gassed. 

Charles was awarded the Victoria Cross for “Operations Against Zeebrugge and Ostend on the night of 22nd to 23rd April 1918” according to his Military Record and a report in the London Gazette in July that year.

Charles died in March 1929, aged 46. His Death Certificate says he died from Pulmonary Tuberculosis and Asthenia (generalised weakness or lack of strength). Charles’s family had inscribed on his gravestone that he died “from effects of wounds received at Zeebrugge”. Whether, in fact, cause and effect were ever established though is not clear.

However Charles does not have a Commonwealth War Grave. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is very thorough in this respect and will ensure service personnel have a CWG memorial stone even if they died long after wounds or injuries received in conflicts if their death can be directly attributed to them, so it would be easy to conclude that this inscription is not necessarily accurate.

So I wrote to the CWCG. I explained what I had discovered and whilst I have not been successful at establishing either the veracity of the view that Charles died as a result of effect of his being gassed in WW1, nor of getting a CWG memorial for him, I did receive this rather lovely reply to my enquiry.

Unfortunately the Commission’s remit is limited to those who died within our qualifying date period for both the First and the Second World War. Rather than being an arbitrary date, 31 August 1921 is when the Act of Parliament was passed which formally brought the First World War to a conclusion, hence is used to define those who died during the war years.

I’m afraid that as this individual died in 1929, so after August 1921, he therefore falls outside of our Royal Charter responsibilities. There is no provision for us to make exceptions, even in cases where there is evidence that a post-1921 death was attributable to wartime service. Sadly many men died in the years immediately following the war and in the subsequent decades – some but not all will have been either directly or indirectly a consequence of wartime military service.  

Whilst understanding that this outcome may represent a disappointment, equally, we hope you can understand the need to apply our Eligibility Criteria consistently. That this individual is not considered a Commonwealth war casualty within the remit of the Commission in no way diminishes the sacrifices made, nor the tragedy that his family had to cope with. We’re glad that through your efforts, Sgt Major Thatcher continues to be remembered.

The final commemoration on this side of the Thatcher plot is that of Emily Kate Smith (1890-1940). Emily was Charles Thatcher’s wife and they were married in September 1918 at the Royal Marines’ Barracks in Alverstoke in Hampshire by the Royal Marines’ Military Chaplain.

Charles John Thatcher and Emily Kate Smith on their wedding day in 1918

Emily was born in Crawley in West Sussex in 1890. When she and Charles married in 1918, Emily gives her address as Cowes on the Isle of Wight. In 1921 they are living in Military Barracks in Gosport in Hampshire. Lily, Charles’s sister, was one of the Witnesses.

Emily was the sole recipient of her husband’s estate when he died at which time they were both living on Jersey. They had no children. Emily died in 1940 aged just 50 from Colon Cancer.

Emily’s Will is curious. Emily leaves her entire estate to an Alison Eleanor Coffin who was only 13 when Emily died. The Will notes that Alison is the daughter of a René Armand Coffin to whom the estate would have gone if Alison were to be deceased when Emily died. Emily’s Will was made just 6 months before she died.

So now I’m curious about the Coffin family of Jersey. I want to know what René and his daughter’s connection was to Emily Smith and why she chose to leave her entire estate to this child. That’s how genealogists get distracted …

Reuben Lawrence Thatcher (1887-1969) was Lily’s younger brother; only two years separated them. Reuben never married. Reuben worked in his Father’s painting and decorating business and from trade records over the years, I could deduce that he took over management of the business after his Father died.

Reuben served in WW1 in both the Royal Defence Corps and the Honourable Artillery Company. Reuben was discharged from the Army in 1918 after being gassed.

Reuben receives half of his Mother’s house in 1924 when Jane Lawrens died (Lily having received the other half). Reuben also receives various bequests of furniture and ornaments from Jane.

Reuben was living on Jersey during WW2 and thus also had a Registration card like Lily and Thomas.

Reuben Lawrens Thatcher WW2 Registration Card

Have you ever seen a happier face being presented to a hostile, occupying military force?

Like Lily, Reuben loved to travel and during the 1950s can be found on various ships’ passenger lists to and from the UK going to Buenos Aires, Canada, and extensively in the Far East including Yokohama in Japan.

Reuben died in 1968 aged 81. His Will is comprehensive.  Probate records show his estate as being worth £42k (worth about £624k now). I think where he died (The Limes, Green St., St Helier) was a nursing and residential care facility for older people.

Reuben’s burial record shows his funeral was held at St Helier Parish Church on Thursday 2 January 1969.  Reuben was cremated and his ashes are buried at Mont-a-l’Abbé cemetery in the Thatcher family plot and commemorated on the same stone as Lily, his sister and Thomas her husband.

Reuben left the individual bequests of between £100 and £250 each to Charity and good causes with some personal bequests to individuals. These are detailed on his Will as follows

  • Jersey Blind Society
  • Brig-y-Don Children’s Convalescent Holiday Home, Jersey
  • Jersey Masonic Temple
  • Eunice Callas de Caen wife of Francis de Boutillier of Highfields, St Ouen, Jersey
  • Christopher Le Boutillier grandson of Francis Le Boutillier
  • John Wilcox son of John T.A. Willcox
  • Jane Wilcox, daughter of John T.A. Wilcox
  • Mary Wilcox
  • Sarah Wilcox

– The last four above named to receive all Reuben’s books, prints and pictures

  • Richard Loughlin, Head Steward the United Club, St Helier, Jersey
  • Philip Edgar Le Couteur, 6, Rouge Bouillon, Jersey
  • Walter F Thatcher, The Follies, Pontiac Common, Jersey [presumably a paternal relative]
  • Fred Percy Tastevin, Avenue House, West Park, Jersey
  • Remainder to Lily, his sister

Should Lily have predeceased him (she didn’t) there were further instructions about how her share should also be divided between charities.

So this is a further bequest that went to Lily in addition to the one from her mother and from her husband.

And finally to finish Lily Mabel Thatcher’s story.

In Part I, we left Lily just after her husband, Thomas, died in 1948. After Thomas’s death, I have found Lily once again on various ships’ passenger lists travelling around the world during the 1950s.

