GREAT GRANDFATHER JOHN HEDGES, THE GUNPOWDER MAKER...

Great Grandfather John Hedges, 1840-1905 (likely year of death…)

My great-grandfather was born in 1840 at Wonersh near Guildford and his father, also called John, of St Martha nearby was a gunpowder maker, presumably for the army.

WONERSH...

My subject though actually joined the army in 1858 and he became a gunpowder maker too, for the East India Company, spending 20 years and 84 days in service, about half of it in the East Indies. 

ST MARTHA, NEAR GUILDFORD...

His father, John Senior appears to have been married twice, first to Eliza Bennett in 1835, then to Harriet Lemmon in 1847, the year after Eliza had died, aged just 31. My great-grandfather was either 11 or 13 in 1851, when the census listed them as living at St Martha, close to the gunpowder mills on the River Tillingbourne at Chilworth in Surrey.

GUNPOWDER MILL BUILDING ON ITS MOUND...

NOT MUCH LEFT THESE DAYS...

I have visited the church where John and Eliza were married, known as St Martha-on-the-Hill and their wedding day was 23rd April 1835,  but it appears that after young John, 13, Eliza, 11 and James, 9, were born, Eliza passed away. 

VIEW FROM ST MARTHA-ON-THE-HILL CHURCH...

ST MARTHA-ON-THE-HILL, WHERE MY GREAT-GREAT-GRANDFATHER WAS FIRST MARRIED...

INCREDIBLE VIEW FROM THE HILL...

Harriet Lemmon then married John Senior and a daughter, Elizabeth, then a son, Thomas and another daughter, Harriet were born to the couple, although at that time, Harriet’s daughter, Louisa Lemmon was also living in the dwelling. She had been born at Albury.

On the Tillingbourne

(a poem for my great, great grandfather...)

I wanted to believe

That his worn, grimy boots,

Given a cursory polish

With cloth and blacking and phlegm

Had trudged this trodden way,

Grudging his weary day,

On a pilgrimage to St Martha’s-on-the-Hill.

I wanted to grieve

For his lung-dusting trade,

Proven a dangerous game

With sulphur and charcoal and saltpetre;

Millstones dressed to coarsely grind,

Regressing his wry mind,

At the foot of St Martha’s pilgrims’ hill.

I wanted to retrieve

There, my meagre, strained life,

Driven a torturous route

With loss and depression and need;

Intrusion released quite palpable tension,

Decreasing my wary distension

On the slopes and the beauty of St Martha’s hill.

I wanted to weave,

In this delightful, ancestral woodland

Haven, a milling link

With tributary and alder and burning;

Lives stressed by explosion fears,

Distressing their worry, their tears

During a funeral procession to St Martha’s-on-the-Hill…

Pete Ray

My great, great grandfather was a gunpowder maker at Chilworth…

 Alder trees were set alight to produce the charcoal, which was mixed by milling with saltpetre and sulphur. 

After my great-grandfather left the family home, it was by then at Hambledon Village Common, where John Senior was 46 and listed as a stoker, Harriet was 38, Elizabeth was 14, Thomas 12 and working as an agricultural labourer, whilst the latest editions were Mary, 9, Frederick, 2 and Rose, 1.  

HAMBLEDON...

John Senior lived to 60, passing away in late 1877, just two years before his son returned to England from India.  

However, John Junior, the main character of this article joined the Royal Warwickshire 1st Battalion, 6th Regiment of Foot on 18th November 1858, being described as having a fair complexion, hazel eyes and dark brown hair. He was 5 feet 5 inches tall and his army number was 356…

ROORKEE, WHERE MY GRANDFATHER ALBERT WAS BORN...

He was awarded four good conduct badges and a good conduct medal, with a £5 gratuity, although he possessed no school certificate. He spent 3 years and 278 days as a Private, until August 19th 1862, before being promoted to Corporal on 20th August. This rank lasted until 17th December 1866, when he was tried by court martial for ‘neglect of duty’.

PESHAWAR...

This episode seems rather strange, for he was ‘confined’ for three days, 18th-21st December and was ‘reduced to the ranks’ at his trial, before his sentence was reduced, his forfeited pay restored and he was reinstated as a Corporal, all on the same day…

He remained a Corporal until 11th September 1868, then he was promoted to Sergeant on 12th September, before re-engaging in the army at Colchester ‘to complete 21 years of service’. 

BOMBAY...

He remained a Sergeant from 16th September 1868 until 10th February 1879, when he was granted his silver medal with a gratuity of £5 for long service and good conduct. 

