Watts Chapel

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Postman's Park

Although this blog is about London Details, this photographic post makes an excursion to Compton, near Guildford, in Surrey where the Watts Mortuary Chapel can be found. The chapel is also known as the Watts Cemetery Chapel and can be found close to Watts Gallery. The first part of the name, Watts, may give you clue why I am including a Surrey chapel in this blog as George Frederic Watts, painter and sculptor, was the brain behind the Memorial to Heroic Self Sacrifice in Postman’s Park. Although Watts already conceived the idea of such a memorial in 1887, it took so long to materialise that only four plaques had been installed in the memorial wall in the park before Watts’ death in 1904. His widow, Mary Seton Fraser Tytler, continued the project, as she was to do with the chapel in Compton.

Mary Watts was the artistic force behind the chapel, but her husband paid for it and presented it to the village of Compton. Lots of villagers were involved in shaping and decorating the chapel with Mary Watts teaching them how to make the terracotta tiles as well as guiding them in decorating the interior in the Arts & Crafts style mixed with Celtic influences. And it is true what Richard Jefferies, former curator of Watts Gallery, says, that nothing prepares you for the shock of seeing the interior, even after having been astounded by the outside (for link see bottom of post). Both George Frederic and Mary are buried in the cemetery behind the chapel. The chapel is now a Grade I listed building and the cemetery itself is Grade II.⁽¹⁾ Unfortunately the inside is rather dark and no match for my small camera, but I hope I can give you at least a faint impression of what there is to see in this amazing building.

Links
Lots has been written about the chapel, but you may like to start with these:
London Historians visited Watts Gallery and you can read their posts on the visit here. You can watch the short introduction to the chapel by Watts Gallery here, or the slightly longer explanation, Mary Watts & The Watts Chapel by Richard Jefferies here. Or simply go to the Watts Gallery website for more information.

——————-
(1) Historic England, Listed building 1029541; and Historic England, Register of Parks and Gardens.

Kicked by a horse

Tags

medicine, Postman's Park

When Joseph Boxall, a tallow chandler, and Jane, a tailoress, got married on 8 March 1857, her address was given as 14 Wageners Buildings (also spelled Wagners or Wagoners). They remained at that address as their children (Charles Henry Joseph, Joseph James, Louisa, Amelia, Sarah Anne, Charles Edwin Henry, Elizabeth Mary, James and John Federick) were all baptised from 14 Wageners Buildings at St. Mark’s Goodman’s Fields, and they were still there when the 1881 census was taken. Wageners Buildings could be found on Gower’s Walk. In 1883, the London, Tilbury and Southend Railway Company built a goods depot off Commercial Street, obliterating the east side of Gower’s Walk. I do not know whether Wageners Building was on the east side, but in 1891, the Boxall family could be found at 27 Tagg Street, so it is likely that they had to move because of the depot.

1894 Ordance Survey map

For this post we are concerned with daughter Elizabeth Mary, baptised on 15 January 1871. We do not know anything about her youth, but she may have attended the Free School in Gower’s Walk, which also had to relocate to make way for the goods depot. Elizabeth would in the normal course of her life have been unlikely to make the newspapers, but she jumped into the path of a runaway horse which threatened to harm a small child and the injuries she received unfortunately led to her death and an angry letter from the governor of London Hospital.

William J. Nixon, Governor of the hospital wrote to the editor of “Lloyd’s News” that his attention had been drawn to the report in the paper of the inquest into the death of Elizabeth Boxall where the allegation was made that she “was butchered in the London Hospital”. That was, according to Mr. Nixon, not true and he felt obliged to state the case from the point of view of the hospital.

The patient was admitted on the 9th of October last year for “contused thigh”. The history being that she had some time before been kloked by a horse and that the injured limb had been further damaged by a fall occurring on the day she was admitted to the hospital. The examination showed the previously unsuspected presence of cancerous disease. The swelling was full of blood, the thighbone was broken, and its ends destroyed by the disorder, and practically the only chance of stopping the spread of the malady was to perform amputation above the knee; and although the consent of the patient or the friends is always, as a rule, obtained in advance, it was decided, after consultation among those present, that immediate amputation was necessary. The case went on fairly well for some time; but by January 31st last there were evidences of the recurrence of the cancer, and it was deemed essential that the operation of amputation at the hip-joint should be performed. With the consent of the patient and her friends this was done. She then improved, and was sent to Folkestone at the expense of our Samaritan society, in charge of a special attendant. Here, however, symptoms were shown of the cancerous malady spreading to the lungs, and we were required to remove her, as being unsuited for residence in a convalescent home. The patient’s stay at Folkestone lasted from the 24th May to the 11th June. On the father’s return he came, I find, to the hospital, and, at his request, some strengthening medicine was given him for his daughter. We heard no more respecting the case until the account of the inquest appeared in the papers. Had any intimation of the coming inquest reached us the hospital would have been represented. The facts I have stated above would then have been in evidence, and the jury would have been able to form a clear opinion whether there was any ground for imputations of ill-treatment in the hospital, and whether a verdict of “Death from shock” after an operation performed upwards of four months previously, and followed by comparative convalescence, could possibly be a corrrect verdict.⁽¹⁾