Lily died in 1976 aged 89. She is the last of John and Jane’s family. Lily’s estate was worth over £1m at the value of today’s currency. While that itself is quite staggering, it is the breadth and extent of the distribution of her estate which is extraordinary.

Lily appointed the Midland Bank as her Executor and her entire estate is divided up between individuals and charitable causes.

This is a distilled, version of Lily’s Last Will and Testament.

Lily begins by specifically stating that she wishes to be buried in “her grave” at the New St John’s Cemetery at  Mont-à-l’Abbé with her husband, Thomas Knight Ball (which she is).  They are both in Block V Plot 15 on the opposite side of the family put from her parents and elder brother. The gravestone also includes a memorial to Lily’s younger brother Reuben who was cremated and his ashes scatted on Plot 15.

The Thatcher Plot at Mont a’l’Abbé – Lily Mabel Thatcher, Thomas Knight Ball and a memorial to Reuben Lawrens Thatcher

Lily asks for her body to be repatriated to Jersey should she die elsewhere and she specifically instructs that she must be buried wearing her wedding ring.

Lily also leaves money in trust for her parents’ graves and hers and Thomas’s graves to be upkept in perpetuity.  

  • To Mr and Mrs John Tooke-Kirby of Goring on Sea the sum of £20,000
  • To her godchild David Tooke-Kirby £10,000 when he reaches 31
  • a Mrs Iris Laurens of “Iona” Greve d’Anette, St Clement, Jersey [a maternal relative on her mother’s side] £10,000 plus all Lily’s jewellery (specifically including “her five stone engagement ring and her solitaire diamond ring) and clothing with the exception of her gold bangle (see below)
  • Miss Gladys Marett of Overseas Flats, Dicq Road, St Saviour, Jersey £3,000
  • Mr and Mrs George Falle of 6, Beach Crescent, St Clement, Jersey [Lily’s mother Jane Laurens had a sister who married a man called Falle so presumably this was a maternal relative] £3,000
  • a Mr and Mrs Harborow of “Larmona” 65 Cleveland Gardens, Golders Green, London, NW2 £3,000 plus to Margaret Harborow, Lily’s gold bangle presented upon her retirement from Lloyds Bank, Lombard Street
  • Mr and Mrs Stanley P Le Ruez of “Freshwinds”, Bon Air Lane, St Saviour, Jersey £3,000
  • Miss Amy Le Cornu of “Hengistbury” Claremont Road, St  Saviour, Jersey £1,000
  • Mrs R Le Templier of 8, Cleveland Avenue, St Helier [the address where Lily died] £1,000
  • Mrs Gwen Talbot c/o Mrs Templier above £500
  • Dr and Mrs Norman Pitts of Red One Montauk Avenue, Stonington, Connecticut 06378, USA £2,000
  • Dr Barnardo’s Homes £4,000
  • the Jersey Blind Society c/o La Motte Chambers, St Helier, Jersey £5,000
  • St Dunstan’s (the organisation for men and women blinded in war service) £7,000
  • Brig-y-Don Children’s Convalescent and Holiday Home, Samares, St Clement, Jersey (to which her brother, Reuben had also left a bequest) £5,000
  • Cancer Research £7,000
  • Invalid Children’s Aid Association £7,000
  • The Home for Aged and Infirm Women known as “Glanville”, St Mark’s Road, Jersey “for providing amenities for the patient’s use” [probably means Lily was in there at some point] £7,000

Finally, Lily says any residue should go to the Jersey General Hospital in memory of her parents and her late brother, Reuben for the purpose of building a home, hostel or homes for old people in need to be called the “Knight Ball and Thatcher Home” or to extend the Jersey hospital with a ward or annexe to be known as the “Knight Ball and Thatcher Ward”. I have visited the hospital and no such ward exists.  Nor could I find a facility for elderly people of the same name. so what happened to that bequest is a bit of a mystery.

What a woman. Lily did such a lot of good with her bequests. I have visited the Thatcher family plot and shown you above a photo of the graves on the East side. Unfortunately, it is the Western side that gets very degraded by the weather and because of this, the gravestone is very, very hard to read. But I could make out some of the writing and it is clear enough that Lily and Thomas are buried there and there is specific mention of the stone also being a memorial for Lily’s brother, Reuben.

Close up of Lily, Thomas and Reuben’s memorial

So there they all are. The Thatchers. Lily was the last of them. Not my relatives but nonetheless incredibly interesting I think (I hope you do too).

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this and thank you for visiting my site.

The Jersey Connection Part 1

Linda Swinburne

You never know where family history will take you do you? I certainly never thought mine would take me to the Channel Island of Jersey and a tale of second marriages, an heiress and German War Records. But it has.

To put you in the picture. I got interested in one of my (it has to be said fairly distant) relatives when I found him heading to Australia to emigrate with his first wife when they were in their 60s. Seemed unusual. So I did a bit of digging. As you do …

Thomas Knight Ball (1858 – 1948) and I have a very distant connection. One of my paternal 4xGreat Grandfathers was Thomas Knight Ball’s 2x Great Grandfather. That makes him my 2nd cousin 3 times removed. I said it was distant … stick with me.

Thomas was born in Euston Square in the North West of central London to parents Thomas Oram Ball and Jane Knight in June 1858. His middle name follows the naming convention that the Victorians rather liked of giving children (particularly the eldest one which Thomas was) the mother’s family name as the child’s middle name (and very glad modern day family historians are for this given it often helps find and validate birth and other records).

Thomas’s father worked on the railways and the family always lived near a mainline station in central London (St Pancras, Cannon Street and in 1858, Euston) to the north of the river Thames. In Victorian times, railway building and expansion was key to make travel more accessible to everyone and the railway companies were major employers.

Thomas’s childhood appears to have been unremarkable and by the time of the 1881 census, when he was 23, Thomas is working as a Grocer’s Assistant in Old Bond Street, Westminster when he lived in a Boarding House for the grocer’s shop staff.

Thomas married Emma Auber at Falkland Road Wesleyan Methodist Chapel in St Pancras, London in 1882. They were both 24. Both living in Kentish Town. Thomas now gives his occupation as a Clerk.

Thomas and Emma continued to live in London until the 1901 census when they have moved to Brighton in East Sussex. But by 1911 at the time of the next census, they are back living in London. This time across the Thames in Brixton in the South West of the city. They have no children and are both 52.