He had spent time at Colchester, Devonport, Calcutta, Barrackpoore, Bombay, Peshawara and Sealkote, as well as Roorkee where my grandad Albert was born.  Barrackpoore is famous for an incident in 1857 when Indian soldier Mangal Pandey attacked a British Commander and was court-marshalled, resulting in Pandey’s Regiment being disbanded.

BARRACKPORE, 1865...

Unfortunately, John struggled at times with his health, for fevers, ague and finally hepatitis plagued him. The hepatitis problem led to his discharge from the army, which was agreed on 18th December 1878. He returned to England with his family aboard the troop ship Seraphis on 19th March 1879, which took a fortnight. 

THE TROOP SHIP 'SERAPHIS'...

Having been so poorly with hepatitis, which was apparently due to the climate, although not aggravated by ‘vice’ or ‘intemperance’, he was soon treated at Netley Military Hospital, near Southampton.

NETLEY HOSPITAL...

He was then posted to Warwick and in the 1881 census, he was listed as living at 4 Barracks Yard, St Mary’s in Warwick with his wife, plus daughters Elizabeth, Julia and Ada, plus Albert… John was described as a Staff Sergeant for the 1st Battalion of the Royal Warwickshire Militia and also a Chelsea Pensioner.

ABOVE AND BELOW: VIEWS OF BUDBROOKE BARRACKS, WARWICK...

A move to 4 Court 5 Great Brook Street, Duddeston in Birmingham was next and by 1891 he was listed as a 49 year-old gunpowder maker, whilst my grandad Albert was just 13 and an errand boy/porter. New daughters Lily and Maud were listed too, as well as a domestic servant called Elizabeth Watts, aged 17.

ABOVE & BELOW: GREAT BROOK STREET BARRACKS, BUILT IN 1793...

I wondered why the family had moved from Warwick Barracks to Great Brook Street in Birmingham and then I discovered that Great Brook Street had barracks, where soldiers were able to lodge, rather than attempting to find hotel or other accommodation.

GREAT BROOK STREET...

John was 59 and described as a Pensioner on the 1901 census form, living at 144 Great Brook Street, although he had died by the time the 1911 census was taken, wherein his wife Elizabeth, a widow, was living with her daughter Julia at 2 Leamington Place, Willis Street, Ashted. It was likely that once her 'Pensioner' husband had died, she would be expected to leave Great Brook Street... 

Interestingly, Julia’s surname hadn’t changed much from Hedges, for her husband was Samuel Hodges, a van man at a piano works… 

BELOW: 

4 STAINED GLASS IMAGES FROM ST MARY'S CHURCH, WARWICK, DEPICTING AND CELEBRATING THE ROYAL WARWICKSHIRE REGIMENT. NOTE THE DRUMMERS...

   

  

GRANDFATHER ALBERT EDWARD HEDGES, 1878-1936...

 Albert Edward Hedges: 1878-1936

BRILLIANT IMAGE OF GRANDAD, FAR RIGHT, MAY 1916...
THANKS TO MY COUSIN John Hedges FOR SENDING ME A PHOTOCOPY OF THE PICTURE, WHICH I WAS ABLE TO ADJUST TO BLACK & WHITE... 

Introduction:

ALBERT, WHEN HE JOINED THE ARMY...

Grandad Hedges was born on 17th July 1878 in the north of India, at Roorkee, which was built on the banks of the Ganges Canal, constructed under the watchful eye of British officer Colonel Proby T. Cautley, during the East India Company’s rule.

THE GANGES CANAL, ROORKEE...

The son of a soldier, John Hedges, who was a gunpowder maker, Albert was a likely candidate for the army I guess and so it was that he joined up as a drummer boy. His mother was Elizabeth Jane Hedges, formerly Jandron, born in Jersey in 1841 or 1842.

ROORKEE...

Albert’s early months were lived in India but his father left the army, being declared unfit at the age of 38, resulting in the family returning to England in 1879. However, the young Albert clearly wanted a military career and was attested at Chatham on 22nd August 1894, joining the Royal Warwickshire Regiment.  He had been working as a trunk maker…

ALBERT THE DRUMMER...

In 1881 the census reveals that John Hedges was living at 4 Barracks Yard, St Mary’s, Warwick, with wife Elizabeth, daughter Elizabeth, 9; Ada, 6; Julia, 5 and of course Albert, 3, all born in India.