Unfortunately, I have not been able to find the original report on the inquest that so enraged Mr. Nixon, but if he is correct in saying that the hospital knew nothing of the inquest, it is indeed strange that they were not asked to give evidence at the inquest. Whoever conducted the inquest should at least have given them the opportunity to state their case as they were accused of “butchering” a patient, a serious charge indeed. Poor Elizabeth may have died of cancer even if she had not jumped in front of a horse, but her brave act to save a child has given her a lasting memorial in Postman’s Park.

Postman’s Park

(1) Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper 1 July 1888.

Fire at Wick Road, Hackney

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Postman's Park

On 4 January 1900, an inquest was held into the death of George Stephen Funnell, a 33-year old police constable.⁽¹⁾ Funnell and some colleagues had rushed to the scene of a fire that had broken out on 22 December 1899 at the Elephant and Castle, situated at the corner of Wick Road and Victoria Park Road. Constable Baker testified that when they rushed to the scene of the fire, the barman, William Goodridge, opened the door, causing a draught that spread the fire in all directions. In the house were, besides the barman, the landlord´s wife Mrs. Fowler, and two barmaids, Alice Maryon and Minnie Lewis. P.C. Funnell went through the flames to rescue the women. Funnell was so overcome by the smoke and fire that he fell back into the parlour where he was rescued by his colleagues. Sergeant Danzey said that the other officers were so overcome that they had to go on the sick list and one of them nearly fell into the fire from exhaustion. Mrs Fowler was so badly burnt that she could not attend the inquest.

Funnel died on 2 January in hospital. Dr. Hall of Hackney Infirmary said that Funnell “had been badly burned and that death was due to pneumonia following on partial suffocation and burning”. The verdict was “accidental death”. The policemen were commended for their efforts to save the lives of those within the pub. They were later to receive a bronze medal from the Royal Society for the Protection of Life from Fire. Just last year, Danzey’s medal turned up at auction (Dix Noonan Webb Ltd, 25 March 2013) as part of a lot of 3 medals. Also included in the lot was a photograph of the five policemen with their medal.

Part of lot 582, auction 25 March 2013 (Source: dnw.co.uk)

So, who was P.C. Funnell? The inquest already told us that he was 33 years old and that his first names were George Stephen. A letter sent to The Times later that month by Henry Seymour Trower of 9, Bryanston Square, tells us that Funnell had a 27-year old wife and two small boys. Trower is appalled at the small yearly pension (£15 and £2 10s for each child) awarded to the widow. Although he realises that it is “presumably as liberal as official considerations permit”, it would not do and he proposes to do something about “this pittance”, so “any subscriptions for the purpose sent to Mr. A.R. Cluer, Worship Street, Police Court, or to me, will be duly acknowledged”.⁽²⁾ How much money was raised by Trower is not known, but it was a kind gesture.

I found a photograph of Funnell and some more information on a website dedicated to the Funnell family, although without exact references and the sources hidden behind a password, so I do not know how reliable the information is, but apparently George’s wife’s name was Jane Lillian and the children were called George Stephen (born 1897) and Lenard A. (born 1898). The England & Wales, FreeBMD Marriage Index gives a George Funnell marrying Jane Lilian Boulton at Gravesend in the latter quarter of 1895 and the England & Wales, FreeBMD Birth Index, gives a George Stephen as born in Hackney in the third quarter of 1896, and Leonard Albert in the early months of 1898, but I have not found the parish records online, so cannot positively state that these are our hero’s boys. If they are, they lived with their widowed mother at 35 Chelmer Road, Hackney at the time of the 1901 census. Ten years later, at the time of the 1911 census, Jane has remarried Henry Arthur Blann, an electric car driver, and the two Funnell boys are living with their three half-siblings at 47 Tankerton Terrace, Mitcham Road, West Croydon.

Photograph of G.S. Funnell (Source: www.funnell.org)

As is usually the case, newspaper reports varied the details of the events surrounding the fire a bit, see here for the News of the World version, but in essence, the stories were the same. George Stephen Funnell lost his life after rescuing three women from a fire. A Postman’s Park plaque well deserved.

