Some E7 late Victorian letterheads

Frequent contributors, Peter Williams and Mark Gorman share some interesting Forest Gate discoveries from their recent work within Newham Archives. 

In the Newham council archives, there are extensive records for what was called the “West Ham Burial Board”.^[1] These Boards were a response to the crisis of overflowing cemeteries in central London from the 1850s onwards and the Boards managed local public/council cemeteries.

The West Ham Board secretary was a Mr Self, and he seems to have kept meticulous records of all the Board’s activities. The archive boxes contain neat bundles of correspondence on a whole range of matters.

The present article concentrates on the letterheads and details of small firms in Forest Gate and Stratford who supplied the Burial Board. It gives an insight into both the lovely artwork of this business correspondence, as well as the range of businesses locally around 1900. There are the obvious suppliers to a cemetery, such as monumental masons, but also more obscure businesses.

Newham Volunteer Kathleen Partington has been cataloguing these papers, and I am grateful to her for drawing these items to my attention.

We start with the monumental masons, the first one, WT Sumpter, based in what is now Cemetery Road E7.

William Thomas Sumpter was a stonemason born in Shoreditch around 1823. By the early 1870s, he was living in Forest Gate, on a property near the new cemetery opened by West Ham council in 1857. He was declared bankrupt in 1867 but appears to have recovered. Bankruptcy was common among small businesses during the Victorian era, and people seemed able to recover quickly in that lively period. He died in 1926 and is buried at East Ham parish church.

Cosburn was another mason in the area of West Ham cemetery in Odessa Road, E7. He had been born in Minchinhampton in Gloucestershire in the mid 1840s and migrated to London as a young man, married young, and was living in Chatsworth Rd off Forest Lane with his young family by his mid twenties. Hundreds of thousands of people moved from the English countryside to London in the Victorian era to make their fortunes. His wife was a Londoner, born in Chelsea.

West Ham, the council-run cemetery, was different from say Manor Park cemetery, which was a family-run, profit-making business. In fact, it is still run by the same family who opened it in 1875, (see here)

The West Ham Cemetery Board clearly needed many other kinds of supplies, most notably ironwork of various kinds. Here we have Henry Freund, based in Tower Hamlets Road off Forest Lane.

Interestingly, the trade directories a few years before this list him as a timber merchant on the same road. Then, in 1908, he is listed as a builder’s merchant at 112-120 Tower Hamlets Road, which is also very close to West Ham cemetery. The site is now under modern housing.

In 1862, Freund had been an ironmonger in Bethnal Green and then had opened a branch in Forest Gate, no doubt as it developed rapidly from the 1860s, with a massive demand for building materials. This newspaper advert shows his business had several branches by the mid-1890s.

Tower Hamlets Independent and East End Advertiser - 29 August 1896

Henry Freund died in 1926 and is buried in East Ham parish church.

There are several letterheads in the collection for a firm called Venables, who were based close to the Holly Tree pub in Dames Road. They were shoeing smiths, a reminder that in Victorian and early Edwardian times, London was entirely dependent on horses for road transport, and there were places to get horseshoes done everywhere. There were serious predictions at that time that central London was going to grind to a halt soon due to the sheer amount of horse manure. But then the car came along!

Notice Venables also had a branch at Forest Gate station.

This invoice is written to the West Ham Cemetery Co., which is strange as it was not a company but council-run. West Ham council came into existence in 1886 and took over the cemetery from the local board of health, the precursor to councils.

Oddly, the following crime report, which discusses Venables, also mentions Mr. Freund being cheated. Notice that the Venables business is described as being on Leyton Rd, because what is now known as Dames Rd was formerly part of Leyton Rd until the 1890s.

Leytonstone Express and Independent - 21 November 1885

Sometimes the letterheads give a precise address, though here a company called Bayliss seems to have occupied a couple of different addresses in Forest Gate.

Today 134 -138 Forest Lane looks purely residential, rather than a shop premises.

