My grandfather & my step–grandmother and Dickens & Nelson

I have never been particularly interested in the idea of trying to trace my family history. However, I have recently rediscovered some of the letters that my grandfather sent to my father, and these do have more than family interest. Here first is an insight into London schooling in the late nineteenth century. My grandfather left school in 1899. The family lived in Bermondsey, close to Tower Bridge.

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My grandfather did indeed learn French, and I am sure many other things at evening classes. I don’t think that he ever read Samuel Smiles’ Self Help, but he definitely embraced the idea of self–improvement. His father was a goods–yard shunter on the railways, and my grandfather (Joe) started off more or less as a tea–boy in a signal box. He worked his way up gradually, and eventually became manager of the Bricklayers Arms Goods Depot in south London. The depot was very extensive and of vital importance during WW2. Consequently it was extensively bombed, and at times not too far removed from–war front conditions. Post–war Joe worked in railway offices at Victoria Station.

My grandmother died before I was born, and Joe remarried. He met his second wife as result of involvement with the Labour Party. Joe was a keen unionist, and his second wife (Joy) was what used to be termed a ‘silver spoon socialist’. She was a member of the Cecil family, and her father owned practically all the land around the village of Bletchingly in Surrey — that is until he successfully managed to gamble most of it away! Anyway, Joy was a truly committed Labour Party member and was re–elected as Labour candidate for the Rural District of Godstone & Parish of Bletchingly — in the very heart of Conservative country — year after year. That was because people knew that she cared — and indeed she would turn out in the middle of the night if need be, to help someone. During Neil Kinnock’s leadership of the Labour Party she was given one of two annually awarded Kier Hardy prizes for outstanding  local political activity. Their marriage was amazing in a way: Joe from the working class, and Joy from the upper or ‘landed’ classes. Nevertheless, it worked wonderfully. Joe became quite the squire in a way — in Bletchingly — and I remember one Christmas his giving the post–boy a half crown. This was a gesture of genuine kindness, but also I think a demonstration of Joe’s standing in the community!                                        

Joe, his wife Lily; and sister, also Lily

The reverend gentleman was visiting from

America. Every morning he was found to be

sitting in the same armchair as he had been

the evening before. Apparently he never went

to bed!

Joy

This last section of correspondence between Joe and my father gives some of the family history, and this is where Nelson and Dickens come in…