13 years later, in September 1924, Thomas and Emma set off on the SS Ballarat bound for Melbourne, Australia. The passenger list says Australia is their “Future Permanent Address”. Just one year later however, they return to England stating that Kinninghall Road in Clapton, East London is to be their permanent residence. Thomas is described as a Farmer. Did they try their hand at farming in Australia I wonder and it didn’t work out? Did they get homesick? Or perhaps Emma was unwell and they wanted to come home. Sadly, Emma died from a heart condition a couple of years later. By this time though, they were back living in Sussex; this time in Worthing.

But it is after Emma died that Thomas’s life really gets interesting.

So having upped and gone to chance a new life in Australia at the age of 65 and returned less than a year after he sailed there with Emma, and following Emma’s death, Thomas seems to embark on a new life.  Much travelling, some with his brother, Francis, and then on to a new marriage to a woman much younger than him. Sigh. It was ever thus. But read on …

Less than three months after Emma has died, Thomas can be found coming back from Durban in South Africa on the same ship (the SS Edinburgh Castle) as his younger brother Francis. By this time, Thomas was 68 and Francis, 65. They embarked at Natal and disembarked at Southampton. Both give addresses in Worthing as their proposed permanent residence. They travelled in 3rd Class. 

Then, four months later, Thomas and Francis are shown on a passenger manifest coming back from Montréal, Quebec in Canada.  They embarked in Quebec and disembarked in Liverpool on the SS Doric.  They travelled in what is described as a “Tourist Cabin”.  Thomas is 69 by now.

Then at the end of 1927, Thomas remarries. He is 69 and described as a Widower. Lily Mabel Thatcher, Thomas’s new wife, is 38 and a Spinster.  She comes from Jersey in the Channel Islands.

Now, I can hear the wheels turning in your head. Young woman. Older man (31 years older to be clear …). A gold digger for sure. Well, think again, dear reader. Lily is single, comes from Jersey, a place known for its substantial economic wealth and high net worth individuals even in the 1920s and 1930s. Thomas has come from very ordinary stock and is travelling the World in Steerage. Who is digging gold you may wonder.

Lily Mabel Thatcher (1889-1977)

Lily is intriguing. A bit of an enigma. I wish I’d known her.

Lily Mabel Thatcher was born on 23 April 1889 in St Helier in the channel Island of Jersey to parents John Charles Thatcher and Jane Ann Lawrens. John was a self made, very successful businessman and owned the island’s biggest painting and decorating company. Jane was from a very old, established Jersey family.

Lily was the youngest of of John and Jane’s four children. Lily had two older brothers, Charles and Reuben and a sister, Ida. Ida died aged 14 in 1899, from Meningitis.

Lily Mabel Thatcher, about 1940

Lily lived at home with her parents and family until at least the 1921 Census taken in June of that year

Lily’s father died in January 1922 and left his entire estate (I suspect a substantial one) to his wife, Jane Lawrens.

In August 1922, aged 33 and unmarried, Lily leaves Jersey and sails from Southampton to Montrèal on the SS Andania. She is travelling with a Mrs Violet Chapman, aged 34 and described as a housewife of St Helier, Jersey and her 4 year old daughter, Pearl.  Lily gives the same address as Mrs Chapman and Pearl in Jersey. The Arrivals Form in Canada says that Lily is single, has £5 on her, is in Canada with Mrs Chapman on holiday and they are both destined for 592, Union Avenue, Montrèal.

On 5 January 1923, Lily comes back from Canada on the SS Minnedosa which departed St John’s, New Brunswick, Canada for Southampton on that date. Lily gives her mother’s address as the one to which she is going to live in St Helier.

I cannot find Mrs Chapman or her daughter on the passenger list but she is to be found coming and going frequently and regularly between the UK and Canada variously to Montreal or St John’s in the years after Lily left and on one passenger list Violet Chapman gives her last country of domicile as Canada. Intriguing but not relevant to our story.

In 1924, Lily’s mother died. Jane Lawrens leaves the house in which she is living jointly to Lily and her younger brother Reuben. Various other items of furniture are left also to Reuben. Jane’s eldest son Charles is the Executor of Jane’s Will and received a tea service (a Japanese tea service to be precise). The remainder of Jane’s estate (the bulk of which was presumably what she was left by her husband two years previously) Jane leaves to Lily.

This is the first in a series of bequests Lily receives from her family.

Then sometime during these years, Lily somehow meets Thomas (I would lay money on it that they met on a ship but I have absolutely no evidence to corroborate this). They marry in 1927 in Worthing where Thomas had lived with his first wife. Both in fact giver their address as the house in which Thomas lived with Emma and where Emma died. The marriage takes place in a Baptist Chapel and the witnesses were Thomas’s brother, Francis and Lily’s younger brother, Reuben. 

During the 1930s there are various records of Thomas and Lily travelling by ship to some fairly exotic destinations. In 1934, they are sailing from Liverpool on the SS Ulysses bound for what seems to be a cruise that goes via Marseilles, Port Said, Colombo, Penang, Singapore, Java, “Australian Ports” and returns to the UK via South Africa before docking finally in London. Both give their address as Jersey in the Channel Islands.  Thomas is 75 and Lily 45. There is a record of them coming back from Indonesia on the Ulysses in January 1935, presumably the same trip.

On the passenger manifest, Thomas and Lily give their address in Jersey as a house called “Karersee” in Samares, one of the twelve Parishes of Jersey, located on the South East coast.

I have been to look at the house. It is a fairly unremarkable but substantial house near to the main coastal road. I imagine the house has been updated since the 1930s but it is still interesting to see it I think

“Karersee”, Samares, Jersey, CI Home of Thomas and Lily

The only reference I can find to the name Karersee is Lago di Carezza in the Italian South Tyrol in a place called Trentino which an autonomous province in the north east of Italy. In German it is known as Lake Karersee. In English, the Rainbow Lake. It looks beautiful. I’d like to think someone name this lovely house on Jersey after that lake. I’d also like to think it was Lily and Thomas ❤️ …

The Channel Islands are a self-governing parliamentary democracy under the constitutional Monarchy of the Crown of Great Britain. The Channel Islands are not part of the United Kingdom but are known as one of the “British Islands”. They have their own financial, legal and judicial systems and the right to self determination. As such the islands are reigned over by the British Monarch, currently King Charles III. There is a Lieutenant Governor resident on Jersey who acts as a link to the Monarch but the Channel Islands are entirely self governing.