Postman’s Park

(1) The Times, 5 January 1900
(2) The Times, 29 January 1900

Fire in Lincoln Court

Tags

housing, Postman's Park

The plaque in Postman’s Park for Ellen Donovan stating that she rushed into a burning house to save the neighbour’s children hides a story of overcrowded and dilapidated houses where London’s poor tried to make the best of their sorry lives. Ellen Donovan lived at 10, Lincoln Court, a narrow street – if you can call it that – between Drury Lane and Great Wild Street in the St. Giles District which was formed of the parishes of St Giles in the Fields and St George Bloomsbury (1855-1890). On that fatal Monday, 28 July 1873, at 7.30 pm, a fire broke out at number 7 because someone had carelessly left combustible material too close to the fireplace. The fire spread rapidly to number 8 and subsequently via the roof also to number 9. Initially everyone got out alive, although some were wounded, but when Ellen Donovan appeared on the scene and inquired whether the children had been got out, she was erroneously told they were not and she rushed inside to save them. She went from room to room, but by the time she reached the top floor she could no longer come down, because the staircase had caught fire. The fire brigade tried to save her, but unfortunately, they could not reach her in time.

The next day, George H. Stanton, the incumbent of Trinity, St. Giles, wrote a letter to the editor of The Times which was published on the 30th, mentioning the overcrowded state of the court and the plight of the 24 families left homeless because of the fire. All contributions gladly accepted. That his appeal did not fall on deaf ears, was shown a few days later, when Stanton thanked everyone by name who had given a donation. The sums given ranged from 2s to 20l with a total of over 56l and even some ‘soup tickets’
had been received.⁽¹⁾ The inquest was held on Thursday the 31st at the King’s Head Tavern in Broad Street where Mr. Dickson, the sanitary inspector for the district, stated that the court had 21 houses (each with eight rooms) with 366 inhabitants in total and that the houses were almost entirely of wood. But despite that, he alleged that the houses were “perfectly habitable”.⁽²⁾ You can judge from the illustration below how ‘perfectly habitable’ they were.

Homes of the London Poor from The Builder (1850s) (Source: British Museum)

The three houses that had burnt down were demolished with unexpected health problems as a result. Dr. George Ross, the Medical Officer of Health, wrote in his 1873 report that

At the commencement of September, I was informed of the occurrence of six cases of Typhus Fever – four of these in Lincoln Court, and two in Great Wild Street. This outbreak was so unexpected that further inquiries were immediately instituted, with the view to ascertain the cause. The localisation of the fever led me to believe that the disturbance of filth in the basements of three houses that had been destroyed by fire in Lincoln Court – a disturbance caused by the removal of the old foundations preparatory to rebuilding – had set free poisonous gases which generated the fever.⁽³⁾

We now know that typhoid fever is caused by the Salmonella typhi bacteria and is spread via contaminated food or water. Although Dr. Ross thought the cause was gases emanating from the ruins, he had the right idea that filthy surroundings were the cause, although not in the way he believed. Not long after, in 1875, another Medical Officer of Health, Dr. S.R. Lovett, made an official appeal to the Board of Works to improve the area in which he stated that many of the houses had no ventilation at all and the narrow alleyways made the houses very dark and he called the whole area “a disease-breeding spot”. The result was the Improvement Scheme of 1877 in which the area between Drury Lane, Great Wild Street, Princes Street and Brewer’s Court was to be razed to the ground and rebuilt.

map of the area from the 1877 report

Almost 2,000 people were to be rehoused. Princes Street (now Kemble Street) and the eastern end of Great Wild Street were to be widened to 40 feet. The site was fully cleared in May 1880 and sold to the Peabody Trust for £15,840. The new six-storey buildings were completed in 1881 and according to the report, “all these dwellings must be maintained in perpetuity as working-class dwellings”. The report mentions the gap between the 1,620 new occupants and the almost 2,000 that were moved out of the old buildings, but what happened to these unfortunates who missed out on a new home is not made clear.⁽⁴⁾

Ordnance Survey map of the area (1893) showing the new Peabody Estate

The Peabody building is still there, testament to a chain of events leading from a fire and the death of Ellen Donovan to better housing for the working classes.

Postman’s Park

(1) The Times, 1 August 1873.
(2) Lloyd’s Weekly, 3 August 1873.
(3) Report of the Medical Officer of Health as part of the Annual Report of the Board of Works for the St. Giles District, 1873 (online here)
(4) London County Council, The Housing Question in London. Being an Account of the Housing Work Done by the Metropolitan Board of Works and the London County Council, Between the Years 1855 and 1900, With a Summary of the Acts of Parliament under which they have worked. The relevant pages can be found here.

