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Epilogue & Prologue

Paris, November 2029 – The Fifth Note Resounds

Tabitha sat by the window at the Sarah Bernhardt Café, letting the murmur of conversations and the occasional purring of the espresso machine settle around her. It was one of the few cafés left in the city where time still moved at a human pace. She stirred her cup absentmindedly. Paris was still Paris, but the world outside had changed in ways her mother’s generation still struggled to grasp.

It wasn’t just the ever-presence of automation and AI making themselves known in subtle ways—screens adjusting to glances, the quiet surveillance woven into everyday life. It wasn’t just the climate shifts, the aircon turned to cold in the midst of November, the summers unpredictable, the air thick with contradictions of progress and collapse of civilization across the Atlantic.

The certainty of impermanence was what defined her generation. BANI world they used to say—Brittle, Anxious, Nonlinear, Incomprehensible. A cold fact: impossible to grasp and impossible to fight. Unlike her mother and her friends, who had spent their lives tethered to a world that no longer existed, she had never known certainty. She was born in the flux.

And yet, this café remained. One of the last to resist full automation, where a human still brought you coffee, where the brass bell above the door still rang, where things still unfolded at a human pace.

The bell above the door rang—the fifth note, as her mother had called it once.

She had never been here before, not in any way that mattered. Yet, she had heard the story. The unlikely reunion five years ago. The night that moved new projects in motion for her mother and her friends.

Tabitha’s fingers traced the worn edges of the notebook in front of her—Lucien’s, then Amei’s, then Darius’s. Pieces of a life written by many hands.

“Some things don’t work the first time. But sometimes, in the ruins of what failed, something else sprouts and takes root.”

And that was what had happened.

The shared housing project they had once dreamed of hadn’t survived—not in its original form. But through their rekindled bond, they had started something else.

 

True Stories of How It Was.

 

It had begun as a quiet defiance—a way to preserve real, human stories in an age of synthetic, permanent ephemerality and ephemeral impermanence, constantly changing memory. They were living in a world where AI’s fabricated histories had overwhelmed all the channels of information, where the past was constantly rewritten, altered, repackaged. Authenticity had become a rare currency.

As she graduated in anthropology few years back, she’d wondered about the validity of history —it was, after all, a construct. The same could be said for literature, art, even science. All of them constructs of the human mind, tenuous grasp of the infinite truth, but once, they used to evolve at such a slow pace that they felt solid, reliable. Ultimately their group was not looking for ultimate truth, that would be arrogant and probably ignorant. Authenticity was what they were looking for. And with it, connections, love, genuineness —unquantifiables by means of science and yet, true and precious beyond measure.

Lucien had first suggested it, tracing the idea from his own frustrations—the way art had become a loop of generated iterations, the human touch increasingly erased. He was in a better place since Matteo had helped him settle his score with Renard and, free of influence, he had found confidence in developing of his own art.

Amei —her mother—, had changed in a way Tabitha couldn’t quite define. Her restlessness had quieted, not through settling down but through accepting impermanence as something other than loss. She had started writing again—not as a career, not to publish, but to preserve stories that had no place in a digitized world. Her quiet strength had always been in preserving connections, and she knew they had to move quickly before real history faded beneath layers of fabricated recollections.

Darius, once skeptical, saw its weight—he had spent years avoiding roots, only to realize that stories were the only thing that made places matter. He was somewhere in Morocco now, leading a sustainable design project, bridging cultures rather than simply passing through them.

Elara had left science. Or at least, science as she had known it. The calculations, the certainty, the constraints of academia, with no escape from the automated “enhanced” digital helpers. Her obsession and curiosities had found attract in something more human, more chaotic. She had thrown herself into reviving old knowledge, forgotten architectures, regenerative landscapes.

And Matteo—Matteo had grounded it.

The notebook read: Matteo wasn’t a ghost from our past. He was the missing note, the one we didn’t know we needed. And because of him, we stopped looking backward. We started building something else.

For so long, Matteo had been a ghost of sorts, by his own account, lingering at the edges of their story, the missing note in their unfinished chord. But now, he was fully part of it. His mother had passed, her past history unraveling in ways he had never expected, branching new connections even now. And though he had lost something in that, he had also found something else. Juliette. Or maybe not. The story wasn’t finished.

Tabitha turned the page.

“We were not historians, not preservationists, not even archivists. But we have lived. And as it turned out, that was enough.”

They had begun collecting stories through their networks—not legends, not myths, but true accounts of how it was, from people who still remembered.

A grandfather’s voice recording of a train ride to a city that no longer exists.
Handwritten recipes annotated by generations of hands, each adding something new.
A letter from a protest in 2027, detailing a movement that the history books had since erased.
An old woman’s story of her first love, spoken in a dialect that AI could not translate properly.

It had grown in ways they hadn’t expected. People began sending them recordings, letters, transcripts, photos —handwritten scraps of fading ink. Some were anonymous, others carefully curated with full names and details, like makeshift ramparts against the tide of time.

At first, few had noticed. It was never the goal to make it worlwide movement. But little by little, strange things happened, and more began to listen.

There was something undeniably powerful about genuine human memory when it was raw and unfiltered, when it carried unpolished, raw weight of experience, untouched by apologetic watered down adornments and out-of-place generative hallucinations.

Now, there were exhibitions, readings, archives—entire underground movements dedicated to preserving pre-synthetic history. Their project had become something rare, valuable, almost sacred.

And yet, here in the café, none of that felt urgent.

Tabitha looked up as the server approached. Not Matteo, but someone new.

“Another espresso?”

She hesitated, then nodded. “Yes. And a glass of water, please.”

She glanced at the counter, where Matteo was leaning, speaking to someone, laughing. He had changed, too. No longer just an observer, no longer just the quiet figure who knew too much. Now, he belonged here.

A bell rang softly as the door swung open again.

Tabitha smiled to herself. The fifth note always sounded, in the end.

She turned back to the notebook, the city moving around her, the story still unfolding in more directions than one.

The Waking 

Lucien – Early 2024	Darius – Dec 2022	Amei – 2022-2023	Elara – 2022	Matteo – Halloween 2023
Aversion/Reflection	Jealousy/Accomplishment	Pride/Equanimity	Attachment/Discernment	Ignorance/Wisdom
The sky outside Lucien’s studio window was still dark, the faint glow of dawn breaking on the horizon. He woke suddenly, the echo of footsteps chasing him out of sleep. Renard’s shadow loomed in his mind like a smudge he couldn’t erase. He sat up, rubbing his temples, the remnants of the dream slipping away like water through his fingers. The chase felt endless, but this time, something had shifted. There was no fear in his chest—only a whisper of resolve. “Time to stop running.”	The hum of the airplane’s engine filled Darius’s ears as he opened his eyes, the cabin lights dimmed for landing. He glanced at the blinking seatbelt sign and adjusted his scarf. The dream still lingered, faint and elusive, like smoke curling away before he could grasp it. He wasn’t sure where he’d been in his mind, but he felt a pull—something calling him back. South of France was just the next stop. Beyond that,… Beyond that? He didn’t know.	Amei sat cross-legged on her living room floor, the guided meditation app still playing its soft tones through her headphones. Her breathing steadied, but her thoughts drifted. Images danced at the edges of her mind—threads weaving together, faces she couldn’t place, a labyrinth spiraling endlessly. The meditation always seemed to end with these fragments, leaving her both unsettled and curious. What was she trying to find?	Elara woke with a start, the unfamiliar sensation of a dream etched vividly in her mind. Her dreams usually dissolved the moment she opened her eyes, but this one lingered, sharp and bright. She reached for her notebook on the bedside table, fumbling for the pen. The details spilled out onto the page—a white bull, a labyrinth of light, faces shifting like water. “I never remember my dreams,” she thought, “but this one… this one feels important.”	Matteo woke to the sound of children laughing outside, their voices echoing through the streets of Avignon. Halloween wasn’t as big a deal here as elsewhere, but it had its charm. He stretched and sat up, the weight of a restless sleep hanging over him. His dreams had been strange—familiar faces, glowing patterns, a sense of something unfinished. The room seemed to glow for a moment. “Strange,” he thought, brushing it off as a trick of the light.
“No resentment, only purpose.”	“You’re not lost. You’re walking your own path.”	“Messy patterns are still patterns.”	“Let go. The beauty is in the flow.”	“Everything is connected. Even the smallest light adds to the whole.”
The Endless Chase – Lucien ran through a labyrinth, its walls shifting and alive, made of tangled roots and flickering light. Behind him, the echo of footsteps and Renard’s voice calling his name, mocking him. But as he turned a corner, the walls parted to reveal a still lake, its surface reflecting the stars. He stopped, breathless, staring at his reflection in the water. It wasn’t him—it was a younger boy, wide-eyed and unafraid. The boy reached out, and Lucien felt a calm ripple through him. The chase wasn’t real. It never was. The walls dissolved, leaving him standing under a vast, open sky.	The Wandering Maze – Darius wandered through a green field, the tall grass brushing against his hands. The horizon seemed endless, but each step revealed new paths, twisting and turning like a living map. He saw figures ahead—people he thought he recognized—but when he reached them, they vanished, leaving only their footprints. Frustration welled up in his chest, but then he heard laughter—a clear, joyful sound. A child ran past him, leaving a trail of flowers in their wake. Darius followed, the path opening into a vibrant garden. There, he saw his own footprints, weaving among the flowers. “You’re not lost,” a voice said. “You’re walking your own path.”	The Woven Tapestry – Amei found herself in a dim room, lit only by the soft glow of a loom. Threads of every color stretched across the space, intertwining in intricate patterns. She sat before the loom, her hands moving instinctively, weaving the threads together. Faces appeared in the fabric—Tabitha, her estranged friends, even strangers she didn’t recognize. The threads wove tighter, forming a brilliant tapestry that seemed to hum with life. She saw herself in the center, not separate from the others but connected. This time she heard clearly “Messy patterns are still patterns,” a voice whispered, and she smiled.	The Scattered Grains – Elara stood on a beach, the sand slipping through her fingers as she tried to gather it. The harder she grasped, the more it escaped. A wave rolled in, sweeping the sand into intricate patterns that glowed under the moonlight. She knelt, watching the designs shift and shimmer, each one unique and fleeting. “Let go,” the wind seemed to say. “The beauty is in the flow.” Elara let the sand fall, and as it scattered, it transformed into light, rising like fireflies into the night sky.	The Mandala of Light – Matteo stood in a darkened room, the only light coming from a glowing mandala etched on the floor. As he stepped closer, the patterns began to move, spinning and shifting. Faces appeared—his mother, the friends he hadn’t yet met, and even his own reflection. The mandala expanded, encompassing the room, then the city, then the world. “Everything is connected,” a voice said, low and resonant. “Even the smallest light adds to the whole.” Matteo reached out, touching the edge of the mandala, and felt its warmth spread through him.