On 1 July 1940 the islands were the first and only part of Great Britain to be invaded and occupied by the German forces during the Second World War. The occupation lasted almost 5 years until 9 May 1945 when the Germans surrendered and the islands were liberated.

This occupation has led to the Channel Islands having very different records during this time from other parts of Great Britain and the United Kingdom. Primary of these (and of most use to family historians) is the identity cards all citizens were required to have by the occupying Forces.

The Jersey Archives have digitised these records and a lot of others created because of the very difficult circumstances in which the island found itself in 1940-45.

Each identity card had personal details of the Channel Islands’ citizen plus (in most cases) an up to date photo. This is Lily’s (I do love the way she has included the addition of her fur stole just thrown over her shoulder and don’t you think her eyes just look super defiant behind those glasses?).

This is the form that was completed for Lily in order to have her card issued. She had “brown hair with some white” she says and brown eyes. The eagle eyed amongst you will notice that her date of birth is slightly different from the one I’ve used from her birth and baptism record but these were difficult times and which of us could say we could remember our birthday when faced with an invading army?

Thomas’s registration card has no photograph (it says he is exempt from giving a photo but I can’t read why). I’ve included below his registration form and card.

Thomas says he has grey hair and grey eyes. At the time of the occupation of the Channel Islands, Thomas was 82 and Lily was 51. Not the final years of their relationship they would have chosen I imagine.

Three years after WW2 ended, Thomas died on 16 February 1948 aged 89.

Thomas had made his Will 16 years earlier, in 1932. Thomas leaves everything to his wife, Lily with the caveat that, should she predecease him, everything is to go to her brother, Reuben. Thomas makes it clear in his Will that has “abandoned” his domicile of origin and intends to live the rest of his life in Jersey.

Whilst I don’t doubt that Thomas’s estate was inferior to Lily’s there was presumably some residual benefit that Lily received.

Birth, marriage and death events are recorded differently in Jersey from the remainder of Great Britain. I have validated Thomas’s death from his funeral and burial records. In Jersey, records of burials and cremations are far more detailed and extensive and as such contain a lot of useful information. so while I don’t know what Thomas died from, I do know that his funeral was carried out at St Luke’s Church by the Reverend Pawson (who charged £10 for his services) and that the funeral cost 40 pounds 3 shillings and 6 pence (younger readers please look this ancient form of currency up here https://www.royalmintmuseum.org.uk/learning/learning-zone/going-decimal/old-money/) and the Funeral Director’s bill was settled in March 1948 by Lily. Exactly where the Church is is obscured by an annoying ink blob on the original record , but to this day there is a St Luke’s Church in St Saviour’s Parish which borders St Clement’s Parish and is just to its north so I’m going for that one.

The Jersey Archives’ Burial Records give me Thomas’s exact date of death and his place of burial. Thomas died on 16 February 1948 aged 89 and was buried in Mont à l’Abbé Cemetery in St Helier two days later.

Mont à l’Abbé Cemetery is a vast cemetery in the capital of Jersey (and indeed the capital of all the Channel Islands). Thomas and Lily are buried together there (spoiler alert – Lily does die but not for a while …) in the Thatcher family plot. But that’s all for Part 2.

Thank you for reading. I promise to be back very soon with the next instalment …

The Church of the Most Holy Trinity, Dockhead, Bermondsey

Linda Swinburne
The Church of the Most Holy Trinity, Dockhead

The Church of the Most Holy Trinity is the Roman Catholic Parish Church of Dockhead.

Dockhead is an area situated just north of Jamaica Road in Bermondsey and runs east/west just south of Tower Bridge. Named to describe its geographical position at the “Head” of the London docks on the South side of the Thames, Dockhead was home to the Dockers, Stevedores and Lightermen who worked in the Docks up until their demise in the 1970s and 1980s and in terms of my family history, home to most of my Mother’s family during the nineteenth century and up until the Docks’ decline. I lived just off Jamaica Road not far from Tower Bridge when I was a child in the 1950s and my Dad and several of his brothers all worked in the London Docks.

The Docks were known as the ‘larder of London’. Everything came through these Docks, frozen meat, spices, tobacco, wool. All unloaded and distributed from the huge ships that came up the Thames up to Tower Bridge or stored in the vast network of Warehouses on both sides of the Thames. Three-quarters of the butter, cheese and canned meat needed for the capital was stored here.

The London Docks, south side of the Thames, looking West, upstream around 1940s

There has been a Roman Catholic Church on the site of the Most Holy Trinity Church since at least 1773 and it was the first church to be built fronting a public highway since the Reformation.

The Church of the Most Holy Trinity, Dockhead about 1907

Dockhead suffered terribly during the Blitz in WW2 due to its proximity to the Docks. Between 7 October 1940 and 6 June 1941, 126 high explosive bombs and 2 Parachute Mines were dropped on the area (https://www.bombsight.org) and in December 1940, the Church was destroyed in a bombing raid. Sadly, five years later, just before the end of the War on 2 March 1945, the Priests’ House was also bombed and three of the four Parish Priests were killed. The fourth was badly injured and rescued only with great difficulty. His rescuer, a milkman, received the George Cross. The adjoining Convent of the Sisters of Mercy was also damaged but with no loss of life. I can’t help thinking that my family must have known the Priests and were almost certainly members of the congregation.

The Church immediately after it was bombed

But the Church was eventually rebuilt and the present polychromatic brick building (first illustration above) was designed by H.S. Goodhart-Rendel and completed in 1959. The modern building was designated Grade II Listed but was upgraded to Grade II* in 2015.

The Church features heavily on my Maternal family tree. So far, I have found 12 marriages and 3 Baptisms at the Church from 1852 to 1931.

The furthest back of these is the first marriage of my 2 x great Grandmother, Hannah Lyons, who married a Michael Taylor there in 1852.

Hannah was born in Ireland in the early 1830s (not sure exactly when) and was living in England by the time of her marriage to a Michael Taylor in 1852.