Later Bayliss’s lamp depot was at 96 Woodgrange Rd. Today, those premises are occupied by a highly skilled plaster moulder, Louis, who hails from Malta. By coincidence, he also carves grave stones!

Lamp oil was the primary source of light until the widespread availability of gas after World War I. With the advent of domestic electricity between the wars, Bayliss adapted his business to accommodate electric lighting, having begun his career as a plumber.^[2] Towards the end of his career, he was referred to as a ‘battery service agent’.

West Ham and South Essex Mail - 05 February 1937 

Henry Stanley Bayliss lived above the shop at 96 Woodgrange Road, according to the 1911 census. He was then described as a gas fitter. He still lived there in 1921. Like many shopkeepers, he lived upstairs with his wife and children. 

He had moved to a farm at Abridge in Essex before he died in 1944, and called it Woodgrange.

 

Probate records via Ancestry

He died wealthy, with an estate worth £5,000, which is equivalent to approximately £250,000 today. This wealth allowed skilled craftsmen/shopkeepers to earn a good living, reminding us that Forest Gate was an affluent suburb. He is buried in West Ham cemetery, where he had provided goods and services whilst trading.

Another small business person in this area was Arthur Bignell, an ironmonger.

Here is a newspaper advert:

West Ham and South Essex Mail - 31 March 1900 

 

Arthur Bignell was born in Croydon in 1862. In the early 1900s he lived in Odessa Road, so not above his shop at 21 Upton Lane. He retired to Banstead (near Croydon) in Surrey to live with one of his children, and died in 1947.

He seems to have been involved in local politics, standing for the West Ham School Board in 1895.

West Ham and South Essex Mail - 02 March 1895

 

Finally, there is another horse shoeing business, this time located in a railway arch of the newly opened overhead railway through Forest Gate, which was only completed in the mid-1890s. It was originally known as the Tottenham and Forest Gate Railway, and its three hundred plus arches must have provided many opportunities for small business premises, as they do today (see here).

 

This location must be very close to the current Youth Zone building.

 Conclusion

Newham Archives holds extensive records of the West Ham Burial Board, which are currently being catalogued by a volunteer. Amongst the records are invoices from suppliers to the Board. As well as being attractive Victorian letterheads in their own right, we can, by using other sources, like online newspapers and Ancestry.com build up a picture of local businesses and businessmen in the Forest Gate area 120 years ago. It was a thriving new suburb with many small businesses, some of which left their owners wealthy.

Thanks to Jess Conway, Newham Council archivist, for permission to photograph the letterheads.

Footnotes

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1. The Burial Acts of 1852 and 1853 placed all decisions initially with local vestries. In the mid-19^th century, vestries played a central role in the collection and distribution of local rates. The Burial Acts permitted each vestry, using a strictly framed democratic process, to vote to establish a burial board. Each board would then be able to raise funding to establish a new cemetery. Burial board cemeteries were laid out in their many hundreds, paid for through loans secured from the Public Works Loan Board and repaid out of the rates. Burial boards were composed of elected ratepayers who managed the cemetery in accordance with government guidelines.

 2. West Ham council had its own electricity department at this time, and indeed generated and sold electricity for profit from a major power station in Bidder Street, Canning Town. This was nationalised after 1948.

 

Strange Claremont Road deaths (2) - suicides

This is the second of three articles we are publishing on unusual deaths and their inquests of residents of Claremont Road, based on a rigorous interrogation of the British Library Newspaper Library's collection of almost 90 million newspaper pages. 

The first article, on child deaths can be found here, and included details of the death of 16-year-old nanny Constance Susan Hand, of 56 Claremont, who died of arsenic poisoning in 1881, with no apparent cause of the suicide being reported..

1891: William Turner: “Hanged, while in an unsound state of mind”, aged 50

Transcript of the West Ham and South Essex Mail article, below.