---

Dreamtime

It begins with running—feet pounding against the earth, my breath sharp in my chest. The path twists endlessly, the walls of the labyrinth curling like roots, closing tighter with each turn. I know I’m being chased, though I never see who or what is behind me. The air thickens as I round a corner and come to a halt before a still lake. Its surface gleams under a canopy of stars, too perfect, too quiet. I kneel to look closer, and the face that stares back isn’t mine. A boy gazes up with wide, curious eyes, unafraid. He smiles as though he knows something I don’t, and my breath steadies. The walls of the labyrinth crumble, their roots receding into the earth. Around me, the horizon stretches wide and infinite, and I wonder if I’ve always been here.

The grass is soft under my feet, swaying with a breeze that hums like a song I almost recognize. I walk, though I don’t know where I’m going. Figures appear ahead—shadowy forms I think I know—but as I approach, they dissolve into mist. I call out, but my voice is swallowed by the wind. Laughter ripples through the air, and a child darts past me, their feet leaving trails of flowers in the earth. I follow, unable to stop myself. The path unfolds into a garden, vibrant and alive, every bloom humming with its own quiet song. At the center, I find myself again—my own footprints weaving among the flowers. The laughter returns, soft and knowing. A voice says, “You’re not lost. You’re walking your own path.” But whose voice is it? My own? Someone else’s? I can’t tell.

The scene shifts, or maybe it’s always been this way. Threads of light stretch across the horizon, forming a vast loom. My hands move instinctively, weaving the threads into patterns I don’t understand but feel compelled to create. Faces emerge in the fabric—some I know, others I only feel. Each thread hums with life, vibrating with its own story. The patterns grow more intricate, their colors blending into something breathtaking. At the center, my own face appears, not solitary but connected to all the others. The threads seem to breathe, their rhythm matching my own heartbeat. A voice whispers, teasing but kind: “Messy patterns are still patterns.” I want to laugh, or cry, or maybe both, but my hands keep weaving as the threads dissolve into light.

I’m on the beach now, though I don’t remember how I got here. The sand is cool under my hands, slipping through my fingers no matter how tightly I try to hold it. A wave rolls in, its foam glowing under a pale moon. Where the water touches the sand, intricate patterns bloom—spirals, mandalas, fleeting images that shift with the tide. I try to gather them, to keep them, but the harder I hold on, the faster they fade. A breeze lifts the patterns into the air, scattering them like fireflies. I watch them go, feeling both loss and wonder. “Let go,” a voice says, carried by the wind. “The beauty is in the flow.” I let the sand fall from my hands, and for the first time, I see the patterns clearly, etched not on the ground but in the sky.

The room is dark, yet I see everything. A mandala of light spreads across the floor, its intricate shapes pulsing with a rhythm I recognize but can’t place. I step closer, and the mandala begins to spin, its patterns expanding to fill the room, then the city, then the world. Faces appear within the light—my mother’s, a child’s, strangers I know but have never met. The mandala connects everything it touches, its warmth spreading through me like a flame. I reach out, my hand trembling, and the moment I touch it, a voice echoes in the air: “Everything is connected. Even the smallest light adds to the whole.” The mandala slows, its light softening, and I find myself standing at its center, whole and unafraid.

I feel the labyrinth’s walls returning, but they’re no longer enclosing me—they’re part of the loom, their roots weaving into the threads. The flowers of the garden bloom within the mandala’s light, their petals scattering like sand into the tide. The waves carry them to the horizon, where they rise into the sky, forming constellations I feel I’ve always known.

I wake—or do I? The dream lingers, its light and rhythm threading through my thoughts. It feels like a map, a guide, a story unfinished. I see the faces again—yours, mine, ours—and wonder where the path leads next.

Elton Marshall’s

Early Quaker Emigrants to USA.

 

The earliest Marshall in my tree is Charles Marshall (my 5x great grandfather), Overseer of the Poor and Churchwarden of Elton. His 1819 gravestone in Elton says he was 77 years old when he died, indicating a birth in 1742, however no baptism can be found.

According to the Derbyshire records office, Elton was a chapelry of Youlgreave until 1866. The Youlgreave registers date back to the mid 1500s, and there are many Marshalls in the registers from 1559 onwards. The Elton registers however are incomplete due to fire damage.

While doing a google books search for Marshall’s of Elton, I found many American family history books mentioning Abraham Marshall of Gratton born in 1667, who became a Quaker aged 16, and emigrated to Pennsylvania USA in 1700. Some of these books say that Abraham’s parents were Humphrey Marshall and his wife Hannah Turner. (Gratton is a tiny village next to Elton, also in Youlgreave parish.)

Abraham’s son born in USA was also named Humphrey. He was a well known botanist.

Abraham’s cousin John Marshall, also a Quaker, emigrated from Elton to USA in 1687, according to these books.

(There are a number of books on Colonial Families in Pennsylvania that repeat each other so impossible to cite the original source)

 

In the Youlgreave parish registers I found a baptism in 1667 for Humphrey Marshall son of Humphrey and Hannah. I didn’t find a baptism for Abraham, but it looks as though it could be correct. Abraham had a son he named Humphrey. But did it just look logical to whoever wrote the books, or do they know for sure? Did the famous botanist Humphrey Marshall have his own family records? The books don’t say where they got this information.

An earlier Humphrey Marshall was baptised in Youlgreave in 1559, his father Edmund. And in 1591 another Humphrey Marshall was baptised, his father George.

But can we connect these Marshall’s to ours? We do have an Abraham Marshall, grandson of Charles, born in 1792. The name isn’t all that common, so may indicate a family connection. The villages of Elton, Gratton and Youlgreave are all very small and it would seem very likely that the Marshall’s who went the USA are related to ours, if not brothers, then probably cousins.

 

Derbyshire Quakers

In “Derbyshire Quakers 1650-1761” by Helen Forde:

“… Friends lived predominantly in the northern half of the country during this first century of existence. Numbers may have been reduced by emigration to America and migration to other parts of the country but were never high and declined in the early eighteenth century. Predominantly a middle to lower class group economically, Derbyshire Friends numbered very few wealthy members. Many were yeoman farmers or wholesalers and it was these groups who dominated the business meetings having time to devote themselves to the Society. Only John Gratton of Monyash combined an outstanding ministry together with an organising ability which brought him recognition amongst London Friends as well as locally. Derbyshire Friends enjoyed comparatively harmonious relations with civil and Anglican authorities, though prior to the Toleration Act of 1639 the priests were their worst persecutors…..”

Also mentioned in this book: There were monthly meetings in Elton, as well as a number of other nearby places.
John Marshall of Elton 1682/3 appears in a list of Quaker emigrants from Derbyshire.

 

The following image is a page from the 1753 book on the sufferings of Quakers by Joseph Besse as an example of some of the persecutions of Quakers in Derbyshire in the 1600s:

A collection of the sufferings of the people called Quakers, for the testimony of a good conscience from the time of their being first distinguished by that name in the year 1650 to the time of the act commonly called the Act of toleration granted to Protestant dissenters in the first year of the reign of King William the Third and Queen Mary in the year 1689 (Volume 1)
Besse, Joseph. 1753

Note the names Margaret Marshall and Anne Staley.  This book would appear to contradict Helen Forde’s statement above about the harmonious relations with Anglican authority.

 

 

The Botanist

Humphry Marshall 1722-1801 was born in Marshallton, Pennsylvania, the son of the immigrant from Elton, Abraham Marshall.  He was the cousin of botanists John Bartram and William Bartram. Like many early American botanists, he was a Quaker. He wrote his first book, A Few Observations Concerning Christ, in 1755.

 

In 1785, Marshall published Arbustrum Americanum: The American Grove, an Alphabetical Catalogue of Forest Trees and Shrubs, Natives of the American United States (Philadelphia).

Marshall has been called the “Father of American Dendrology”.

A genus of plants, Marshallia, was named in honor of Humphry Marshall and his nephew Moses Marshall, also a botanist.

In 1848 the Borough of West Chester established the Marshall Square Park in his honor. Marshall Square Park is four miles east of Marshallton.

via Wikipedia.

 

From The History of Chester County Pennsylvania, 1881, by J Smith Futhey and Gilbert Cope:

 

From The Chester Country History Center:

“Immediately on the Receipt of your Letter, I ordered a Reflecting Telescope for you which was made accordingly. Dr. Fothergill had since desired me to add a Microscope and Thermometer, and will
pay for the whole.’

– Benjamin Franklin to Humphry, March 18, 1770

“In his lifetime, Humphry Marshall made his living as a stonemason, farmer, and miller, but eventually became known for his contributions to astronomy, meteorology, agriculture, and the natural sciences.

In 1773, Marshall built a stone house with a hothouse, a botanical laboratory, and an observatory for astronomical studies. He established an arboretum of native trees on the property and the second botanical garden in the nation (John Bartram, his cousin, had the first). From his home base, Humphry expanded his botanical plant exchange business and increased his overseas contacts. With the help of men like Benjamin Franklin and the English botanist Dr. John Fothergill, they eventually included German, Dutch, Swedish, and Irish plant collectors and scientists. Franklin, then living in London, introduced Marshall’s writings to the Royal Society in London and both men encouraged Marshall’s astronomical and botanical studies by supplying him with books and instruments including the latest telescope and microscope.

Marshall’s scientific work earned him honorary memberships to the American Philosophical Society and the Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture, where he shared his ground-breaking ideas on scientific farming methods. In the years before the American Revolution, Marshall’s correspondence was based on his extensive plant and seed exchanges, which led to further studies and publications. In 1785, he authored his magnum opus, Arbustum Americanum: The American Grove. It is a catalog of American trees and shrubs that followed the Linnaean system of plant classification and was the first publication of its kind.”

Potential Plot Arch

The uncovered box in the garden of Bob & Clara is a Time Capsule which was actually buried in the future, but mistakenly sent to the past. It has symbols etched on it, that activate some nano-technology.
Due to its contact with it, Bob starts recovering his memories, while retaining the hallucinations of his dead wife Jane, which actually become more credible and intense.