It may have been that Hannah’s family came to England a s a result of what became known as “The Irish Potato Famine” between 1845 and 1852 when almost 2.2m people mostly from southern and western Ireland emigrated to England or America following the failure of the potato crop on which they depended, predominantly due the infection of potato crops by a blight that affected crops in other countries in Europe as well. Over 1m people starved to death in Ireland alone.

Hannah and Michael continued to live in Bermondsey and had three children. Johanna who was the mother of the Kalaher orphans who were the subject of an earlier blog post on here (see link below), John and Julia who was my great grandmother.

The Kalaher Orphans

Michael Taylor died in 1874 from Bronchitis (not unusual then in this damp area around the London Docks) aged 46.

Hannah remarried a couple of years later to a Thomas Sullivan but by 1891 Hannah is again a widow. Hannah’s two younger children, John and Julia, are still with her but by then Hannah’s other daughter, Johanna and her husband had both died leaving their children orphaned and Hannah has taken three of them to live with her.

On the 1901 census, Hannah is living with her youngest daughter Julia and Julia’s husband and she died just a few months later aged 65.

Both Hannah and Michael’s daughters, Johanna and Julia married at Holy Trinity (Julia giving birth to her first child just five days later) as did Julia’s daughter, also called Hannah (my grandmother) two of her other daughters and her son who were all my great Aunts and Uncles.

I can’t find any photos of my Grandmother and grandfather’s wedding (perhaps there weren’t any …) but here’s the little family they made including my lovely Mum, Marie and her sisters Hannah (this Hannah was baptised at Holy Trinity too) and Eileen plus Hannah’s husband enjoying a day at the beach I’m guessing in the late 1940s, perhaps early 1950s.

Thank you for reading this and I’m sorry I’ve been away so long ❤️

The Marriotts Part I

Linda Swinburne

Cards on the table from the start. I am not related to the Marriotts. They are a total distraction. But they are so, so interesting.

How is there at least a connection?

My 3 x paternal Great Grandfather, Herbert Ball, married twice. He is the Father of Herbert Cannon Ball, the subject of my Blog post last October (2020).

But my blood line runs through from Herbert and his first wife who died when she was fairly young. Herbert married again. this time to a much younger woman (sighs …).

Herbert’s second wife was called Mary Whale and she and Herbert went on to have another family. I was looking for Mary’s death when I lighted upon her siblings. One of whom was her brother, William Whale.

William and his wife, Elizabeth, are buried in Nunhead Cemetery in South London, one of London’s “Big Seven” Victorian cemeteries (the seven include Highgate which most people have heard of but not many have heard of Nunhead which is just as lovely).

William Whale had married an Elizabeth Rose. William and Elizabeth died in 1867 and 1880 respectively. The grave also contains three of their children who died young or in infancy from about 1857 to 1874. So far, so normal (sadly, at least for the mid 19th Century).

Weirdly though, there were two other burials in 1941 and 1943, some 60 years later, of apparently unconnected people also in the same grave.

The names of these people were Arthur Weatherley Trevanon Marriott and Madeleine Delano Marriott. Gosh I thought, what grand names. Who could these people be? And so started a 6 month distraction with people to whom I am entirely unrelated.

There is an official term for this behaviour. It is documented in a recent Newsletter of the Society of Genalogists. It is known as “Genealogical Attention Deficit Disorder”. Or the freedom to pursue whatever looks interesting. So here we go.

I started with William, to see if I could link the Marriott burials with him.

William Whale (1827 – 1867) was the publican of this pub, The Crown in Southwark from at least 1851 until his death in 1867. The photo below was taken in 1851, so William and his family may well be seen standing proudly outside.

The Crown, 31, Lant street, Southwark in 1851

William and Elizabeth had five children. Only one, Elizabeth Louisa Whale, survived beyond 16.

Elizabeth Louisa Whale was born in the pub in 1853. She lived with her family until she married in 1878.

Elizabeth’s marriage was to the very grandly named Sidney Randolph Ronald Allies Marriott who was a Clerk to the Admiralty. This turn of events is very unusual for a girl from Southwark in the mid 19th Century. Most married Labourers or Dock workers. But not for Elizabeth. A high ranking senior Civil Servant working in Whitehall no less.

But more importantly for this post. Aha. There it is. The connection to the name of the people buried with William Whale and Elizabeth Rose. Marriott. I was sucked in. Hope you are too.

Elizabeth and Sidney lived their life in very grand houses in Brixton or Streatham, both of which were wealthy, green and leafy suburbs of London in those times. They go on to have ten children. Yes, ten. None die in infancy. There are servants and Nurses. Elizabeth has her first child at 24 and her last at 44.

It is though, the children’s names that are quite extraordinary (there’s even a boy called Shirley …and Delano appears a couple of times. Delano was Sidney’s mother’s maiden name).

Arthur Weatherley Trevenon Marriott (1879 – 1943)

Madeleine Delano Marriott (1880 – 1941)

Claude Randolph Marriott (1882 – 1963)

Ethel Clara Marriott (1883 – 1982)

Kathleen Mabel Marriott (1884 – 1964)

Weatherley Sidney Mortimer Marriott (1887 – 1969)

Shirley Verdon William Marriott (1891 – 1918)

Roy Dudley Marriott (1893 – 1916)

Osborne Delano Marriott (1894 – 1917)

Kenneth Melbourne Hugh Marriott (1897 – 1918)

And here they are … at Claude’s wedding in 1908.

They’re a handsome bunch. And they look very well to do. Look at those hats the women are wearing. The height of Edwardian sophistication.

And it is the two eldest children, Arthur and Madeleine who were buried in the family grave in Nunhead with grandparents and Aunts they had never met.

But if you’re observant, you will have seen there was a cloud looming for not only for Britain but particularly the Marriotts whose four youngest children all died fighting in World War I.

I hope you can hang on for my next instalment about the Marriotts. coming very soon. If you “like” my Blog, you’ll get notified when the next post comes. Promise to be more regular with my stories than I have been recently.

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Christmas Weddings

Linda Swinburne

During the 18th and 19th Centuries, it was not unusual for weddings to take place on Christmas Day.

In fact, churches held special events to enable weddings to take place and young couples flocked to get married at Christmas. However, this was not for some desire to capture Christmas romance. The real reason was entirely practical.