Bathing in the Lea

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Postman's Park

The report in The Standard of the bathing accident in Which George Blencowe, one of the Postman’s Park heroes, lost his life first appeared in the 8 September issue where it was said that it took place on Monday evening (that is 6 September) near the old wooden bridge crossing the river Lea near Temple Mills. They named one of the victims as William Sales, 15 years old, from Limehouse who had swum across the river to the Essex shore, but got into difficulties on his way back. Another boy, George Blencowe, 16 years old, from Stratford, saw him struggling and went to his rescue. Unfortunately, he was dragged under by Sales and they both drowned.

The next day, the same paper issued a report on the subsequent inquest. The paper silently corrected several of the facts they had had wrong in the previous report; the boy who got into difficulties transpired to be Walter Sale and only twelve years old. He was the son of John Sale, a greengrocer, and had gone to the river with his friend Stephen Webb. Webb stated at the inquest that when they reached the Back River, Sale said he would go in, but as Webb could not swim, he stayed on the shore to look after the clothes. Blencowe, the son of George Blencowe senior, a fruiterer, had heard the screams for help, took off his coat and boots and swam to the rescue. Webb saw them struggling and disappear.

Stephen Jones, a hammerman, heard the screams from the Walthamstow side of the Lea and swam across the river and ran over a bit of marshland to reach the Back River. He was then told by some bystanders that two boys had gone down and he swam to where they were last seen. He managed to find Sale’s body and brought it back ashore. But when he returned for Blencowe, another man had appeared who, according to Jones “was standing on the boy’s body”. That man, who was later to be found intoxicated, tried to get hold of Jones and fearing that he would be dragged under and being exhausted by that time, Jones returned to the shore. Blencowe’s body was eventually recovered with the help of drags.

The other witnesses of the accident said they could not help because they could not swim. The coroner praised Blencowe for his heroic, albeit unsuccessful and fatal, attempt to save the life of another boy. The coroner also mentioned that it had come to his notice that this was the third person Jones had saved or recovered and that he would make sure that his conduct was brought to the attention of the Royal Humane Society and that he allowed him “with great pleasure” the remuneration he was entitled to receive. The Jury opened a subscription for Jones who said that “he considered it his duty to save a life if he could do so”. Hear, hear.

section of the Lea and its side-channels (Source: Wikipedia)

If the stretch of the river Lea described as the Back River can be identified as what is now called Bow Back River, it lies to the southwest of the Olympic Park. Temple Mills, mentioned in the first newspaper report, however, was a yard belonging to the Great Eastern Railway lying north of the Olympic Park and not besides the Lea. Walthamstow is still further north, but Jones may just have been referring to the east shore of what is now called the Waterworks River. The Wikipedia page on the Bow Back Rivers (note the plural) presents a schematic plan of the river Lea and its – mainly man-made – channels. Now, if the newspaper was wrong on the details of the victim Sale, it may also have been wrong about the name of the Mills; the boys were probably swimming near the City Mills section of the river. But never mind where it was precisely, it remains a dreadful accident and Blencowe fully deserves his place among the heroes of Postman’s Park.

Postman’s Park

Drowned on the Devon coast

Tags

Postman's Park

The wall with the tiles in Postman’s Park abounds with names of people who drowned in trying to save the life of someone else and the following story is of yet another life cut short by a watery death. In this case, very short, as Herbert Maconoghu (variously spelled in the newspaper reports as Maconoghey, Maconoghie or Maconoghue) was only 13 years old when he died trying to save the life of his school friends.

Young Herbert’s parents lived in India and he and his younger brother Frank, like so many of their colonial contemporaries, were sent to school in England. According to the 1881 census, Elizabeth Palmer was the “Lady Principal” of a private school at Neilgherry House on Landsdowne Road, Wimbledon, and she had in her care some twenty boys and girls aged between 5 and 12. Only two of the children were born in England, the rest were all born in India or Ceylon. Herbert and his brother Frank were born in Banda (Uttar Pradesh). Neilgherry House, by the way, was named after the Neilgherry (now usually spelled Nilgiri) hills, part of the Western Ghats mountain chain where the fertile soil prompted the British to start plantations of, for instance, Cinchona from which Peruvian bark could be extracted, a medicine against malaria. The mountain range, also referred to as the Blue Mountains, became a favourite summer retreat of the British because of its gentle climate.