Will Tarkin is actually a time traveler from the future, who came to live a simple life in the past, selling stone gargoyles at the local supermarket and rediscovering the ways of his ancestors.

With the box being found and opened at the wrong time, it creates unwanted attention from the Time Dragglers who need to intervene to prevent alterations of the timeline.
Contents of the box are in part encoded books of stories from local families and would have revealed important things about the past, Jane’s death, and Clara’s future.

With Bob recovering his memories, it’s revealed Jane and Bob were actually also refugees from the future, but had aged naturally in the past, which is why Will seemed to recognize Bob. Bob was living in hiding from the Time Police, but with the box discovery, it changes everything. The box being opened at the wrong time disrupts the natural flow of events and starts causing unexpected consequences. This creates a complex web of relationships and events that must be untangled and understood in order to move forward.

With his recovering of mental capacities, Bob partners with Will in order to restore the natural flow of time, even if it means his mental health will deteriorate again, which he is happy to do while continuing to live the rest of his life span with his daughter.

Potential developments

Clara Meets the Mysterious Will

Nora finally reaches the little village where Clara and Bob live and is greeted by a man named Will
Will seems to know Bob from somewhere
Clara starts to feel suspicious of Will’s intentions and begins to investigate

The Power of Memories

Bob starts to have flashbacks of his past and begins to remember the connection between him, Will, and the mysterious time capsule
Bob realizes that Jane, his wife, had been keeping something from him and that the time capsule holds the key to unlocking the truth
Jane appears to Bob and urges him to tell Clara about their past and the significance of the time capsule

The Truth Behind the Capsule

Nora, Clara, and Bob finally find the answers they’ve been searching for by opening the time capsule
The contents of the capsule reveal a shocking truth about Jane’s past and the reason behind her death
They learn that Jane was part of a secret society that protected ancient knowledge and artifacts and that the time capsule was meant to be opened at a specific time
The group realizes that they were meant to find the capsule and continue Jane’s work in protecting the knowledge and artifacts

The Ties Between Living and Dead

Bob comes to terms with Jane’s death and the role she played in their lives
Clara and Bob grow closer as they work together to continue Jane’s work and preserve the knowledge and artifacts
The group encounters obstacles but with the help of the spirits of the past, they are able to overcome them and succeed in their mission

A Realization of the Past and Present

Clara, Bob, and Nora come to realize the power of memories and how they shape our present and future
They also learn that things never truly remain buried and that the past always finds a way to resurface
The group successfully preserves the knowledge and artifacts, ensuring that they will be passed down for generations to come
The story ends with Clara, Bob, and Nora sitting by the fire, reflecting on their journey and the lessons they’ve learned.

Table of characters:

Characters	Keyword Characteristics	Sentiment
Clara	Woman in her late 40s, VanGogh’s owner	Inquisitive, curious
VanGogh	Clara’s dog	Curious
Grandpa Bob	Clara’s grandfather, widowed, early signs of dementia	Skeptical, anxious
Nora	Clara’s friend, amateur archaeologist, nicknamed Alienor by Clara	Adventure-seeking
Jane	Grandpa Bob’s wife, Clara’s mother, only Bob seem to see her, possibly a hallucination	Teasing
Julienne / Mr. Willets	Neighbors of Clara & Bob	–
Bubbles	(Time-dragglers squad, alternate timeline) Junior drag-queen, reporting to Linda Pol (office manager)	adventurous, brave, concerned
Will	After Nora encountered a man with a white donkey, she awakes in a cottage. Will is introduced later, and drugs Nora unbeknownst to her. Later Bob & Clara come at his doorstep (they know him as the gargoyle statues selling man from the market), looking for her friend.	Affable, mysterious, hiding secrets

Some connecting threads:

1. The discovery of a mysterious pear-shaped box with inscriptions by Clara and her grandfather.
2. Clara sending photos of the artifact to Nora (Alienor), an amateur archaeologist.
3. Nora’s journey from her place to reach the location where the box was discovered and her encounter with a man with a donkey (Will?).
4. Grandpa Bob’s anxious behavior and the confusion over the torn piece of paper with a phone number.
5. The parallel timeline of a potential breach in the timelines in Linda Pol’s office.
6. The search for VanGogh and the discovery of a map tucked into his collar.
7. The suggestion from Jane that Clara should be told something.
8. Nora awakes at a cottage and spends time with Will who drugs her soup. Bob & Clara show up later, looking for her.

The House on Penn Common

Toi Fang and the Duke of Sutherland

 

Tomlinsons

 

 

Grassholme

 

Charles Tomlinson (1873-1929) my great grandfather, was born in Wolverhampton in 1873. His father Charles Tomlinson (1847-1907) was a licensed victualler or publican, or alternatively a vet/castrator. He married Emma Grattidge (1853-1911) in 1872. On the 1881 census they were living at The Wheel in Wolverhampton.

Charles married Nellie Fisher (1877-1956) in Wolverhampton in 1896. In 1901 they were living next to the post office in Upper Penn, with children (Charles) Sidney Tomlinson (1896-1955), and Hilda Tomlinson (1898-1977) . Charles was a vet/castrator working on his own account.

In 1911 their address was 4, Wakely Hill, Penn, and living with them were their children Hilda, Frank Tomlinson (1901-1975), (Dorothy) Phyllis Tomlinson (1905-1982), Nellie Tomlinson (1906-1978) and May Tomlinson (1910-1983). Charles was a castrator working on his own account.

Charles and Nellie had a further four children: Charles Fisher Tomlinson (1911-1977), Margaret Tomlinson (1913-1989) (my grandmother Peggy), Major Tomlinson (1916-1984) and Norah Mary Tomlinson (1919-2010).

My father told me that my grandmother had fallen down the well at the house on Penn Common in 1915 when she was two years old, and sent me a photo of her standing next to the well when she revisted the house at a much later date.

Peggy next to the well on Penn Common:

 

My grandmother Peggy told me that her father had had a racehorse called Toi Fang. She remembered the racing colours were sky blue and orange, and had a set of racing silks made which she sent to my father.
Through a DNA match, I met Ian Tomlinson. Ian is the son of my fathers favourite cousin Roger, Frank’s son. Ian found some racing silks and sent a photo to my father (they are now in contact with each other as a result of my DNA match with Ian), wondering what they were.

 

When Ian sent a photo of these racing silks, I had a look in the newspaper archives. In 1920 there are a number of mentions in the racing news of Mr C Tomlinson’s horse TOI FANG. I have not found any mention of Toi Fang in the newspapers in the following years.

The Scotsman – Monday 12 July 1920:

 

 

The other story that Ian Tomlinson recalled was about the house on Penn Common. Ian said he’d heard that the local titled person took Charles Tomlinson to court over building the house but that Tomlinson won the case because it was built on common land and was the first case of it’s kind.

 

Penn Common Right of Way Case:
Staffordshire Advertiser March 9, 1912

In the chancery division, on Tuesday, before Mr Justice Joyce, it was announced that a settlement had been arrived at of the Penn Common Right of Way case, the hearing of which occupied several days last month. The action was brought by the Duke of Sutherland (as Lord of the Manor of Penn) and Mr Harry Sydney Pitt (on behalf of himself and other freeholders of the manor having a right to pasturage on Penn Common) to restrain Mr James Lakin, Carlton House, Penn; Mr Charles Tomlinson, Mayfield Villa, Wakely Hill, Penn; and Mr Joseph Harold Simpkin, Dudley Road, Wolverhampton, from drawing building materials across the common, or otherwise causing injury to the soil.

The real point in dispute was whether there was a public highway for all purposes running by the side of the defendants land from the Turf Tavern past the golf club to the Barley Mow.
Mr Hughes, KC for the plaintiffs, now stated that the parties had been in consultation, and had come to terms, the substance of which was that the defendants admitted that there was no public right of way, and that they were granted a private way. This, he thought, would involve the granting of some deed or deeds to express the rights of the parties, and he suggested that the documents should be be settled by some counsel to be mutually agreed upon.

His lordship observed that the question of coal was probably the important point. Mr Younger said Mr Tomlinson was a freeholder, and the plaintiffs could not mine under him. Mr Hughes: The coal actually under his house is his, and, of course, subsidence might be produced by taking away coal some distance away. I think some document is required to determine his actual rights.
Mr Younger said he wanted to avoid anything that would increase the costs, but, after further discussion, it was agreed that Mr John Dixon (an expert on mineral rights), or failing him, another counsel satisfactory to both parties, should be invited to settle the terms scheduled in the agreement, in order to prevent any further dispute.

 

 

The name of the house is Grassholme.  The address of Mayfield Villas is the house they were living in while building Grassholme, which I assume they had not yet moved in to at the time of the newspaper article in March 1912.

 

 

What my grandmother didn’t tell anyone was how her father died in 1929:

 

 

 

On the 1921 census, Charles, Nellie and eight of their children were living at 269 Coleman Street, Wolverhampton.

 

 

They were living on Coleman Street in 1915 when Charles was fined for staying open late.

Staffordshire Advertiser – Saturday 13 February 1915:

 

 

What is not yet clear is why they moved from the house on Penn Common sometime between 1912 and 1915. And why did he have a racehorse in 1920?

Harriet Compton

Harriet Comptom is not directly related to us, but her portrait is in our family collection.

Alfred Julius Eugene Compton painted this portrait of his daughter, Harriet Compton, when she was six.  Harriet Compton was Charles Tooby’s mothers mother, and Charles married my mothers aunt Dorothy Marshall. They lived on High Park Ave in Wollaston, and his parents lived on Park Road, Wollaston, opposite my grandparents, George and Nora Marshall. Harriet married Thomas Thornburgh, they had a daughter Florence who married Sydney Tooby. Florence and Sydney were Charles Tooby’s parents.

Charles and Dorothy Tooby didn’t have any children. Charles died before his wife, and this is how the picture ended up in my mothers possession.

I attempted to find a direct descendant of Harriet Compton, but have not been successful so far, although I did find a relative on a Stourbridge facebook group.  Bryan Thornburgh replied: “Francis George was my grandfather.He had two sons George & my father Thomas and two daughters Cissie & Edith.  I can remember visiting my fathers Uncle Charles and Aunt Dorothy in Wollaston.”

Francis George Thornburgh was Florence Tooby’s brother.

The watercolour portrait was framed by Hughes of Enville St, Stourbridge.