Before Albert’s attestation, his home was at 4 Court 5 Great Brook Street, where his parents John and Elizabeth lived with their children. Living there in 1891 were Elizabeth, 19; Julia, 15, a domestic servant; my Grandad to be, who was an errand boy/porter and 13 years of age; Ada, 10 (conceived in India, born at Budbrooke, Warwick); Lily, 8; Maud, 6 and a domestic servant called Elizabeth Watts, 17, born in Birmingham.  

GRANDAD, NAN & SON ALBERT (CLAL)...

A Military Life:

THE DRUMMER REACHES R.S.M., CENTRE OF IMAGE, SEATED...

Albert was only 4 feet 8 + a quarter of an inch tall and 73 pounds in weight, with a fresh complexion, grey eyes and brown hair when he joined up. He had tattoos of a dot and a flag on his left forearm and a dot on the back of his left hand, plus a mark on the back of his ring finger. Small scars were evident on the left side of his chest and at the back of his left elbow.

In November 1895 Private Hedges, a Drummer was given the army number 4328 and the Regiment was posted to Malta that year, then in January 1897 they moved on to Alexandria. On 15th December in 1898, he was amongst 856 soldiers, part of a Brigade from the 2nd Battalion who faced the Dervishes in Sudan at the Battle of Omdurman.

OMDURMAN...

A bullet went through his drum on one occasion around this time and my mum remembers it being kept in the loft of their house but then it was sadly left behind in Alderson Road, Ward End, presumably.

Via Alexandria the Regiment moved onto Bombay and in 1899 Grandad was promoted to Lance Corporal and was posted to South Africa to take part in the Second Boer War, getting injured at Leewkop on 22nd April 1900. His group was responsible too for guarding prisoners on Bermuda. He reached the rank of Corporal on 4th June 1902, before being posted back to the Warwick depot on 4th October, where he was appointed Lance Sergeant.

On 5th October 1904, he reverted to Corporal and re-engaged for the Royal Warwickshires at The Curragh, on 22nd August 1905, ‘for such term as shall complete 21 years service’.

On July 1st 1906 he was appointed Lance Sergeant again, before negotiating a tour of duty was on 12th January 1910 with the 3rd Battalion. On October 11th that year he was promoted to Sergeant. From November 1902, his group moved from Plymouth, to Portland, to Bordon Camp and Lichfield.

On 20th November with the 5th Battalion, the staff were posted for a tour of duty, extended until September 29th 1912. Promoted first to Company Sergeant, he was then appointed acting Sergeant Major on May 29th 1915. It appears that he had been involved with the 2nd Territorial Battalion which trained at Coventry and Salisbury Plain, from October 1914.

With the 182nd Brigade and the 61st Division, at the end of May 1916, Grandad was involved in training at Bethune, France, then continued working under the terms of the Military Service Act. On 29th May 1916 he was promoted to Warrant Officer Class II, then Class I. Trench warfare was seen at Fauquissart, near Armentieres.

GRANDAD WAS KNOWN TO BE NEAR HERE...

From April 1917, his group moved from Monchy-Lagache to Marteville, near St Quentin. There was involvement in the third battle of Ypres, in August and September that year following bad weather and the group was in trenches beyond Wieltje Farm. An attack on Hill 35 was unsuccessful and the group eventually withdrew but Grandad was finally sent home on 22nd September and he was discharged from the army on 18th February 1918, after 23 years of service.

The image below, from May 1916 shows him seated behind a lounging officer and described as Regimental Sergeant Major Hedges, surrounded by the 2/5th Battalion members of the Sergeants’ Mess…

He was mentioned in Despatches as ‘deserving of special mention’ on 14th December 1917.

Grandad’s medals were as follows:

THE QUEEN’S SUDAN MEDAL, 1898;

THE QUEEN’S SOUTH AFRICA MEDAL;

THE BRITISH EMPIRE WAR MEDAL;

THE ALLIED VICTORY MEDAL;

THE LONG SERVICE/GOOD CONDUCT MEDAL;

THE KHEDIVE’S SUDAN MEDAL.

These medals were gifted to the Royal Warwickshire Regimental Museum…

Other information:

Albert’s education from the army was described as first having gained a 3rd class certificate, attained on 29th March 1895, then a 2nd class certificate on 24th June in the same year. He also successfully qualified at the School of Musketry, Hythe, on 18th November 1911. 