With so many people working “in service” (as servants) usually Christmas Day and Boxing Day were the only days off they were likely to get off in the whole year (most people worked six days a week and did not get paid for the one day they didn’t work) and if they wanted to get married, the opportunity to do so on Christmas or Boxing Day would have been very welcome .

Christmas Day is a traditional holiday and is not, and never has been a bank holiday in England, Wales or Ireland. Sir John Lubbock first introduced bank holidays. He was a banker and politician who loved his cricket and couldn’t stand the idea of competitors gaining an advantage by trading on days he and his staff went to support or play in their local village matches. He introduced the Bank Holidays Act 1871 which recognised four official bank holidays – Easter Monday, Whit Monday, the first Monday in August and Boxing Day. The same act did make Christmas Day a bank holiday in Scotland.

On my Mother’s side of my family, I have so far found eight Christmas Day weddings including my own maternal Grandmother, Hannah Cownley, who married Frederick Mason on 25 December 1919.

At the time of their wedding, Hannah and Fred were both living in Bermondsey. Hannah was working as a “Factory Hand at a Jam Factory” and Fred was a “Farrier Journeyman” (so someone who looked after horses’ hooves – can’t imagine needing one of those in Bermondsey now can you?)

Hannah was likely to have worked at Hartley’s Jam Factory which employed about 1,500 people in Bermondsey at the beginning of the 20th Century.

Hartley’s Jam Factory Bermondsey, 1920s

Neither Hannah nor Fred will have had much time off and I imagine a Christmas Day wedding would have been appealing to them (the other added incentive would doubtless have been that Hannah was about 7 months pregnant with their eldest daughter, also called Hannah and born on 4 March 1920).

I don’t have any family wedding photos older than the 1950s. But here’s one of my Mum (Hannah and Fred’s youngest daughter) and Dad who got married in late March 1952. In the snow funnily enough …

Marie Mason and Stanley Charles Ball, The Church of Our lady of Seven Dolours, Peckham, South London 29 March 1952

In case you were wondering, there’s no legal reason why you can’t get married on Christmas Day nowadays. But no one really wants to because they don’t have to I suppose and most Churches are likely to tell you they are too busy (Register offices are not open so no Registrars available for other venues).

Anyway, Happy Christmas to anyone reading this. I shall be back with more stories in 2021.

The Kalaher Orphans

Linda Swinburne

The Kalaher orphans, all six of them, are my 1st cousins twice removed.   They have fascinating stories and I have worked out that my maternal Grandmother, Hannah, who was their cousin, must have known at least some of them. I find that extraordinary. As the actress Olivia Coleman said in her episode of Who Do You think You Are, “we have touched hands through time”.

My Great great Aunt, Johanna Taylor (1856 – 1887) who was my Great grandmother’s sister, married a Bartholemew Kalaher at the Roman Catholic Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Dockhead (named since this area was literally the Head of the then vibrant London Docks) in Bermondsey in June 1873. Bartholemew was a Labourer and he and Johanna were living just a few doors away from each other near the Thames in Bermondsey when they were married.

The Church of the Most Holy Trinity, Dockhead, Bermondsey

Like most poor people in Bermondsey at that time, Bartholemew and Johanna moved around a lot but never far from where they had grown up and where they were living when they got married.

Johanna and Bartholemew had seven children,

Mary Ann born 1874,

John born 1875

Thomas born 1877 (died in 1886 aged just 9 from Heart Disease)

Ellen born 1879

Catherine born 1883

James born 1885 and

Albert born 1886

In December of 1887, when her youngest child was just over a year old, Johnna developed Bronchitis and died aged just 31. Her husband, Bartholemew registered her death and was left with six children to look after. But there was more tragedy to follow when in the following May, aged just 34, Bartholemew himself died from Broncho-Pneumonia. Bartholemew’s death was registered by Johanna’s sister Julia Taylor, my great grandmother who was to play a rôle in some of her nieces’ and nephews’ lives in the coming years.

So, what happened to the Kalaher orphans?

Well.  Mary Ann, James and John went to live with their Grandmother, Hannah Lyons (my great great Grandmother).  Ellen and Catherine went to a Roman Catholic Orphanage and poor little Albert Kalaher ended up in the Horsleydown Workhouse where he died in January 1889 aged just 2 from TB, Ricketts and Diarrhoea. 

Albert’s Death Certificate is the saddest thing I have seen in all my time researching family history.

Albert Kalaher 1886 – 1889

Albert was actually just turned 2 when he died, although his Death Certificate says 18 months.  It seems that no-one knows who his parents were with the Certificate merely noting “Parents names and occupations unknown. Both parents deceased”. I wonder whether any of Albert’s family knew that he had died? I wonder where he was buried? Did he have a funeral? So sad.  Poor little thing.

Ellen Kalaher and Catherine Kalaher were sent to The Convent of the Faithful Virgin, Boarding School and Orphanage, Central Hill, Upper Norwood in South East London. They were aged 9 and 5 respectively in 1888 when they were orphaned.

This must have seemed like going to the other side of the world for these girls who were unlikely ever to have left Bermondsey where all their family still lived. I imagine the only solace for them must have been that they had each other.

Well, only until 1894 when Catherine, the younger sister, died at the Orphanage aged 11 of Heart Disease and Exhaustion. Ellen was now alone.

But she survived and in 1900 when she was 21, she married a Stephen Mitchell at the Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Dockhead where her parents had married 27 years before, so she had come back home.  Ellen’s family must have stayed in touch with her throughout her years at the orphanage though because her sister Mary Ann had by this time got married and her husband is a witness.  Also, Ellen gives the same address as her Aunt Julia Taylor and Uncle John Cownley (my great Grandparents) give on the 1901 Census so I assume she was living with them when she got married.

Ellen and Stephen went on to have seven children. Ellen was widowed in 1922 and is on the 1939 Register with four of her grown up children, by now in their thirties.

So, that is three of the six orphans but what about the three who went to live with their Grandmother?

First, the eldest, Mary Ann Kalaher.  After she was orphaned in 1888, Mary Ann went to live with her Grandmother, Hannah Lyons, and is on the Census with Hannah in 1891. The family lived in Queen Elizabeth Street right on the South bank of the Thames by Tower Bridge.