Alfred Julius Eugene Compton was born in 1826 Paris, France, and died on 6 February 1917 in Chelsea, London.
Harriet Compton his daughter was born in 1853 in Islington, London, and died in December 1926 in Stourbridge.

Without going too far down an unrelated rabbit hole, a member of the facebook group Family Treasures Reinstated  shared this:

“Will reported in numerous papers in Dec 1886.
Harriet’s father Alfred appears to be beneficiary but Harriet’s brother, Percy is specifically excluded . 
“The will (dated March 6, 1876) of the Hon. Mrs. Fanny Stanhope, late of No. 24, Carlyle-square, Chelsea, who died on August 9 last, was proved on the 1st ult. by Alfred Julius Eugene Compton, the value of the personal estate amounting to over £8000.
The testatrix, after giving & few legacies, leaves one moiety of the residue of her personal estate, upon trust, for John Auguste Alexandre Compton, for life, and then, subject to an annuity to his wife, for the children (except Percy) of Alfred Julius Eugene Compton, and the other moiety, upon trust, for the said Alfred Julius Eugene Compton, for life, and at his death for his children, except Percy.”
-Illustrated London News.

Harriet Compton:  

From Tanganyika with Love

continued part 8

With thanks to Mike Rushby.

Morogoro 20th January 1941

Dearest Family,

It is all arranged for us to go on three months leave to Cape Town next month so
get out your flags. How I shall love showing off Kate and John to you and this time
George will be with us and you’ll be able to get to know him properly. You can’t think
what a comfort it will be to leave all the worries of baggage and tipping to him. We will all
be travelling by ship to Durban and from there to Cape Town by train. I rather dread the
journey because there is a fifth little Rushby on the way and, as always, I am very
queasy.

Kate has become such a little companion to me that I dread the thought of leaving
her behind with you to start schooling. I miss Ann and George so much now and must
face separation from Kate as well. There does not seem to be any alternative though.
There is a boarding school in Arusha and another has recently been started in Mbeya,
but both places are so far away and I know she would be very unhappy as a boarder at
this stage. Living happily with you and attending a day school might wean her of her
dependance upon me. As soon as this wretched war ends we mean to get Ann and
George back home and Kate too and they can then all go to boarding school together.
If I were a more methodical person I would try to teach Kate myself, but being a
muddler I will have my hands full with Johnny and the new baby. Life passes pleasantly
but quietly here. Much of my time is taken up with entertaining the children and sewing
for them and just waiting for George to come home.

George works so hard on these safaris and this endless elephant hunting to
protect native crops entails so much foot safari, that he has lost a good deal of weight. it
is more than ten years since he had a holiday so he is greatly looking forward to this one.
Four whole months together!

I should like to keep the ayah, Janet, for the new baby, but she says she wants
to return to her home in the Southern Highlands Province and take a job there. She is
unusually efficient and so clean, and the houseboy and cook are quite scared of her. She
bawls at them if the children’s meals are served a few minutes late but she is always
respectful towards me and practically creeps around on tiptoe when George is home.
She has a room next to the outside kitchen. One night thieves broke into the kitchen and
stole a few things, also a canvas chair and mat from the verandah. Ayah heard them, and
grabbing a bit of firewood, she gave chase. Her shouts so alarmed the thieves that they
ran off up the hill jettisoning their loot as they ran. She is a great character.

Eleanor.

Morogoro 30th July 1941

Dearest Family,

Safely back in Morogoro after a rather grim voyage from Durban. Our ship was
completely blacked out at night and we had to sleep with warm clothing and life belts
handy and had so many tedious boat drills. It was a nuisance being held up for a whole
month in Durban, because I was so very pregnant when we did embark. In fact George
suggested that I had better hide in the ‘Ladies’ until the ship sailed for fear the Captain
might refuse to take me. It seems that the ship, on which we were originally booked to
travel, was torpedoed somewhere off the Cape.

We have been given a very large house this tour with a mosquito netted
sleeping porch which will be fine for the new baby. The only disadvantage is that the
house is on the very edge of the residential part of Morogoro and Johnny will have to
go quite a distance to find playmates.

I still miss Kate terribly. She is a loving little person. I had prepared for a scene
when we said good-bye but I never expected that she would be the comforter. It
nearly broke my heart when she put her arms around me and said, “I’m so sorry
Mummy, please don’t cry. I’ll be good. Please don’t cry.” I’m afraid it was all very
harrowing for you also. It is a great comfort to hear that she has settled down so happily.
I try not to think consciously of my absent children and remind myself that there are
thousands of mothers in the same boat, but they are always there at the back of my
mind.

Mother writes that Ann and George are perfectly happy and well, and that though
German bombers do fly over fairly frequently, they are unlikely to drop their bombs on
a small place like Jacksdale.

George has already left on safari to the Rufiji. There was no replacement for his
job while he was away so he is anxious to get things moving again. Johnny and I are
going to move in with friends until he returns, just in case all the travelling around brings
the new baby on earlier than expected.

Eleanor.

Morogoro 26th August 1941

Dearest Family,

Our new son, James Caleb. was born at 3.30 pm yesterday afternoon, with a
minimum of fuss, in the hospital here. The Doctor was out so my friend, Sister Murray,
delivered the baby. The Sister is a Scots girl, very efficient and calm and encouraging,
and an ideal person to have around at such a time.

Everything, this time, went without a hitch and I feel fine and proud of my
bouncing son. He weighs nine pounds and ten ounces and is a big boned fellow with
dark hair and unusually strongly marked eyebrows. His eyes are strong too and already
seem to focus. George is delighted with him and brought Hugh Nelson to see him this
morning. Hugh took one look, and, astonished I suppose by the baby’s apparent
awareness, said, “Gosh, this one has been here before.” The baby’s cot is beside my
bed so I can admire him as much as I please. He has large strong hands and George
reckons he’ll make a good boxer some day.

Another of my early visitors was Mabemba, George’s orderly. He is a very big
African and looks impressive in his Game Scouts uniform. George met him years ago at
Mahenge when he was a young elephant hunter and Mabemba was an Askari in the
Police. Mabemba takes quite a proprietary interest in the family.

Eleanor.

Morogoro 25th December 1941

Dearest Family,

Christmas Day today, but not a gay one. I have Johnny in bed with a poisoned
leg so he missed the children’s party at the Club. To make things a little festive I have
put up a little Christmas tree in the children’s room and have hung up streamers and
balloons above the beds. Johnny demands a lot of attention so it is fortunate that little
James is such a very good baby. He sleeps all night until 6 am when his feed is due.
One morning last week I got up as usual to feed him but I felt so dopey that I
thought I’d better have a cold wash first. I went into the bathroom and had a hurried
splash and then grabbed a towel to dry my face. Immediately I felt an agonising pain in
my nose. Reason? There was a scorpion in the towel! In no time at all my nose looked
like a pear and felt burning hot. The baby screamed with frustration whilst I feverishly
bathed my nose and applied this and that in an effort to cool it.

For three days my nose was very red and tender,”A real boozer nose”, said
George. But now, thank goodness, it is back to normal.

Some of the younger marrieds and a couple of bachelors came around,
complete with portable harmonium, to sing carols in the early hours. No sooner had we
settled down again to woo sleep when we were disturbed by shouts and screams from
our nearest neighbour’s house. “Just celebrating Christmas”, grunted George, but we
heard this morning that the neighbour had fallen down his verandah steps and broken his
leg.

Eleanor.

Morogoro Hospital 30th September 1943

Dearest Family,

Well now we are eight! Our new son, Henry, was born on the night of the 28th.
He is a beautiful baby, weighing ten pounds three and a half ounces. This baby is very
well developed, handsome, and rather superior looking, and not at all amusing to look at
as the other boys were.George was born with a moustache, John had a large nose and
looked like a little old man, and Jim, bless his heart, looked rather like a baby
chimpanzee. Henry is different. One of my visitors said, “Heaven he’ll have to be a
Bishop!” I expect the lawn sleeves of his nightie really gave her that idea, but the baby
does look like ‘Someone’. He is very good and George, John, and Jim are delighted
with him, so is Mabemba.

We have a dear little nurse looking after us. She is very petite and childish
looking. When the baby was born and she brought him for me to see, the nurse asked
his name. I said jokingly, “His name is Benjamin – the last of the family.” She is now very
peeved to discover that his real name is Henry William and persists in calling him
‘Benjie’.I am longing to get home and into my pleasant rut. I have been away for two
whole weeks and George is managing so well that I shall feel quite expendable if I don’t
get home soon. As our home is a couple of miles from the hospital, I arranged to move
in and stay with the nursing sister on the day the baby was due. There I remained for ten
whole days before the baby was born. Each afternoon George came and took me for a
ride in the bumpy Bedford lorry and the Doctor tried this and that but the baby refused
to be hurried.

On the tenth day I had the offer of a lift and decided to go home for tea and
surprise George. It was a surprise too, because George was entertaining a young
Game Ranger for tea and my arrival, looking like a perambulating big top, must have
been rather embarrassing.Henry was born at the exact moment that celebrations started
in the Township for the end of the Muslim religious festival of Ramadan. As the Doctor
held him up by his ankles, there was the sound of hooters and firecrackers from the town.
The baby has a birthmark in the shape of a crescent moon above his left eyebrow.

Eleanor.

Morogoro 26th January 1944

Dearest Family,

We have just heard that we are to be transferred to the Headquarters of the
Game Department at a place called Lyamungu in the Northern Province. George is not
at all pleased because he feels that the new job will entail a good deal of office work and
that his beloved but endless elephant hunting will be considerably curtailed. I am glad of
that and I am looking forward to seeing a new part of Tanganyika and particularly
Kilimanjaro which dominates Lyamungu.

Thank goodness our menagerie is now much smaller. We found a home for the
guinea pigs last December and Susie, our mischievous guinea-fowl, has flown off to find
a mate.Last week I went down to Dar es Salaam for a check up by Doctor John, a
woman doctor, leaving George to cope with the three boys. I was away two nights and
a day and returned early in the morning just as George was giving Henry his six o’clock
bottle. It always amazes me that so very masculine a man can do my chores with no
effort and I have a horrible suspicion that he does them better than I do. I enjoyed the
short break at the coast very much. I stayed with friends and we bathed in the warm sea
and saw a good film.

Now I suppose there will be a round of farewell parties. People in this country
are most kind and hospitable.

Eleanor.