 

West Ham and South Essex Mail 18 July 1891

“Sad death of Mr WH Turner – it is with regret that we record the melancholy death of Mr WH Turner of Claremont road, Forest Gate, who hanged himself at his residence on Thursday the 10^th inst … while in an unsound state of mind. The deceased gentleman had been in a depressed condition for some time, and although in good circumstances, having retired from business only 12 months ago, was haunted with an idea that he had not sufficient to keep himself."

"No one, however, had the least suspicion that he contemplated suicide, and when the news of his death became known, it caused a violent shock to those who had known him. He was a gentleman highly respected by a large circle of friends, and as president of the Liberal Association, and in other capacities, he had been of great service to the Liberal party, many of whose officers and members followed his remains to the grave.”

It would appear that Turner was a juryman on a high-profile case for compensation against the Tottenham and Forest Gate Railway at the time of his death. This was reported to the court two days later and the case continued in his absence. There is no indication from newspaper coverage that the case was a factor in his suicide.

55 Claremont Road, today

 

William Turner was born in Acton in 1841 and lived at 55 Claremont Road with his wife, Maria, daughter, niece, and a boarder when he died aged 50 in 1891. He was described as “living on means”. At a time when there were no state pensions, fifty seems a very young age to have retired, and it seemed the cause of his depression. He was principally a linen draper throughout his working life.

Turner and his wife were living in Leyton Road, West Ham, by the time of the 1871 census. They had a 15-year-old son, William. A decade later, the family lived at the Claremont Road address and had another son, Harold, born in 1873.

Sources: West Ham and South Essex Mail 18 July, Essex Times 22 July, Find My Past

 1926: Henry Lee Lewis: “Suicide, while of unsound mind”, aged 63

In articles recording his death, Henry Lee Lewis was described as living on Claremont Road, with no house number given. At the time of his death, he was a married and childless 63-year-old schoolmaster who had moved to Hastings in the last few weeks of his life because of his poor health. He taught at Colgrave Road school in Leytonstone and had previously lived in Leyton and on Cann Hall Road.

His body was discovered, slumped on a deckchair on the pier at Hastings on Tuesday 29 March, and taken to the Royal East Sussex Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. An almost empty bottle of Lysol, a disinfectant, was found near his deckchair.

Hastings and St Leonards Observer 3 April 1926

 

A note addressed to his wife was found in the hotel where they were staying. Although its full contents were not revealed at the inquest, the coroner read extracts, which said: “I am wearing you out. You have been my angel. Forgive me.”

A witness at the inquest said that: “Mr Lewis’ health had given him much anxiety” over recent weeks, and that he had been complaining about a loss of taste and hearing. He had been suffering from neurasthenia, a form of chronic fatigue caused by stress. He had no financial troubles, but had been talking of suicide in the weeks before his death..

The post-mortem found that he had about 10 ounces of Lysol in his stomach and “the stomach wall was practically gangrenous, due to the effects of the disinfectant. There were smaller marks of burning on his lips.”

The coroner’s verdict was: “Suicide whilst of unsound mind.”

West Ham and Essex Times 2 Apr, Manchester Evening News 30 Mar, Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 3 April

1928: Maria Susan Hibbs: “Suicide while of unsound mind”, aged 64

Miss Maria Sarah Hibbs was a 64 year old costumier, living at 54 Claremont Road, when she committed suicide in August 1928. This was next door to number 56, where Constance Hands (see earlier post) had taken her own life 37 years before and opposite where William Turner had killed himself ten years later. 

Sarah Hibbs' body was discovered in the garden, underneath an open landing window by her housekeeper, Annie Anderson.

54 Claremont Road, today

 The inquest heard:

"On Saturday, the housekeeper went out, and when she returned, she called out to Miss Hibbs, but got no reply … She noticed that a landing window was open, and later, when she went into the garden, she saw the deceased’s body lying on the ground beneath the window."

The investigating police officer, PC Ware told the inquest that:

"The woman had apparently fallen from the landing window, which was four feet from the floor. However, on the landing beneath it was a laundry box, and on top of that, an attache case. The height of the box and the case was about two feet."