Also living there are Mary Ann’s two brothers John and James and Hannah’s two grown up children John and Julia (my great Grandmother). Hannah was a widow by this time. Mary Ann was a witness at her Aunt, Julia Taylor’s, wedding to John Cownley in 1893 and was only 7 years younger than her Aunt so presumably the two of them became friends.

Mary Ann married a John Henry Gover Shaw in 1896 again at the Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Dockhead, Bermondsey. John Shaw lived in Grays Inn Road and his Father was a Methodist Minister.  This is a bit unusual for this family.  Mostly they married Dockers or Labourers and from a very small area around Dockhead.  Grays Inn Road is quite a stretch for a girl from Bermondsey in those days.  John Shaw worked in the Print and was ten years older than Mary Ann.

Mary Ann and John Shaw went on to have three children

Mary Isabella born 1897

John Bartholomew born 1895 and 

Stephen Martin Michael born 1905

When their first child was born, Mary Ann and John Shaw are living in Beckenham.  This is really the first time I have found members of this family leaving Bermondsey. But by the time their second child was born, they are back in Camberwell, where they stayed certainly until the 1901 census.  But by 1905, when their third child was born, Mary Ann and John Shaw have moved to St Albans in Hertfordshire where they still lived when the 1911 Census was taken.

In 1911, both their elder children are at Roman Catholic Boarding Schools. This is an interesting portent for the lives of the two boys.

Firstly, John Bartholomew Shaw served as a Pilot Officer (2nd Lieutenant) in the RAF during WW1. He started on 23 April 1918 and was a “Handley Page” pilot which seems to mean he tested the new super bomber designed by a company called Handley Page (but made too late to be effective in the war). John ceased flying on 26 November 1918 and was “Dispersed” at Purfleet early in 1919.

It seems that John had already started to train for the Priesthood prior to his Military Service and he returned to his studies after 1919. John was ordained at Westminster Cathedral in 1923, appointed a Canon of the Westminster Chapter in 1955 and served continuously as a Parish Priest around London until his retirement in 1967.  He went back to his Parish in Fulham, where he had been Parish Priest from 1953 to 1967, to live out his retirement until he died in December 1981 aged 82.

The Vicar General of the Westminster Diocese, Monsignor Martin Hayes, told me that Canon John’s Requiem Mass was held in Latin and celebrated with “great solemnity” at St Thomas’s Church, Fulham, where John served, and Canon John’s soul is prayed for every year at Westminster Cathedral on the anniversary of his death, 19 December. 

John Bartholemew Shaw 1899 – 1981
taken from a very grainy photo in a Parish Magazine in about 1970

Then John Shaw’s brother, Stephen Martin Michael Shaw, also became a Priest.  Having completed his training for the Priesthood, Stephen was ordained in 1928 aged 23.

Stephen also served as a Parish Priest around London until he was appointed as the National Director of the Pontifical Aid Society in 1947, a post which he held until 1970 when he was made “Protonory Apostolic” (ProtAp) and travelled frequently to Rome for consultations and discussions with the Pope and members of the Vatican Council. ProtAp means that Stephen was an honorary Prelate (a senior member of the Clergy) upon whom the Pope has conferred this title and its special privileges, including the title “Monsignor”.

Stephen retired to Killarney in Ireland due to ill health and died there on 13 May 1998 aged 92, following a Stroke. Stephen’s funeral was at Killarney Cathedral on 15 May 1998 and he is buried in a cemetery nearby.  Monsignor Stephen missed out on his 70th Ordination anniversary by only about a week and at the time of his death was the longest serving Westminster Priest.  He was also a published author of at least four Religious books. 

John and Stephen’s elder sister, Mary Isabella Shaw, married a William Sait in 1926.  The ceremony was carried out by her brother, John.  Mary continued to live in the Hertfordshire area before her death in 1996 aged 99 in Exeter near to where her son, Michael Sait lived.  Michael registered both his Uncle John’s and his Mother’s deaths.

The next Kalaher orphan is John Kalaher. John was about 12 when he was orphaned.  In 1891, he was living with his Grandmother, Hannah Lyons and in 1892 he joins the Army aged just 16 and served in 4th Battalion East Surrey Volunteer Regiment. After that, I can find nothing for John. Not a marriage, a family, an entry on the 1939 Register or a death. 

Lastly James Kalaher. James was only 3 when he was orphaned in 1888. He too went to live with his Grandmother, Hannah Lyons, along with his brother, James, and his sister, Mary Ann. James is with his Grandmother, her two youngest children (who are his Aunt and Uncle) and his brother and sister in 1891 when he is five.

I cannot find James on the 1901 Census but in 1902, he joins the Army aged nearly 18 and gives the address my great Grandmother (Julia Taylor) and great Grandfather (John Cownley) give on their 1901 Census return so he was presumably, living with them. James joins the same volunteer Battalion in which his brother John served.

In 1911, James is working as a Blacksmith’s Mate and is still living with his Aunt and Uncle, Julia and John and their family including my grandmother, Hannah Cownley, who was 14 by then so presumably Hannah knew James, although he was much older than her.  

On 2 June 1915. James married an Alice Markham, again, in the Church of the Most Holy Trinity, Dockhead and ten days later (hold that moment …) their first child, Alice Victoria Kalaher, is born.

In 1916, James is discharged from the Army.  By this time, he is serving in a different Regiment, the King’s Royal Rifle Corps. He has a different Army Number from when he joined the Volunteer Regiment in 1902 and I suspect this may have been a Regular Battalion but I am not sure.  The Attestation states that he joined the Army from the Reserve which makes sense. Given WW1 was on, though, it seems strange to release a man from the Army when others were being called up.

However, James and Alice continued to live in Bermondsey, have five children, and James gives his occupation as an Iron foundry Labourer.  There was a huge Iron foundry in Bermondsey, owned by the General Iron Foundry Company that provided work for hundreds of men during the 1920s and 1930s and this was presumably where James worked.

But things took an unfortunate turn for James and Alice in the late 1920s when their children were still very young (aged between 13 and 5). On 11 December 1928, James was admitted to Banstead Mental Hospital which was in Sutton in Surrey.  The Admissions register reveals that James was diagnosed as suffering from “Melancholia” which in those days was considered to be on the “Lunatic” spectrum.  Nowadays, I understand the diagnosis would be Severe Depression. It occurs to me that this may have been a legacy of James’s service in WW1 and perhaps, the reason for his discharge in 1916 when the War was at its height.