Lyamungu 20th March 1944

Dearest Family,

We left Morogoro after the round of farewell parties I had anticipated. The final
one was at the Club on Saturday night. George made a most amusing speech and the
party was a very pleasant occasion though I was rather tired after all the packing.
Several friends gathered to wave us off on Monday morning. We had two lorries
loaded with our goods. I rode in the cab of the first one with Henry on my knee. George
with John and Jim rode in the second one. As there was no room for them in the cab,
they sat on our couch which was placed across the width of the lorry behind the cab. This
seat was not as comfortable as it sounds, because the space behind the couch was
taken up with packing cases which were not lashed in place and these kept moving
forward as the lorry bumped its way over the bad road.

Soon there was hardly any leg room and George had constantly to stand up and
push the second layer of packing cases back to prevent them from toppling over onto
the children and himself. As it is now the rainy season the road was very muddy and
treacherous and the lorries travelled so slowly it was dark by the time we reached
Karogwe from where we were booked to take the train next morning to Moshi.
Next morning we heard that there had been a washaway on the line and that the
train would be delayed for at least twelve hours. I was not feeling well and certainly did
not enjoy my day. Early in the afternoon Jimmy ran into a wall and blackened both his
eyes. What a child! As the day wore on I felt worse and worse and when at last the train
did arrive I simply crawled into my bunk whilst George coped nobly with the luggage
and the children.

We arrived at Moshi at breakfast time and went straight to the Lion Cub Hotel
where I took to my bed with a high temperature. It was, of course, malaria. I always have
my attacks at the most inopportune times. Fortunately George ran into some friends
called Eccles and the wife Mollie came to my room and bathed Henry and prepared his
bottle and fed him. George looked after John and Jim. Next day I felt much better and
we drove out to Lyamungu the day after. There we had tea with the Game Warden and
his wife before moving into our new home nearby.

The Game Warden is Captain Monty Moore VC. He came out to Africa
originally as an Officer in the King’s African Rifles and liked the country so much he left the
Army and joined the Game Department. He was stationed at Banagi in the Serengetti
Game Reserve and is well known for his work with the lions there. He particularly tamed
some of the lions by feeding them so that they would come out into the open and could
readily be photographed by tourists. His wife Audrey, has written a book about their
experiences at Banagi. It is called “Serengetti”

Our cook, Hamisi, soon had a meal ready for us and we all went to bed early.
This is a very pleasant house and I know we will be happy here. I still feel a little shaky
but that is the result of all the quinine I have taken. I expect I shall feel fine in a day or two.

Eleanor.

Lyamungu 15th May 1944

Dearest Family,

Well, here we are settled comfortably in our very nice house. The house is
modern and roomy, and there is a large enclosed verandah, which will be a Godsend in
the wet weather as a playroom for the children. The only drawback is that there are so
many windows to be curtained and cleaned. The grounds consist of a very large lawn
and a few beds of roses and shrubs. It is an ideal garden for children, unlike our steeply
terraced garden at Morogoro.

Lyamungu is really the Government Coffee Research Station. It is about sixteen
miles from the town of Moshi which is the centre of the Tanganyika coffee growing
industry. Lyamungu, which means ‘place of God’ is in the foothills of Mt Kilimanjaro and
we have a beautiful view of Kilimanjaro. Kibo, the more spectacular of the two mountain
peaks, towers above us, looking from this angle, like a giant frosted plum pudding. Often the mountain is veiled by cloud and mist which sometimes comes down to
our level so that visibility is practically nil. George dislikes both mist and mountain but I
like both and so does John. He in fact saw Kibo before I did. On our first day here, the
peak was completely hidden by cloud. In the late afternoon when the children were
playing on the lawn outside I was indoors hanging curtains. I heard John call out, “Oh
Mummy, isn’t it beautiful!” I ran outside and there, above a scarf of cloud, I saw the
showy dome of Kibo with the setting sun shining on it tingeing the snow pink. It was an
unforgettable experience.

As this is the rainy season, the surrounding country side is very lush and green.
Everywhere one sees the rich green of the coffee plantations and the lighter green of
the banana groves. Unfortunately our walks are rather circumscribed. Except for the main road to Moshi, there is nowhere to walk except through the Government coffee
plantation. Paddy, our dog, thinks life is pretty boring as there is no bush here and
nothing to hunt. There are only half a dozen European families here and half of those are
on very distant terms with the other half which makes the station a rather uncomfortable
one.

The coffee expert who runs this station is annoyed because his European staff
has been cut down owing to the war, and three of the vacant houses and some office
buildings have been taken over temporarily by the Game Department. Another house
has been taken over by the head of the Labour Department. However I don’t suppose
the ill feeling will effect us much. We are so used to living in the bush that we are not
socially inclined any way.

Our cook, Hamisi, came with us from Morogoro but I had to engage a new
houseboy and kitchenboy. I first engaged a houseboy who produced a wonderful ‘chit’
in which his previous employer describes him as his “friend and confidant”. I felt rather
dubious about engaging him and how right I was. On his second day with us I produced
some of Henry’s napkins, previously rinsed by me, and asked this boy to wash them.
He looked most offended and told me that it was beneath his dignity to do women’s
work. We parted immediately with mutual relief.

Now I have a good natured fellow named Japhet who, though hard on crockery,
is prepared to do anything and loves playing with the children. He is a local boy, a
member of the Chagga tribe. These Chagga are most intelligent and, on the whole, well
to do as they all have their own small coffee shambas. Japhet tells me that his son is at
the Uganda University College studying medicine.The kitchen boy is a tall youth called
Tovelo, who helps both Hamisi, the cook, and the houseboy and also keeps an eye on
Henry when I am sewing. I still make all the children’s clothes and my own. Life is
pleasant but dull. George promises that he will take the whole family on safari when
Henry is a little older.

Eleanor.

Lyamungu 18th July 1944

Dearest Family,

Life drifts quietly by at Lyamungu with each day much like the one before – or
they would be, except that the children provide the sort of excitement that prohibits
boredom. Of the three boys our Jim is the best at this. Last week Jim wandered into the
coffee plantation beside our house and chewed some newly spayed berries. Result?
A high temperature and nasty, bloody diarrhoea, so we had to rush him to the hospital at
Moshi for treatment. however he was well again next day and George went off on safari.
That night there was another crisis. As the nights are now very cold, at this high
altitude, we have a large fire lit in the living room and the boy leaves a pile of logs
beside the hearth so that I can replenish the fire when necessary. Well that night I took
Henry off to bed, leaving John and Jim playing in the living room. When their bedtime
came, I called them without leaving the bedroom. When I had tucked John and Jim into
bed, I sat reading a bedtime story as I always do. Suddenly I saw smoke drifting
through the door, and heard a frightening rumbling noise. Japhet rushed in to say that the
lounge chimney was on fire! Picture me, panic on the inside and sweet smile on the
outside, as I picked Henry up and said to the other two, “There’s nothing to be
frightened about chaps, but get up and come outside for a bit.” Stupid of me to be so
heroic because John and Jim were not at all scared but only too delighted at the chance
of rushing about outside in the dark. The fire to them was just a bit of extra fun.

We hurried out to find one boy already on the roof and the other passing up a
brimming bucket of water. Other boys appeared from nowhere and soon cascades of
water were pouring down the chimney. The result was a mountain of smouldering soot
on the hearth and a pool of black water on the living room floor. However the fire was out
and no serious harm done because all the floors here are cement and another stain on
the old rug will hardly be noticed. As the children reluctantly returned to bed John
remarked smugly, “I told Jim not to put all the wood on the fire at once but he wouldn’t
listen.” I might have guessed!

However it was not Jim but John who gave me the worst turn of all this week. As
a treat I decided to take the boys to the river for a picnic tea. The river is not far from our
house but we had never been there before so I took the kitchen boy, Tovelo, to show
us the way. The path is on the level until one is in sight of the river when the bank slopes
steeply down. I decided that it was too steep for the pram so I stopped to lift Henry out
and carry him. When I looked around I saw John running down the slope towards the
river. The stream is not wide but flows swiftly and I had no idea how deep it was. All I
knew was that it was a trout stream. I called for John, “Stop, wait for me!” but he ran on
and made for a rude pole bridge which spanned the river. He started to cross and then,
to my horror, I saw John slip. There was a splash and he disappeared under the water. I
just dumped the baby on the ground, screamed to the boy to mind him and ran madly
down the slope to the river. Suddenly I saw John’s tight fitting felt hat emerge, then his
eyes and nose. I dashed into the water and found, to my intense relief, that it only
reached up to my shoulders but, thank heaven no further. John’s steady eyes watched
me trustingly as I approached him and carried him safely to the bank. He had been
standing on a rock and had not panicked at all though he had to stand up very straight
and tall to keep his nose out of water. I was too proud of him to scold him for
disobedience and too wet anyway.

I made John undress and put on two spare pullovers and wrapped Henry’s
baby blanket round his waist like a sarong. We made a small fire over which I crouched
with literally chattering teeth whilst Tovelo ran home to fetch a coat for me and dry clothes
for John.

Eleanor.

Lyamungu 16th August 1944

Dearest Family,

We have a new bull terrier bitch pup whom we have named Fanny III . So once
more we have a menagerie , the two dogs, two cats Susie and Winnie, and
some pet hens who live in the garage and are a real nuisance.

As John is nearly six I thought it time that he started lessons and wrote off to Dar
es Salaam for the correspondence course. We have had one week of lessons and I am
already in a state of physical and mental exhaustion. John is a most reluctant scholar.
“Why should I learn to read, when you can read to me?” he asks, and “Anyway why
should I read such stupid stuff, ‘Run Rover Run’, and ‘Mother play with baby’ . Who
wants to read about things like that? I don’t.”

He rather likes sums, but the only subject about which he is enthusiastic is
prehistoric history. He laps up information about ‘The Tree Dwellers’, though he is very
sceptical about the existence of such people. “God couldn’t be so silly to make people
so stupid. Fancy living in trees when it is easy to make huts like the natives.” ‘The Tree
Dwellers is a highly imaginative story about a revolting female called Sharptooth and her
offspring called Bodo. I have a very clear mental image of Sharptooth, so it came as a
shock to me and highly amused George when John looked at me reflectively across the
tea table and said, “Mummy I expect Sharptooth looked like you. You have a sharp
tooth too!” I have, my eye teeth are rather sharp, but I hope the resemblance stops
there.