Neilgherry Hills, India (Source: itouchmap.com)

Peruvian bark plantation in the Neilgherry Mountains (Source: Illustrated London News, 1862)

Some of the boys from India could go to family in the summer holidays, but for the seven or eight who could not, the school arranged a few weeks on the North Devon seaside with a governess, Ellen Hardie. Herbert and his schoolmates stayed at Croyde Bay lodging house, belonging to Captain Thomas Heddon. Although the boys had often been to bath where they went in the water that fatal Monday – off Black Rock – there was, on that particular day, according to Heddon, “an exceedingly heavy ground sea running, at a quarter past ten, when the lads went out to bathe, the tide was running out very swiftly”. Charles Binney (10 years old) and Havelock McGeorge (12 years old) were swept out to sea “towards Baggy Point and into a dangerous piece of water known as Glover’s pool”. Maconoghu and another lad, Edward Cornford, went after them to try and save them. Cornford lost sight of the boys and barely managed to get back on shore and was still too ill to attend the inquest a week later, but Maconoghu was swept out to sea with the other two boys.

OS map ±1900

On the Sunday after the tragedy, Heddon was walking along the beach when he saw the body of McGeorge lying near the high water mark. He arranged for the body to be brought to the mortuary at Georgeham. Later that Sunday, one Thomas Staddon saw the body of Maconoghu lying in a deep gully and with the help of a friend, also brought this body to the mortuary. At the time of the inquest, on Tuesday 5 September, the body of Charles Binney had not yet been recovered, but the drowning of McGeorge and Maconoghu was found “accidental”. They were both buried in Georgeham cemetery. Although too late for these unfortunate boys, the accident “caused a great sensation in the neighbourhood, and a general feeling … that some warning should be given visitors against bathing on the beach at certain times, when it is known to be dangerous”. At the inquest, it was reported that “some public-spirited gentlemen” fixed “a notice board on the sands with the object of preventing similar disasters”.

The spot were the Maconoghu plaque hangs originally held a plaque commemorating the death of four workman at the East Ham Sewage Works in 1895. That plaque had incorrectly stated the tragedy as having taken place in 1885 and at the West Ham Sewage Works. This incorrect tile was removed and a new plaque was made by Doulton. It was not put back in its original place, but on another row as it looked better with the other Doulton tiles, rather than as the odd one out amongst the De Morgan tiles. This left a gap in the original De Morgan row, but as De Morgan’s pottery no longer existed, nothing was done about it for some years, until Fred Passenger was located at the Bushey Heath pottery. He had worked at the De Morgan pottery and was able to make one in the same style as the early De Morgan tiles. Maconogue’s tile was put up in April 1931 and was the last one to go up on the Postman’s Park wall.⁽¹⁾

Postman’s Park

– The report of the inquest on which most of the above is based can be found in The North Devon Journal of 7 September 1882.
(1) John Price, Postman’s Park: G.F. Watts’s Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice (2008), pp. 33-34.

Run over by a train

Tags

Postman's Park, transport

On Friday 11 January, 1878, an unfortunate accident happened at Woolwich Arsenal train station. It transpired that a woman had been waiting for a train to take her to the County Lunatic Asylum near Maidstone. She was accompanied by a minder, but when she saw the train coming, she became violent and attempted to escape. From this point onwards, the reports in the newspapers diverge slightly, but unfortunately the outcome was the same. According to Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper⁽¹⁾, a railway inspector, Frederick Alfred Craft – not Croft as his plaque in Postman’s Park would have it – saw what was happening and tried to grab hold of the woman, but in the struggle, she knocked him onto the line. According to The Morning Post⁽²⁾, however, the woman had thrown herself in front of the engine and Craft jumped after her to pull her away. Whatever the true sequence of events, Craft was run over by the train and died of his wounds shortly after in Woolwich infirmary. At the inquest it was decided that Craft had “expired from injuries received whilst endeavouring to save the life of another”⁽³⁾.

Plaque for Frederic Alfred Craft in Postman’s Park

Frederic Alfred was probably born in late 1847 as he was baptised on the 9th of January, 1848 at St. Andrew’s Enfield as the son of Frederick and Elizabeth Craft. The occupation given for Frederick senior is farmer. In the 1851 census, the family still lives at Enfield, but by 1861 they have moved to Stanford, Kent. In 1871, Frederic senior is no longer farming, but has switched careers and is now a railway porter. Young Frederic is no longer living at home, but lodging in Eltham. He too has taken up a job with the railways and is listed in the census as railway signalman. On 15 September, 1872, Frederic junior, “railway servant”, marries Elizabeth Phillips, the daughter of Edward Phillips, a stone mason. The couple are to have two sons, Frederick Thomas (born 22 January, baptised 6 april 1873) and William Harry (born 22 April, baptised 13 June 1875). In both entries for the baptisms, Frederic Alfred is listed as railway signalman. One of the newspapers reporting on Craft’s accident said that he had recently been promoted from railway guard to inspector at the Woolwich station.⁽²⁾