The medical evidence was that death was due to a fracture of the skull.

West Ham and South Essex Mail 7 Sept 1928

Bryce Rogers, another witness, friend, and confidante from Forest Hill, tried to give some context at the inquest. He said that Maria Hibbs confided everything of a financial nature to him, and that: “she was under the impression that she was in a bad way financially, but her ideas of financial disaster were delusional.”

He said he was able to show her she made a profit each week in her business, but “she had made an investment in an electrical concern, and the shares have fallen considerably, and this worried her.”

"She was, he said, very miserable and depressed and was in poor health. She was worried because her business was very bad. She had resources and was quite sound financially, but she exaggerated the matter considerably."

The jury’s verdict was: “suicide due to an unsound mind”.

Source: West Ham and Essex Mail 7 Sept

Tom Duncombe's story - a local Spanish Civil War International Brigade volunteer

Following our piece on West Ham-based members of the International Brigade, volunteers who fought for the Republicans against the fascist military usurpers, we have uncovered a more detailed biography of one of the featured members, thanks mainly to the efforts of his nephew to preserve his memory. He provided us with treasured family photographs, documents, and memories to tell Tom’s story. It is a fascinating tale.

 

The Spanish Civil War

By way of background, a Republican government was democratically elected for the first time in Spain in early 1936. Elements of its armed forces’ officer corps found this objectionable and began a military uprising against it in July that year.

For the most part, democratic countries in Europe looked the other way and refused to send troops to defend the young democracy. Fascist countries, like Nazi Germany and Mussolini's Italy, got involved, arming and physically supporting the emerging Junta, which was soon to be led by the young military officer Francisco Franco, despite having signed a non-intervention pact with Britain and France.

Appalled at the prospect of another fascist government emerging in Spain and their own government's inaction in resisting it, supporters of the Republican government from around the world flocked to Spain to defend the fledgling democracy. They were ill-equipped and, for the most part, lacked training, but formed themselves into International Brigades.

Our previous article (see here) featured 16 men with West Ham links who enlisted in those Brigades. This is the story of one of them.

Tom Duncombe 1913 – 1938

A portrait of Tom Duncombe

Tom was born in West Ham and listed his address as 37 Rosher Road, Stratford, when he enlisted. A Rosher Close still exists nearby, close to Carpenters Road.

There was a house fire on Carpenter's Road when Tom was a teenager. Aided by a policeman, Tom climbed onto an adjoining roof, smashed a window, rescued a young child, lowered it into the policeman’s arms, and then climbed down himself.

The policeman and child had their photograph published in the Stratford Express, and the policeman received a medal for bravery – but Tom did not get a mention!

Tom and his brothers, Charlie, Joe, and Harry, became card-carrying members of the Communist Party in the 1930s, and held the red flag in the infamous Battle of Cable Street, in October 1936, opposing the march of Mosley’s fascists into the East End (see family photo).

 

Tom, holding the Communist banner (underneath the "ST"), attending anti-Mosley march in Cable Street, October 1936)

The Communist Party urged its members to join the International Brigades, and despite pleadings from his brothers and father (a gunner during World War One) to not do so, Tom enlisted.

He attended a rally at Trafalgar Square, where he was approached to enlist (which was illegal at the time) and quickly signed up. He was told to take a specific train from Victoria to Dover, and in a scene that seemed straight out of a cheesy spy movie, was instructed to have a packet of Woodbine cigarettes sticking out of his breast pocket, as a form of recognition.

Also at Trafalgar Square was Pablo Picasso, who was quickly sketching drawings to raise money for the International Brigades. Tom bought two—of Lenin and Stalin (he mentions them in a letter to his mother, dated February 28, 1938, which still exists—see below). After the war, his brothers asked their mother what she had done with them. She replied: “When it was confirmed that he had died, I burned them, along with his other useless possessions”!