John has an uncomfortably logical mind for a small boy. The other day he was
lying on the lawn staring up at the clouds when he suddenly muttered “I don’t believe it.”
“Believe what?” I asked. “That Jesus is coming on a cloud one day. How can he? The
thick ones always stay high up. What’s he going to do, jump down with a parachute?”
Tovelo, my kitchen boy, announced one evening that his grandmother was in the
kitchen and wished to see me. She was a handsome and sensible Chagga woman who
brought sad news. Her little granddaughter had stumbled backwards into a large cooking
pot of almost boiling maize meal porridge and was ‘ngongwa sana’ (very ill). I grabbed
a large bottle of Picric Acid and a packet of gauze which we keep for these emergencies
and went with her, through coffee shambas and banana groves to her daughter’s house.
Inside the very neat thatched hut the mother sat with the naked child lying face
downwards on her knee. The child’s buttocks and the back of her legs were covered in
huge burst blisters from which a watery pus dripped. It appeared that the accident had
happened on the previous day.

I could see that it was absolutely necessary to clean up the damaged area, and I
suddenly remembered that there was a trained African hospital dresser on the station. I
sent the father to fetch him and whilst the dresser cleaned off the sloughed skin with
forceps and swabs saturated in Picric Acid, I cut the gauze into small squares which I
soaked in the lotion and laid on the cleaned area. I thought the small pieces would be
easier to change especially as the whole of the most tender parts, front and back, were
badly scalded. The child seemed dazed and neither the dresser nor I thought she would
live. I gave her half an aspirin and left three more half tablets to be given four hourly.
Next day she seemed much brighter. I poured more lotion on the gauze
disturbing as few pieces as possible and again the next day and the next. After a week
the skin was healing well and the child eating normally. I am sure she will be all right now.
The new skin is a brilliant red and very shiny but it is pale round the edges of the burnt
area and will I hope later turn brown. The mother never uttered a word of thanks, but the
granny is grateful and today brought the children a bunch of bananas.

Eleanor.

c/o Game Dept. P.O.Moshi. 29th September 1944

Dearest Mummy,

I am so glad that you so enjoyed my last letter with the description of our very
interesting and enjoyable safari through Masailand. You said you would like an even
fuller description of it to pass around amongst the relations, so, to please you, I have
written it out in detail and enclose the result.

We have spent a quiet week after our exertions and all are well here.

Very much love,
Eleanor.

Safari in Masailand

George and I were at tea with our three little boys on the front lawn of our house
in Lyamungu, Northern Tanganyika. It was John’s sixth birthday and he and Jim, a
happy sturdy three year old, and Henry, aged eleven months, were munching the
squares of plain chocolate which rounded off the party, when George said casually
across the table to me, “Could you be ready by the day after tomorrow to go on
safari?” “Me too?” enquired John anxiously, before I had time to reply, and “Me too?”
echoed Jim. “yes, of course I can”, said I to George and “of course you’re coming too”,
to the children who rate a day spent in the bush higher than any other pleasure.
So in the early morning two days later, we started out happily for Masailand in a
three ton Ford lorry loaded to capacity with the five Rushbys, the safari paraphernalia,
drums of petrol and quite a retinue of servants and Game Scouts. George travelling
alone on his monthly safaris, takes only the cook and a couple of Game Scouts, but this was to be a safari de luxe.

Henry and I shared the cab with George who was driving, whilst John and Jim
with the faithful orderly Mabemba beside them to point out the game animals, were
installed upon rolls of bedding in the body of the lorry. The lorry lumbered along, first
through coffee shambas, and then along the main road between Moshi and Arusha.
After half an hour or so, we turned South off the road into a track which crossed the
Sanya Plains and is the beginning of this part of Masailand. Though the dry season was
at its height, and the pasture dry and course, we were soon passing small groups of
game. This area is a Game Sanctuary and the antelope grazed quietly quite undisturbed
by the passing lorry. Here and there zebra stood bunched by the road, a few wild
ostriches stalked jerkily by, and in the distance some wildebeest cavorted around in their
crazy way.

Soon the grasslands gave way to thorn bush, and we saw six fantastically tall
giraffe standing motionless with their heads turned enquiringly towards us. George
stopped the lorry so the children could have a good view of them. John was enchanted
but Jim, alas, was asleep.

At mid day we reached the Kikoletwa River and turned aside to camp. Beside
the river, under huge leafy trees, there was a beautiful camping spot, but the river was
deep and reputed to be full of crocodiles so we passed it by and made our camp
some distance from the river under a tall thorn tree with a flat lacy canopy. All around the
camp lay uprooted trees of similar size that had been pushed over by elephants. As
soon as the lorry stopped a camp chair was set up for me and the Game Scouts quickly
slashed down grass and cleared the camp site of thorns. The same boys then pitched the tent whilst George himself set up the three camp beds and the folding cot for Henry,
and set up the safari table and the canvas wash bowl and bath.

The cook in the meantime had cleared a cool spot for the kitchen , opened up the
chop boxes and started a fire. The cook’s boy and the dhobi (laundry boy) brought
water from the rather muddy river and tea was served followed shortly afterward by an
excellent lunch. In a very short time the camp had a suprisingly homely look. Nappies
fluttered from a clothes line, Henry slept peacefully in his cot, John and Jim sprawled on
one bed looking at comics, and I dozed comfortably on another.

George, with the Game Scouts, drove off in the lorry about his work. As a Game
Ranger it is his business to be on a constant look out for poachers, both African and
European, and for disease in game which might infect the valuable herds of Masai cattle.
The lorry did not return until dusk by which time the children had bathed enthusiastically in
the canvas bath and were ready for supper and bed. George backed the lorry at right
angles to the tent, Henry’s cot and two camp beds were set up in the lorry, the tarpaulin
was lashed down and the children put to bed in their novel nursery.

When darkness fell a large fire was lit in front of the camp, the exited children at
last fell asleep and George and I sat on by the fire enjoying the cool and quiet night.
When the fire subsided into a bed of glowing coals, it was time for our bed. During the
night I was awakened by the sound of breaking branches and strange indescribable
noises.” Just elephant”, said George comfortably and instantly fell asleep once more. I
didn’t! We rose with the birds next morning, but breakfast was ready and in a
remarkably short time the lorry had been reloaded and we were once more on our way.
For about half a mile we made our own track across the plain and then we turned
into the earth road once more. Soon we had reached the river and were looking with
dismay at the suspension bridge which we had to cross. At the far side, one steel
hawser was missing and there the bridge tilted dangerously. There was no handrail but
only heavy wooden posts which marked the extremities of the bridge. WhenGeorge
measured the distance between the posts he found that there could be barely two
inches to spare on either side of the cumbersome lorry.

He decided to risk crossing, but the children and I and all the servants were told to
cross the bridge and go down the track out of sight. The Game Scouts remained on the
river bank on the far side of the bridge and stood ready for emergencies. As I walked
along anxiously listening, I was horrified to hear the lorry come to a stop on the bridge.
There was a loud creaking noise and I instantly visualised the lorry slowly toppling over
into the deep crocodile infested river. The engine restarted, the lorry crossed the bridge
and came slowly into sight around the bend. My heart slid back into its normal position.
George was as imperturbable as ever and simply remarked that it had been a near
thing and that we would return to Lyamungu by another route.

Beyond the green river belt the very rutted track ran through very uninteresting
thorn bush country. Henry was bored and tiresome, jumping up and down on my knee
and yelling furiously. “Teeth”, said I apologetically to George, rashly handing a match
box to Henry to keep him quiet. No use at all! With a fat finger he poked out the tray
spilling the matches all over me and the floor. Within seconds Henry had torn the
matchbox to pieces with his teeth and flung the battered remains through the window.
An empty cigarette box met with the same fate as the match box and the yells
continued unabated until Henry slept from sheer exhaustion. George gave me a smile,
half sympathetic and half sardonic, “Enjoying the safari, my love?” he enquired. On these
trying occasions George has the inestimable advantage of being able to go into a Yogilike
trance, whereas I become irritated to screaming point.

In an effort to prolong Henry’s slumber I braced my feet against the floor boards
and tried to turn myself into a human shock absorber as we lurched along the eroded
track. Several times my head made contact with the bolt of a rifle in the rack above, and
once I felt I had shattered my knee cap against the fire extinguisher in a bracket under the
dash board.

Strange as it may seem, I really was enjoying the trip in spite of these
discomforts. At last after three years I was once more on safari with George. This type of
country was new to me and there was so much to see We passed a family of giraffe
standing in complete immobility only a few yards from the track. Little dick-dick. one of the smallest of the antelope, scuttled in pairs across the road and that afternoon I had my first view of Gerenuk, curious red brown antelope with extremely elongated legs and giraffe-like necks.

Most interesting of all was my first sight of Masai at home. We could hear a tuneful
jangle of cattle bells and suddenly came across herds of humped cattle browsing upon
the thorn bushes. The herds were guarded by athletic,striking looking Masai youths and men.
Each had a calabash of water slung over his shoulder and a tall, highly polished spear in his
hand. These herdsmen were quite unselfconscious though they wore no clothing except for one carelessly draped blanket. Very few gave us any greeting but glanced indifferently at us from under fringes of clay-daubed plaited hair . The rest of their hair was drawn back behind the ears to display split earlobes stretched into slender loops by the weight of heavy brass or copper tribal ear rings.

Most of the villages were set well back in the bush out of sight of the road but we did pass one
typical village which looked most primitive indeed. It consisted simply of a few mound like mud huts which were entirely covered with a plaster of mud and cattle dung and the whole clutch of huts were surrounded by a ‘boma’ of thorn to keep the cattle in at night and the lions out. There was a gathering of women and children on the road at this point. The children of both sexes were naked and unadorned, but the women looked very fine indeed. This is not surprising for they have little to do but adorn themselves, unlike their counterparts of other tribes who have to work hard cultivating the fields. The Masai women, and others I saw on safari, were far more amiable and cheerful looking than the men and were well proportioned.