Woolwich Arsenal station c. 1900

Woolwich station had been opened in 1849, serving the North Kent Line of the South-Eastern Railway Company from London to Gillingham. The building was to be replaced in 1906 and again in 1996 with the present glass and steel structure. The South-Eastern Railway Company instigated a subscription after the accident for the widow and orphans with a £20 donation and the Woolwich Arsenal station master received “numerous subscriptions from various parts of the country” to add to the initial sum. The funeral took place at St. Thomas’s Church, Woolwich and drew a large crowd including many railway workers.⁽³⁾

About a fortnight after Frederic’s death, a bit more information about the woman who caused the accident emerged. It turned out that when the board of guardians took possession of her property after she was conveyed to the asylum, a considerable number of valuable articles were found in her house, amongst which “some ready money, a deed representing £900 invested in Three per Cent” and some “very costly jewellery”. The money and jewellery were sent to the bank for safekeeping and the cost of the woman’s maintenance were to be defrayed out of the proceeds.⁽⁴⁾ No mention was made in the paper of any sort of compensation or damages for the widow out of these proceeds.

Postman’s Park

(1) Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper, 13 January 1878.
(2) The Morning Post, 16 January 1878.
(3) The Penny Illustrated Paper and Illustrated Times, 26 January 1878.
(4) Reynolds’s Newspaper, 3 February 1878.

Burst steam pipe

Tags

Battersea, Postman's Park

Thomas (Tom) Griffin, the son of William and Hannah Griffin of Welford, Northamptonshire, was born in about 1878. By 1899, he was living at 75 Usk Road, Battersea, and working at nearby Garton, Hill and Company’s sugar refinery, Southampton Wharf, as a fitter’s labourer under engineer Frederick Biggs. On the fatal Wednesday morning of 12 April, 1899, while the workmen were changing their clothes in the boiler room in preparation to start work, a jarring sound was heard and Biggs went to the adjacent room to have a look. A steam pipe burst and Biggs was injured in the ribs, but managed to escape by another door before the steam could harm him. A fellow-worker, William Woodman, who heard the burst and saw the steam escaping closed all the doors and told the others not to go in because of the scalding steam. Griffin, mistakenly thinking that Biggs was still in there, shouted “my mate, my mate” and entered the room where the pipe had burst, only to return a few seconds later scalded all over with the skin hanging from his hands. In one report, his mates took him into the yard where he was given first aid – the newspapers do not tell us what that first-aid consisted of – and in another report he was taken to the office where his hands were dressed. Whatever the details of the aid, his fellow workers did their best for him and subsequently took him to Bolingbroke Hospital on Wandsworth Common where he unfortunately died a few hours later. Dr. Lyster said at the inquest that Griffin’s body was scalded all over and that he died of shock.

Garton Sons & Co Sugar Works, Battersea, 1933 (Source: Britain from Above)

The manager of Garton’s, Mr. Spencer Pratt, said at the inquest that it was the first accident of its kind to have happened at the refinery. “The pipe, a cast-iron one five-eighths of an inch thick, had had steam in it three days before bursting. It burst when the pressure was only 50lb to the inch, and was completely severed, the parts being blown nine inches apart.”⁽¹⁾ Other reports said the pipe was 8 inches thick, which sounds more likely as it was allegedly a main pipe.⁽²⁾ Mr. Harper, the barrister for Garton & Co, expressed his condolences to the family and remarked that it was particularly sad that Griffin died as he was due to have been married only a few days after the accident. No mention is made of the bride-to-be’s name or background, nor is it clear whether she attended the inquest. Griffin’s father formally identified the body as that of his son and said he had heard from him on the night before his death and that he was then in good health.⁽³⁾

portrait from Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper, 23 April 1899

The jury returned a verdict of death by misadventure and the Deputy-Coroner said, “We all recognise that he acted heroically on this occasion, and we appreciate the act”.⁽¹⁾ The Coroner added, “The conduct of a man like him deserves to be recorded. No doubt there are heroes in everyday life, but they do not come to the front, so we do not hear of them”.⁽³⁾ But that latter statement is not quite true, as we have heard of Griffin’s selfless act through the Postman’s Park initiative of George Frederick Watts who set up the memorial to unknown heroes. Watt’s wife Mary added more tiles to the memorial wall after the artist’s death. Griffin’s plaque was one of the first batch of four memorial tiles to go up on 30 July 1900. These first tiles were designed and made by William De Morgan.