Albert married my Nan on Christmas Day, 1904, as described in the article about her but I wonder whether Nan was ‘in service’ at his home in 145 Great Brook Street at the time, for her address was given as the same as his on the marriage certificate. Strangely, the other couple married on the same day in a double-wedding, namely Albert’s sister Ada and her bridegroom William Bygeare, were both living at that address too.

WITH MOST OF THE FAMILY, JUST JOHN EDWARD (EDDIE) MISSING...
NO CHANGE THERE...

When one considers the football skills of sons John (Eddie), Fred (Bun), Albert (Clal) and Samuel (Claude), plus the athletic prowess of daughters Ivy, Ghreta and my mum, Marjorie, it was no surprise to find this image of Grandad seated in the front row of an army soccer team, football at his feet and most likely the skipper… 

Grandad passed away in 1936, likely from stomach cancer, according to my cousin Derek Eastwood…

A WRY SMILE?

The above has been difficult to piece together from poorly written original documents with a variety of conflicting spellings and ambiguous information but I have done the best I can…

WITH SON FRED (BUN)...

I have included the most likely places Grandad visited but I pity his epic voyage back to England when just a few months old, with an ill father, his other siblings and a stressed mother…

More about that when I feature Albert’s father John Hedges, my great-grandfather…

Thanks go again to my ex-teaching colleague Jan Pick for her input, without which I would have been floundering…

BRILLIANT IMAGE OF MAN & DOG, BUT IT'S CLEAR THAT ALBERT IS THE MORE LIKELY SNARLER...

   

GRANDFATHER RAY: 1883-1941...

 Grandfather: William Ernest Ray, 1883-1941…

I was never fortunate enough to meet my dad’s father, for he passed away in 1941, when my dad was only 21 years of age. I know that when he was unwell, my grandfather asked my dad to visit his grave when he had died and drink a beer there. My father did just that…

A LITTLE MORE PORTLY HERE...

My dad told me that William had ‘run away to the circus’ when he was 14 years of age and had experienced tightrope walking, as well as being the person who climbed to the top of a human pyramid, then toppled from the summit to forward-roll out of his fall. Naturally, William was not very tall…

RATHER SMALL IN STATURE...

Considering that my father loved being in the army during World War II, he didn’t mention William’s experiences in World War I, although I do have the medals awarded to my grandfather. However, my dad reckoned that one of William’s ancestors ‘brought the wooden bicycle wheel to Birmingham’, which seemed a very odd, if confident statement to make.

A RESIGNED SMILE...

Having lost his first wife in 1905, probably during the birth of a second child, William soon married my Nan, Lilian ‘Wilson’, although having just received Nan's birth certificate, no father is included.

The research is ongoing. That first wife was Lilian Maud Mary Hammond, whose father was a cycle maker, which was crucial, for William was a cycle handlebar polisher, apparently… It appears that he lived at 137 Heneage Street with her, although they weren’t married until 12th April 1903 and daughter Lilian Winifred came along in the August of that year.

Heneage Street...

When William married my Nan, they were both living in Duddeston Mill Road, presumably with Nan looking after William’s daughter. They were married on 4th March 1906.

GRANDAD WITH NAN, MY DAD, SHEILA & CONNIE...

William worked at Radnall’s in Dartmouth Street, apparently on Raleigh cycles, until 1940, the year before he died, aged just 58. He had apparently been struggling with his breathing, resulting from World War I gas attacks, the fumes from the metal polish he had used at work, also from smoking cigarettes and likely too from the coal dust which no doubt lingered around the ‘coal-house’ off the kitchen in the later marital home of 347 Bromford Lane, near the famous racecourse. 

In 1901, aged 17 (he was born in December 1883) the family was living in Holt Street, number 29, I believe, along with older brother Joseph, an edge tool maker and his younger siblings Ann, Frederick, George and Samuel. William was listed as an iron polisher. 

His father was a barrel welder, whilst his mother Ann hailed from Manchester, a member of the Best family but in 1891, when the family lived at 4 Court 20, Staniforth Street, she was listed as a spoon polisher and husband Joseph was described as a gun barrel welder, which adds more clarity to the aforementioned ‘barrel welder’…

STANIFORTH STREET...

It appears that in 1881, the 22 year olds Joseph and Ann lived at 2 Staniforth Street and their son Joseph was 3 months old, but an older sister Angelina, 2 years old, was there too, although apparently she died when she was about 4. 