They wore skirts of dressed goat skin, knee length in front but ankle length behind. Their arms
from elbow to wrist, and legs from knee to ankle, were encased in tight coils of copper and
galvanised wire. All had their heads shaved and in some cases bound by a leather band
embroidered in red white and blue beads. Circular ear rings hung from slit earlobes and their
handsome throats were encircled by stiff wire necklaces strung with brightly coloured beads. These
necklaces were carefully graded in size and formed deep collars almost covering their breasts.
About a quarter of a mile further along the road we met eleven young braves in gala attire, obviously on their way to call on the girls. They formed a line across the road and danced up and down until the lorry was dangerously near when they parted and grinned cheerfully at us. These were the only cheerful
looking male Masai that I saw. Like the herdsmen these youths wore only a blanket, but their
blankets were ochre colour, and elegantly draped over their backs. Their naked bodies gleamed with oil. Several had painted white stripes on their faces, and two had whitewashed their faces entirely which I
thought a pity. All had their long hair elaborately dressed and some carried not only one,
but two gleaming spears.

By mid day George decided that we had driven far enough for that day. He
stopped the lorry and consulted a rather unreliable map. “Somewhere near here is a
place called Lolbeni,” he said. “The name means Sweet Water, I hear that the
government have piped spring water down from the mountain into a small dam at which
the Masai water their cattle.” Lolbeni sounded pleasant to me. Henry was dusty and
cross, the rubber sheet had long slipped from my lap to the floor and I was conscious of
a very damp lap. ‘Sweet Waters’ I felt, would put all that right. A few hundred yards
away a small herd of cattle was grazing, so George lit his pipe and relaxed at last, whilst
a Game Scout went off to find the herdsman. The scout soon returned with an ancient
and emaciated Masai who was thrilled at the prospect of his first ride in a lorry and
offered to direct us to Lolbeni which was off the main track and about four miles away.

Once Lolbeni had been a small administrative post and a good track had
led to it, but now the Post had been abandoned and the road is dotted with vigourous
thorn bushes and the branches of larger thorn trees encroach on the track The road had
deteriorated to a mere cattle track, deeply rutted and eroded by heavy rains over a
period of years. The great Ford truck, however, could take it. It lurched victoriously along,
mowing down the obstructions, tearing off branches from encroaching thorn trees with its
high railed sides, spanning gorges in the track, and climbing in and out of those too wide
to span. I felt an army tank could not have done better.

I had expected Lolbeni to be a green oasis in a desert of grey thorns, but I was
quickly disillusioned. To be sure the thorn trees were larger and more widely spaced and
provided welcome shade, but the ground under the trees had been trampled by thousands of cattle into a dreary expanse of dirty grey sand liberally dotted with cattle droppings and made still more uninviting by the bleached bones of dead beasts.

To the right of this waste rose a high green hill which gave the place its name and from which
the precious water was piped, but its slopes were too steep to provide a camping site.
Flies swarmed everywhere and I was most relieved when George said that we would
stay only long enough to fill our cans with water. Even the water was a disappointment!
The water in the small dam was low and covered by a revolting green scum, and though
the water in the feeding pipe was sweet, it trickled so feebly that it took simply ages to
fill a four gallon can.

However all these disappointments were soon forgotten for we drove away
from the flies and dirt and trampled sand and soon, with their quiet efficiency, George
and his men set up a comfortable camp. John and Jim immediately started digging
operations in the sandy soil whilst Henry and I rested. After tea George took his shot
gun and went off to shoot guinea fowl and partridges for the pot. The children and I went
walking, keeping well in site of camp, and soon we saw a very large flock of Vulturine
Guineafowl, running aimlessly about and looking as tame as barnyard fowls, but melting
away as soon as we moved in their direction.

We had our second quiet and lovely evening by the camp fire, followed by a
peaceful night.

We left Lolbeni very early next morning, which was a good thing, for as we left
camp the herds of thirsty cattle moved in from all directions. They were accompanied by
Masai herdsmen, their naked bodies and blankets now covered by volcanic dust which
was being stirred in rising clouds of stifling ash by the milling cattle, and also by grey
donkeys laden with panniers filled with corked calabashes for water.

Our next stop was Nabarera, a Masai cattle market and trading centre, where we
reluctantly stayed for two days in a pokey Goverment Resthouse because George had
a job to do in that area. The rest was good for Henry who promptly produced a tooth
and was consequently much better behaved for the rest of the trip. George was away in the bush most of the day but he returned for afternoon tea and later took the children out
walking. We had noticed curious white dumps about a quarter mile from the resthouse
and on the second afternoon we set out to investigate them. Behind the dumps we
found passages about six foot wide, cut through solid limestone. We explored two of
these and found that both passages led steeply down to circular wells about two and a
half feet in diameter.

At the very foot of each passage, beside each well, rough drinking troughs had
been cut in the stone. The herdsmen haul the water out of the well in home made hide
buckets, the troughs are filled and the cattle driven down the ramps to drink at the trough.
It was obvious that the wells were ancient and the sloping passages new. George tells
me that no one knows what ancient race dug the original wells. It seems incredible that
these deep and narrow shafts could have been sunk without machinery. I craned my
neck and looked above one well and could see an immensely long shaft reaching up to
ground level. Small footholds were cut in the solid rock as far as I could see.
It seems that the Masai are as ignorant as ourselves about the origin of these
wells. They do say however that when their forebears first occupied what is now known
as Masailand, they not only found the Wanderobo tribe in the area but also a light
skinned people and they think it possible that these light skinned people dug the wells.
These people disappeared. They may have been absorbed or, more likely, they were
liquidated.

The Masai had found the well impractical in their original form and had hired
labourers from neighbouring tribes to cut the passages to water level. Certainly the Masai are not responsible for the wells. They are a purely pastoral people and consider manual labour extremely degrading.

They live chiefly on milk from their herd which they allow to go sour, and mix with blood that has been skilfully tapped from the necks of living cattle. They do not eat game meat, nor do they cultivate any
land. They hunt with spears, but hunt only lions, to protect their herds, and to test the skill
and bravery of their young warriors. What little grain they do eat is transported into
Masailand by traders. The next stage of our journey took us to Ngassamet where
George was to pick up some elephant tusks. I had looked forward particularly to this
stretch of road for I had heard that there was a shallow lake at which game congregates,
and at which I had great hopes of seeing elephants. We had come too late in the
season though, the lake was dry and there were only piles of elephant droppings to
prove that elephant had recently been there in numbers. Ngassamet, though no beauty
spot, was interesting. We saw more elaborate editions of the wells already described, and as this area
is rich in cattle we saw the aristocrats of the Masai. You cannot conceive of a more arrogant looking male than a young Masai brave striding by on sandalled feet, unselfconscious in all his glory. All the young men wore the casually draped traditional ochre blanket and carried one or more spears. But here belts and long knife sheaths of scarlet leather seem to be the fashion. Here fringes do not seem to be the thing. Most of these young Masai had their hair drawn smoothly back and twisted in a pointed queue, the whole plastered with a smooth coating of red clay. Some tied their horn shaped queues over their heads
so that the tip formed a deep Satanic peak on the brow. All these young men wore the traditional
copper earrings and I saw one or two with copper bracelets and one with a necklace of brightly coloured
beads.

It so happened that, on the day of our visit to Ngassamet, there had been a
baraza (meeting) which was attended by all the local headmen and elders. These old
men came to pay their respects to George and a more shrewd and rascally looking
company I have never seen, George told me that some of these men own up to three
thousand head of cattle and more. The chief was as fat and Rabelasian as his second in
command was emaciated, bucktoothed and prim. The Chief shook hands with George
and greeted me and settled himself on the wall of the resthouse porch opposite
George. The lesser headmen, after politely greeting us, grouped themselves in a
semi circle below the steps with their ‘aides’ respectfully standing behind them. I
remained sitting in the only chair and watched the proceedings with interest and
amusement.

These old Masai, I noticed, cared nothing for adornment. They had proved
themselves as warriors in the past and were known to be wealthy and influential so did
not need to make any display. Most of them had their heads comfortably shaved and
wore only a drab blanket or goatskin cloak. Their only ornaments were earrings whose
effect was somewhat marred by the serviceable and homely large safety pin that
dangled from the lobe of one ear. All carried staves instead of spears and all, except for
Buckteeth and one blind old skeleton of a man, appeared to have a keenly developed
sense of humour.

“Mummy?” asked John in an urgent whisper, “Is that old blind man nearly dead?”
“Yes dear”, said I, “I expect he’ll soon die.” “What here?” breathed John in a tone of
keen anticipation and, until the meeting broke up and the old man left, he had John’s
undivided attention.

After local news and the game situation had been discussed, the talk turned to the
war. “When will the war end?” moaned the fat Chief. “We have made great gifts of cattle
to the War Funds, we are taxed out of existence.” George replied with the Ki-Swahili
equivalent of ‘Sez you!’. This sally was received with laughter and the old fellows rose to
go. They made their farewells and dignified exits, pausing on their way to stare at our
pink and white Henry, who sat undismayed in his push chair giving them stare for stare
from his striking grey eyes.

Towards evening some Masai, prompted no doubt by our native servants,
brought a sheep for sale. It was the last night of the fast of Ramadan and our
Mohammedan boys hoped to feast next day at our expense. Their faces fell when
George refused to buy the animal. “Why should I pay fifteen shillings for a sheep?” he
asked, “Am I not the Bwana Nyama and is not the bush full of my sheep?” (Bwana
Nyama is the native name for a Game Ranger, but means literally, ‘Master of the meat’)
George meant that he would shoot a buck for the men next day, but this incident was to
have a strange sequel. Ngassamet resthouse consists of one room so small we could
not put up all our camp beds and George and I slept on the cement floor which was
unkind to my curves. The night was bitterly cold and all night long hyaenas screeched
hideously outside. So we rose at dawn without reluctance and were on our way before it
was properly light.

George had decided that it would be foolhardy to return home by our outward
route as he did not care to risk another crossing of the suspension bridge. So we
returned to Nabarera and there turned onto a little used track which would eventually take
us to the Great North Road a few miles South of Arusha. There was not much game
about but I saw Oryx which I had not previously seen. Soon it grew intolerably hot and I
think all of us but George were dozing when he suddenly stopped the lorry and pointed
to the right. “Mpishi”, he called to the cook, “There’s your sheep!” True enough, on that
dreary thorn covered plain,with not another living thing in sight, stood a fat black sheep.

There was an incredulous babbling from the back of the lorry. Every native
jumped to the ground and in no time at all the wretched sheep was caught and
slaughtered. I felt sick. “Oh George”, I wailed, “The poor lost sheep! I shan’t eat a scrap
of it.” George said nothing but went and had a look at the sheep and called out to me,
“Come and look at it. It was kindness to kill the poor thing, the vultures have been at it
already and the hyaenas would have got it tonight.” I went reluctantly and saw one eye
horribly torn out, and small deep wounds on the sheep’s back where the beaks of the
vultures had cut through the heavy fleece. Poor thing! I went back to the lorry more
determined than ever not to eat mutton on that trip. The Scouts and servants had no
such scruples. The fine fat sheep had been sent by Allah for their feast day and that was
the end of it.