Postman’s Park

(1) The Morning Post, 18 April 1899.
(2) New Zealand Herald, 3 June 1899.
(3) The Standard, 18 April 1899.

Casualty on the ward

Tags

medicine, Postman's Park

As the Resident Medical Officer at Middlesex Hospital, William Freer Lucas M.R.C.S.Eng., L.R.C.P. Lond., although just 23 years old, was responsible for the medical procedures in the wards on that fatal day in October 1893, and when a child with diphtheria needed a tracheotomy, it was his job to perform the operation. When he was administering chloroform, mucus from the child landed on his face, either because the child sneezed or in some other way during the procedure, and from that Lucas became infected with the disease. He died four days later on the 8th of October.

The newspaper reports of his death all praise William for continuing with the operation without stopping to wipe off the mucus and putting the patient before his own well-being. The Hampshire advertiser gave “all honour to our hospitals that they are full of men [no mention of women!] ready to run such risks for the saving of life and the relief of pain. Their heroism is seldom recognised […] but when such a record as this does reach us we pay eager tribute to its nobility”.⁽¹⁾ There is a lot to be said for surgical masks!

Middlesex Hospital emblem

The British Medical Journal included an obituary from which we learn that Lucas was officially styled ‘Casualty Medical Officer’ and had studied and worked at the Middlesex Hospital since 1888.⁽²⁾ Before that, he had attended the Royal Medical Benevolent College at Epsom, which was founded in 1855 to provide education for the sons of medical practitioners. Later, children from different backgrounds were admitted.⁽³⁾

William Freer’s father, William Lucas, was a farmer who employed 11 men and 2 boys on his 420 acre Sussex farm.⁽⁴⁾ William Freer had a number of brothers and sisters, and one of them, Richard Clement (born 1873), also went to Epsom College, even becoming assistant master there and later headmaster at Seabright’s, Wolverley. Another Richard Clement (1846-1915), probably William Freer’s uncle on his father’s side, had a distinguished career at Guy’s Hospital and became Fellow of the College of Surgeons.⁽⁵⁾

A College letterhead in the mid-1860s (Source: Epsom College Archive)

But back to our hero: William Freer was baptised on 25 September, 1870 at St. Andrew’s Church, Grafham, Sussex, as the son of William and Miriam Lucas. The church record does not say exactly when he was born, but Epsom College Archive could tell me that his date of birth was 24 August, 1870.⁽⁶⁾ He was buried on 13 October, 1893 at Shamley Green, Guildford.⁽⁷⁾ Why there is unclear; as far as I have managed to find out, his family had no ties there. The burial list for 1881-1900 does not mention another Lucas, but there may have been a link on his mother’s side. In his memory, his parents endowed the Freer Lucas Scholarship for students of Epsom College. The scholarship is awarded annually on the nomination of the headmaster.⁽⁸⁾

Who the child that Lucas treated was, whether it survived, what its name was, or even if it was a girl or a boy remains a mystery.

plaque in Postman’s Park for William Freer Lucas

Postman’s Park

(1) The Hampshire advertiser, 18 Oct. 1893.
(2) The British Medical Journal, 28 Oct. 1893. online here.
(3) William Freer’s achievements as a scholar at Epsom were: “prefect. Rugby XV. Cricket XI. Brande G.C. and Wakley Prizes” (Source: Epsom medical biographies 1855-1889.
(4) Census 1881: Moor Farm House, Petworth, Sussex.
(5) The British Medical Journal, 10 July 1915. online here.
(6) Thanks to Alan Scadding, the archivist at The Royal Medical Foundation of Epsom College, for supplying the date of birth and for supplying the link in note 3.
(7) Register supplied by wonershchurchorg.uk, online here.
(8) The Medical Press and Circular, 13 September 1916, p 237.

Skating on the ice

Tags

Postman's Park, Welsh Harp

The winter of 1894-95 was a very severe one in the UK. It started in late December when the wind veered to the northwest, bringing cold and snow. In February the wind came from an easterly direction, making it even colder; temperatures of -20°C were frequently recorded.⁽¹⁾ The Morning Post of 6 February ran a report on the severe winter weather and said about the day before: “In the Metropolis the day was comparatively fine and bright, but the wind was piercingly cold, the thermometer ranging from 24deg. to 30deg.” According to the paper, it was a fine dry day for skating with sunshine between 11 am and 2 pm. They had not yet invented the term ‘wind chill’ in those days, but, although it was only freezing a few degrees, it must have felt a lot colder because of the wind.