Several days after his recruitment in Trafalgar Square, Tom travelled to Dover, sporting his Woodbine packet, and was approached and given tickets to his onward journey to Spain.

A packet of Woodies - the secret sign!

 

He described his journey, in the first surviving letter to his mother, dated 19 February 1938: “I had a rough crossing going over, but everything is alright in gay Paree now. I’ve been here a day or two, but will be moving out tomorrow.”

He apologized for not saying his farewells before he left England:

Tom's first letter home - from Paris

 

I’m sorry I could not say goodbye to you, I could not get myself to do it, but you will understand the reasons I came out here … Mum, you know no one made my mind up for me to come out here, so don’t make a fuss. I came here of my own free will.

International Brigade (IB) records show Tom arrived in Spain on 25 February and joined the International Brigade on the 27th, becoming part of the British Battalion at Albacete, which is halfway between Madrid and the Mediterranean coast.

He was killed in action within six weeks. 

Tom’s last surviving letter to his mother was written the day after he joined the IB. The address he gave for himself was 270 Plaza del Allazona, Albacete. Much of the letter’s content is personal and family-related. Still, his fierce anti-fascism and determination to fight for freedom and democracy stand out, as some of these extracts show:

The last the family heard from Tom

 

Mum, don’t shed any tears, you should be proud that you have not brought up a coward …I am out here to stop murder, not only of the Spanish people, but people throughout the whole world … The fight against fascism is a fight against war.

Well I hope Harry still has the Daily Worker every day because you will find more news about this war than I can tell you.

I want Joe to put my two pictures on the wall, you know Lenin and Stalin. (see story of their origin and fate, above).”

It seems that he would have been sent to the Aragon front, where the Republicans were resisting the military fascists’ advance toward Catalonia. By this point, he would have had little to no training. Almost every available man, whether sick, wounded, or unprepared, was pushed to defend Republican towns and territory.

It appears probable that he was killed during the First Battle of Gandesa, which occurred in early April. Nationalist troops advanced toward Catalonia, while Republican forces retreated. The XV International Brigade was pushed back to Gandesa and was determined to defend it. Despite the bravery of British volunteers, the town fell on 3 April, and 140 members of the British and American International Brigades were captured. Tom seems likely to have been among them.

"Finding a brother who fell at the Elbro" - picture courtesy of International Brigade Memorial Trust

 

The resistance of those IB members allowed the Republican forces to regroup and move supplies and troops across the Ebro River for the next phase of defending democracy. A comrade of Tom’s met up with his family members in the early 1950s, passed on a few possessions, and shared some memories. Among those was a mention that, although they were both injured during the battle, they both swam the Ebro (Tom had won swimming medals for West Ham before the war), helping comrades who couldn’t swim get across. This comrade survived the Civil War, though Tom sadly didn’t.

Surviving International Brigade records suggest that the last mention of him was “’Missing’ Aragon”, March 1938. The family has subsequently acquired a copy of his death certificate (reproduced below). 

 

Tom's death certificate, from the Republican forces

The image is faint, but a transcription reads:

Mr Antonio Gordon Garcia, Colonel of the Artillery of the Sub-secretariat  of the Ministry for War for National Defence:

Certified: Thomas Duncombe, of English nationality, born in England on the 14^th January 1913, a voluntary fighter at the order of the Government of the Spanish Republic, in the XV Brigade, fell in a sector of Gandesa, on the 3^rd April of the current year, as a result of wounds received in action.

And for this purpose, this document is issued in Barcelona on the 7^th December 1938.

Tom’s uncle, Mike, the source of the family story told here, says: “I have no knowledge of his fighting, and little other memories of him (Mike was born after Tom was killed). His brothers rarely spoke about him other than to say: “He died for his beliefs, fighting fascists with the International Brigade”.

Footnote. Huge thanks to Tom’s nephew and former Forest Gate resident, Mick Duncombe, who lived in Albert Square, Stratford, for the first 25 years of his life, for sharing much of the above with this site.