Banstead Asylum [Mental Hospital]

Sadly, poor James was never discharged from this Mental Hospital and he died there on 13 June 1944.  The Death Certificate gives “Myocardial Degeneration, Emphysema and Bronchitis” as the cause of his death but the hospital records reveal that James was considered, at the time of his death,  to be suffering from “Chronic Melancholia” which would seem to be a worse kind of what they then thought was Lunacy. I suppose that if he had been in a mental hospital for sixteen years and was still suffering from Depression (and why wouldn’t he?) that it was now considered to be a “Chronic” case.  James was buried in the graveyard of the Hospital.

Alice, James’s wife, continued to live in Bermondsey with their children and on the 1939 Register is living with just their youngest child who by this time was aged 24.Alice died in Leicestershire in 1959 aged 66.  Hers and James’ eldest daughter had married in 1936 and Alice’s Death is registered by this daughter in her married name living at the same address at which Alice had died.  I presume Alice had gone to Leicestershire in later life to live with her daughter and her daughter’s husband.

So that’s the Kalaher orphans. Different times and hard experiences. But at least three if not four of them had good lives given the times they were living in. I only wish I had known about them when my grandmother, Hannah, was still alive and I could have asked her what they were really like …

Pickle Herring Street, Bermondsey

Linda Swinburne

In 1891, Elizabeth Regan (blog of 19 August ) and James Waddington are living with their three children in Pickle Herring Street, Bermondsey which has now disappeared but was right next to Tower Bridge.

Many people know the current walkway beside the Thames, between London Bridge and Tower Bridge. About halfway along is the museum ship HMS Belfast. In the 1980s, before the walkway was created, this part of the riverfront was called Symonds Wharf. There was also a flight of river-stairs called Pickle Herring Stairs along with a causeway very close to this spot.

In the days when large cargo ships moored alongside this piece of riverfront, there was also a street running behind the warehouses that lined the river which extended east from these stairs and eventually passed under the approach road to Tower Bridge. Much of that land is now a park called Potter’s Fields. Now used by tourists to stand and admire views of Tower Bridge and the Tower of London and the site of The Greater London Authority Headquarters, City Hall.

The old thoroughfare was called Pickle Herring Street.

Potters Fields is so called because of the Dutch potters who came to work here having fled religious persecution in Holland. It was the site of the earliest Delftware kilns in England, established around 1618 and the area became famous for producing a particular variety of Delftware called ‘Pickle Herring pottery’. The theory that the Dutch fondness for pickled herrings gave the street and the nearby river stairs their name is sometimes proposed but likely to be unfounded. The precise origin is not known, but is much older.

I find the street fascinating. If for no other reason than it was right next to Tower Bridge where thousands and thousands of tourists now tread with no-one knowing (or probably caring) that once not so long ago people lived there packed into cramped and horrid conditions carving out a meagre living in the Docks.

I have found out quite a lot about the street though.  A publication called Old and New London, published in 1878 describes the area as follows,

“From about the middle of Tooley Street, on the north side, to St. Saviour’s Dock, the whole line of street – called in one part Pickle Herring Street, and in another Shad Thames – exhibits an uninterrupted series of wharves, warehouses, mills and factories, on both sides of the narrow and crowded roadway. The buildings on the northern side are contiguous to the river, and in the gateways and openings in these we witness the busy scenes and the mazes of the shipping which pertain to such a spot. “

The following early 19th century map extract shows the area prior to the construction of Tower Bridge. Note Horsleydown Old Stairs. This is where Tower Bridge would be built later in the 19th century.

There was also a Pickle Herring Stairs roughly where St. Olave’s Wharf is shown in the 1940 map shown below. It is interesting to note that Pickle Herring street was directly opposite Traitor’s Gate of the Tower of London. I struggle to imagine how much money a person would need to live in such a prime location today. 

1940 map showing Pickle Herring Street

The following two photographs from 1947 and 2015 respectively show how the area has changed in so little a time really. The 1947 photo immediately below is looking East towards Shad Thames now a site for high end restaurants and even higher end flats and apartments,

Pickle Herring Street looking East towards Shad Thames

and this photograph looking west shows what is now the site of the seat of London Government, City Hall built on Potter’s Field.

Pickle Herring Street, 2015

When the south bank of the Thames was redeveloped in the 1980s, a new river-wall, from London Bridge to Tower Bridge was built and anything pre-1980 was cleared away. All reference to Pickle Herring Street was lost.

There is mention of Picked Herring Wharf in the novelist and historian Walter Besant’s book East London, 1901 together with this illustration which shows the bridges in the Wharf which can also be seen on the 1947 photograph above:

Additionally, the artist and illustrator Gustav Doré visited the area in about 1872 and produced this illustration of the Wharf:

Pickled herrings are an age-old method of preserving a very well-known fish. They are also known as rollmops. Pickled herring fillets, usually served these days rolled up with onions or gherkins inside and bought in a jar or other container of vinegar. They are well-known and eaten in Britain as well as being even more popular in Europe and particularly Scandinavia. The idea of a pickled herring in London is known to go back to the days of the Domesday Book in 1086 where Herrings and Southwark are mentioned together in a reference for the ‘Guildable Manor of Southwark’. This manor extended from the southern end of London Bridge, along the riverside, almost as far as Hay’s Wharf Dock nearer to London Bridge.

This mention is related to lands held by Odo the Bishop of Bayeux. Along with several pieces of land in England, there is a reference to ‘Oxted and Walkingstead, in Tandridge Hundred, land of Count Eustace’. Under this entry, it says ‘The Count holds Walkingstead himself … To this manor belong 15 dwellings in Southwark and in London, at 6s, and 2000 herrings’. The mention of the ‘six shillings’ and also the herrings probably indicates that taxes had been levied and were payable partly in money and the rest in herrings. Because fresh fish would not have kept, it is likely that the Herrings would have been pickled before being handed over in payment.

Pickle Herring Stairs could be the place where the herrings were landed, pickled and used as a kind of currency.

Who knows? But it’s an intriguing story.