The Illustrated Police News ran an article in its paper on 16 February, 1895 entitled ‘The Frost and its Victims’. The illustration accompanying the article covered almost the whole of the front page and showed all the disasters that could befall humankind because of the cold: families were “on the very verge of starvation”; working men were “frozen out”; a kitchen boiler exploded because the pipe had been choked; a man was found frozen to his kitchen sink; people died of exposure or were drowned by falling through the ice. The two men shown in the left-hand bottom of the illustration were bank clerks who drowned. Nobody saw the accident happen, but it was thought that Galway, whose skates were found on the bank of the lake, tried to save Cowan because the branch of a tree was found near the two bodies. Not all incidents ended unhappily, however, “a boy, aged five years, fell of the north bank of the river Nene, and, before the skaters on the flooded meadows could go to his assistance, a shepherd’s dog jumped in and pulled him out.”

We know that news(paper) reports were and are not always accurate and that they frequently copy each other, thereby perpetuating the historical distortion and the following story is a case in point. In Postman’s Park we see a plaque to honour Edward Blake who had been skating at the Welsh Harp (Brent Reservoir) and who died in an attempt to recue two unknown girls. The first newspaper reports of the incident appeared the next day.

Welsh Harp in 1891 (Source: londongardenstrust.org)

According to the Morning Post and several other papers that covered the story in almost the same wording, two girls ventured onto the ice between the eastern side of Edgware Road and the Midland Railway viaduct. These days, that section of water is a fairly narrow canalised section of the river Brent, but in 1895 it still consisted of a considerable area of water. The ice broke and the girls fell in the icy water. They were rescued by Blake’s brother, but Edward lost his life. The Daily News of 11 February tells us that the hero’s full name was Charles Edward Clack, that he lived on Tennyson Road, Kilburn, that he drowned while trying to save “a young lady” and that he was to be buried in Old Willesden Cemetery on the 11th. His wife was heavily pregnant and the Willesden Conservative Association decided to raise a subscription to help her. So far, so good, a slight mistake by the typesetter in his name and confusion over the number of girls rescued, but essentially the same story. However, why would the Royal Humane Society award a bronze medal to one Sidney Coke who “At great personal risk, rescued Lily Jones from drowning at the Welsh Harp, Hendon, on the 5th February 1895”?⁽²⁾ Are we talking about the same incident? And if so, why was Blake’s brother called Coke, and what happened to the second girl, if there ever was one?

Royal Humane Society Bronze Medal (Source: medalsofengland.com)

So lets turn to The Observer of 10 February where the coroner’s inquest into the death of our hero is described as part of an article on “The Phenomenal Frost”. The coroner, Dr. Danford Thomas, held an inquiry on the 9th at the District Council Office, Hendon to establish the circumstances of the death of Edward Charles Clark, a plumber of Tennyson Road who was drowned while trying to save Lizzie Jones who had been sliding on the ice between Edgware Road and the viaduct. The coroner heard that a young man (Blake/Clark) got through the railings round the lake and walked towards Lizzie on the ice, but it broke under him and he disappeared. He came up just once, but witnesses did not see him again. Another man, Sidney Coke, an umbrella maker of 339 Oxford Street, took off his coat and jumped from the road bridge onto the ice which broke. He seized hold of the child and swam towards the shore. In the mean time, a ladder had been obtained which was passed to him “just in time as he was paralysed with the cold and was about to sink”. The stretch of water where Lizzie had been sliding was not open to the public and whoever went on the water between the bridge and the viaduct was trespassing. The jury returned a verdict of accidental death and recommended that posters should be set up to warn the public of the dangerous ice in that particular spot. So, Edward Blake has first turned into Charles Edward Clack and now into Edward Charles Clark. The two unknown girls turn into one with a name and the brother may have been there and saw his brother drown, but he did not rescue the girl as that was the work of Sidney Coke who certainly deserved his medal. The Deceased Online website does give a burial at Willesden Old Cemetery for one Edward C. Clark on 11 Feb. 1895, so it is fairly certain, short of getting his official death certificate, that Edward Charles Clark was his real name. The plaque in Postman’s Park unfortunately still mentions two girls, the brother and even the wrong name. Of course the plaque is still deserved, but it would have been nice to see the correct information on it.

plaque in Postman’s Park for Edward Charles Clark

Postman’s Park

(1) Wikipedia article on the 1894-95 winter.
(2) Royal Humane Society bronze medals citations taken from the Annual Report for 1895, compiled by Peter Helmore (Case 27576) Source: http://www.lsars.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/bronz95s.htm