In 1871,  13 year old Joseph was living at 26 Balloon Street with siblings William, Thomas and Richard. Their father, 35 year old Samuel R(e)ay was a wheelwright (the wooden wheel man?) and his wife was Neomiah, aged 30…

Strangely, at 24 Balloon Street, a Joseph Ray, who was even more oddly, a gun barrel welder, lived as a lodger…

TAKEN FROM A CORNER OF BALLOON STREET...

However, back to William… 

He joined up to fight in the Great War in 1914 and I believe he travelled to the Front before Christmas that year, arriving on 3rd December, his 31st birthday and might have even have been nearby when the famous Christmas Truce and football match were held… 

It was confusing that William went to France so soon but it turns out that he had joined the 6th Battalion of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment Militia on 4th June, 1901, with a service number of 8267. He was working in Vesey Street at a cycle works, under a Mr Croft, who agreed for William to join the Militia as a part-time soldier. He was described as being 5 feet 4 inches (1.62 metres) tall, 114 pounds in weight (just over 8 stones, or 51.7kg), with black hair, brown eyes and a fresh complexion. He signed on for 6 years and the Militia disbanded soon afterwards anyway.

Strangely, his attestation date of 4th June would be the same date 19 years later, when his son (my dad Victor) was born…  

So, at the outbreak of WW1, William joined the Royal Warwickshire Regiment and his new army number was 1856. He was sent to France and Flanders with the 1st Battalion, ending up on a list of casualties, ‘wounded’ on 15th July 1915. He wore a Wound Stripe on his uniform thenceforth.…

PRIVATE RAY...

His grandson Leslie, from his son Leslie’s first marriage remembered sitting on William’s lap before he was evacuated to Repton in Derbyshire. He recalled Great War war medals being displayed on a wall at 347 Bromford Lane but that William was too often bringing up phlegm. Leslie was never to see his grandfather again.

BROMFORD RACECOURSE...

...& ITS SERVING RAILWAY STATION...

William’s 80 year old mother Ann died around Christmas time in 1939, having been living in Vicarage Road, Aston.  She had been born in Manchester it appears and by the age of 2, her father George Best (yes, I know…) was farming 40 acres of land at West Haddlesey, Yorkshire. In 1871, George was not only farming but the innkeeper at the George and Dragon pub in the village. 

GEORGE & DRAGON, HADDLESEY...

The image below shows the pub in modern times, when arson was suspected in 2019, after an attempted break-in.

George’s father had also been a farmer, working 47 acres in Chapel Haddlesey…

FARMLAND IN HADDLESEY...

I know nothing about William’s sporting interests, although his son Will was an avid Birmingham City fan, often at odds with my dad, who supported Aston Villa. Later in life, dad used to drive a struggling Will to Villa Park to watch the Reserve team play on occasional Saturday afternoons, meeting Gary Shaw a few times in the process, one of Villa’s local goalscoring forwards. 

I penned the following poem about Grandad Ray a few weeks back:

You Just Get Used To It…

Factory conditions.

Noise permanence.

Got used to it though.

Rumbling machinery.

Polishing bicycle handlebars to a gleam.

Industrial perdition.

Fumes intolerance.

Put up with it though,

The din and the flummery.

The future diminishing. 

Any ambition a dream.

Trench conditions.

Noise preponderance.

Got used to it though.

Shambling acrimony.

Suffering mustard gas in the front line.

Ingestion, inhalation.

Blind insouciance.

Put up with it though.

The hell with camaraderie,

The future vanishing.

Any hope benign.

Horror conditions.

Noise indifference.

Got used to it though, you see.

Choking cacophony.

Staring at torn limbs in mud’s revealing.

Putrefaction, infection.

Bland acceptance.

Put up with it though, you see.

The fear of ill chance.

The future banished.

No likely healing.

Chest condition.

Noise interference.

Got used to it though, you know.

Smoking, pitifully.

Wearing diseased lungs to gasping.

Deception, dissatisfaction.

Fumes dependence.

Put up with it though, you know.

The pain through reliance.

The future tarnished.

At life grasping…

Pete Ray

13th January 2021

This poem was meant to be about getting used to seeing death, horror and maiming during the First World War.

However, as I began to write it, my paternal grandfather came to mind, whose peacetime job had been polishing bicycle handlebars.

He fought in WW1 trenches and suffered during poison gas attacks.

After the Great War he wheezed, apparently due to a combination of the polish fumes, German gas and of course, cigarettes. 

He died in the mid-1930s and therefore I never met him…

So, this poem is dedicated to William Ernest Ray, my grandfather, of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment…

Many thanks to Jan Pick yet again for her efforts on my behalf!