“ ‘Mpishi’ is more convinced than ever that I am a wizard”, said George in
amusement as he started the lorry. I knew what he meant. Several times before George
had foretold something which had later happened. Pure coincidence, but strange enough
to give rise to a legend that George had the power to arrange things. “What happened
of course”, explained George, “Is that a flock of Masai sheep was driven to market along
this track yesterday or the day before. This one strayed and was not missed.”

The day grew hotter and hotter and for long miles we looked out for a camping
spot but could find little shade and no trace of water anywhere. At last, in the early
afternoon we reached another pokey little rest house and asked for water. “There is no
water here,” said the native caretaker. “Early in the morning there is water in a well nearby
but we are allowed only one kerosene tin full and by ten o’clock the well is dry.” I looked
at George in dismay for we were all so tired and dusty. “Where do the Masai from the
village water their cattle then?” asked George. “About two miles away through the bush.
If you take me with you I shall show you”, replied the native.

So we turned off into the bush and followed a cattle track even more tortuous than
the one to Lolbeni. Two Scouts walked ahead to warn us of hazards and I stretched my
arm across the open window to fend off thorns. Henry screamed with fright and hunger.
But George’s efforts to reach water went unrewarded as we were brought to a stop by
a deep donga. The native from the resthouse was apologetic. He had mistaken the
path, perhaps if we turned back we might find it. George was beyond speech. We
lurched back the way we had come and made our camp under the first large tree we
could find. Then off went our camp boys on foot to return just before dark with the water.
However they were cheerful for there was an unlimited quantity of dry wood for their fires
and meat in plenty for their feast. Long after George and I left our campfire and had gone
to bed, we could see the cheerful fires of the boys and hear their chatter and laughter.
I woke in the small hours to hear the insane cackling of hyaenas gloating over a
find. Later I heard scuffling around the camp table, I peered over the tailboard of the lorry
and saw George come out of his tent. What are you doing?” I whispered. “Looking for
something to throw at those bloody hyaenas,” answered George for all the world as
though those big brutes were tomcats on the prowl. Though the hyaenas kept up their
concert all night the children never stirred, nor did any of them wake at night throughout
the safari.

Early next morning I walked across to the camp kitchen to enquire into the loud
lamentations coming from that quarter. “Oh Memsahib”, moaned the cook, “We could
not sleep last night for the bad hyaenas round our tents. They have taken every scrap of
meat we had left over from the feast., even the meat we had left to smoke over the fire.”
Jim, who of our three young sons is the cook’s favourite commiserated with him. He said
in Ki-Swahili, which he speaks with great fluency, “Truly those hyaenas are very bad
creatures. They also robbed us. They have taken my hat from the table and eaten the
new soap from the washbowl.

Our last day in the bush was a pleasantly lazy one. We drove through country
that grew more open and less dry as we approached Arusha. We pitched our camp
near a large dam, and the water was a blessed sight after a week of scorched country.
On the plains to the right of our camp was a vast herd of native cattle enjoying a brief
rest after their long day trek through Masailand. They were destined to walk many more
weary miles before reaching their destination, a meat canning factory in Kenya.
The ground to the left of the camp rose gently to form a long low hill and on the
grassy slopes we could see wild ostriches and herds of wildebeest, zebra and
antelope grazing amicably side by side. In the late afternoon I watched the groups of
zebra and wildebeest merge into one. Then with a wildebeest leading, they walked
down the slope in single file to drink at the vlei . When they were satisfied, a wildebeest
once more led the herd up the trail. The others followed in a long and orderly file, and
vanished over the hill to their evening pasture.

When they had gone, George took up his shotgun and invited John to
accompany him to the dam to shoot duck. This was the first time John had acted as
retriever but he did very well and proudly helped to carry a mixed bag of sand grouse
and duck back to camp.

Next morning we turned into the Great North Road and passed first through
carefully tended coffee shambas and then through the township of Arusha, nestling at
the foot of towering Mount Meru. Beyond Arusha we drove through the Usa River
settlement where again coffee shambas and European homesteads line the road, and
saw before us the magnificent spectacle of Kilimanjaro unveiled, its white snow cap
gleaming in the sunlight. Before mid day we were home. “Well was it worth it?” enquired
George at lunch. “Lovely,” I replied. ”Let’s go again soon.” Then thinking regretfully of
our absent children I sighed, “If only Ann, George, and Kate could have gone with us
too.”

Lyamungu 10th November. 1944

Dearest Family.

Mummy wants to know how I fill in my time with George away on safari for weeks
on end. I do believe that you all picture me idling away my days, waited on hand and
foot by efficient servants! On the contrary, life is one rush and the days never long
enough.

To begin with, our servants are anything but efficient, apart from our cook, Hamisi
Issa, who really is competent. He suffers from frustration because our budget will not run
to elaborate dishes so there is little scope for his culinary art. There is one masterpiece
which is much appreciated by John and Jim. Hamisi makes a most realistic crocodile out
of pastry and stuffs its innards with minced meat. This revolting reptile is served on a
bed of parsley on my largest meat dish. The cook is a strict Mohammedan and
observes all the fasts and daily prayers and, like all Mohammedans he is very clean in
his person and, thank goodness, in the kitchen.

His wife is his pride and joy but not his helpmate. She does absolutely nothing
but sit in a chair in the sun all day, sipping tea and smoking cigarettes – a more
expensive brand than mine! It is Hamisi who sweeps out their quarters, cooks
delectable curries for her, and spends more than he can afford on clothing and trinkets for
his wife. She just sits there with her ‘Mona Lisa’ smile and her painted finger and toe
nails, doing absolutely nothing.

The thing is that natives despise women who do work and this applies especially
to their white employers. House servants much prefer a Memsahib who leaves
everything to them and is careless about locking up her pantry. When we first came to
Lyamungu I had great difficulty in employing a houseboy. A couple of rather efficient
ones did approach me but when they heard the wages I was prepared to pay and that
there was no number 2 boy, they simply were not interested. Eventually I took on a
local boy called Japhet who suits me very well except that his sight is not good and he
is extremely hard on the crockery. He tells me that he has lost face by working here
because his friends say that he works for a family that is too mean to employ a second
boy. I explained that with our large family we simply cannot afford to pay more, but this
didn’t register at all. Japhet says “But Wazungu (Europeans) all have money. They just
have to get it from the Bank.”

The third member of our staff is a strapping youth named Tovelo who helps both
cook and boy, and consequently works harder than either. What do I do? I chivvy the
servants, look after the children, supervise John’s lessons, and make all my clothing and
the children’s on that blessed old hand sewing machine.

The folk on this station entertain a good deal but we usually decline invitations
because we simply cannot afford to reciprocate. However, last Saturday night I invited
two couples to drinks and dinner. This was such an unusual event that the servants and I
were thrown into a flurry. In the end the dinner went off well though it ended in disaster. In
spite of my entreaties and exhortations to Japhet not to pile everything onto the tray at
once when clearing the table, he did just that. We were starting our desert and I was
congratulating myself that all had gone well when there was a frightful crash of breaking
china on the back verandah. I excused myself and got up to investigate. A large meat
dish, six dinner plates and four vegetable dishes lay shattered on the cement floor! I
controlled my tongue but what my eyes said to Japhet is another matter. What he said
was, “It is not my fault Memsahib. The handle of the tray came off.”

It is a curious thing about native servants that they never accept responsibility for
a mishap. If they cannot pin their misdeeds onto one of their fellow servants then the responsibility rests with God. ‘Shauri ya Mungu’, (an act of God) is a familiar cry. Fatalists
can be very exasperating employees.

The loss of my dinner service is a real tragedy because, being war time, one can
buy only china of the poorest quality made for the native trade. Nor was that the final
disaster of the evening. When we moved to the lounge for coffee I noticed that the
coffee had been served in the battered old safari coffee pot instead of the charming little
antique coffee pot which my Mother-in-law had sent for our tenth wedding anniversary.
As there had already been a disturbance I made no comment but resolved to give the
cook a piece of my mind in the morning. My instructions to the cook had been to warm
the coffee pot with hot water immediately before serving. On no account was he to put
the pewter pot on the hot iron stove. He did and the result was a small hole in the base
of the pot – or so he says. When I saw the pot next morning there was a two inch hole in
it.

Hamisi explained placidly how this had come about. He said he knew I would be
mad when I saw the little hole so he thought he would have it mended and I might not
notice it. Early in the morning he had taken the pewter pot to the mechanic who looks
after the Game Department vehicles and had asked him to repair it. The bright individual
got busy with the soldering iron with the most devastating result. “It’s his fault,” said
Hamisi, “He is a mechanic, he should have known what would happen.”
One thing is certain, there will be no more dinner parties in this house until the war
is ended.

The children are well and so am I, and so was George when he left on his safari
last Monday.

Much love,
Eleanor.

 

My Grandparents

George Samuel Marshall 1903-1995

Florence Noreen Warren (Nora) 1906-1988

I always called my grandfather Mop, apparently because I couldn’t say the name Grandpa, but whatever the reason, the name stuck. My younger brother also called him Mop, but our two cousins did not.

My earliest memories of my grandparents are the picnics.  Grandma and Mop loved going out in the car for a picnic. Favourite spots were the Clee Hills in Shropshire, North Wales, especially Llanbedr, Malvern, and Derbyshire, and closer to home, the caves and silver birch woods at Kinver Edge, Arley by the river Severn, or Bridgnorth, where Grandma’s sister Hildreds family lived.  Stourbridge was on the western edge of the Black Country in the Midlands, so one was quickly in the countryside heading west.  They went north to Derbyshire less, simply because the first part of the trip entailed driving through Wolverhampton and other built up and not particularly pleasant urban areas.  I’m sure they’d have gone there more often, as they were both born in Derbyshire, if not for that initial stage of the journey.

There was predominantly grey tartan car rug in the car for picnics, and a couple of folding chairs.  There were always a couple of cushions on the back seat, and I fell asleep in the back more times than I can remember, despite intending to look at the scenery.  On the way home Grandma would always sing,  “Show me the way to go home, I’m tired and I want to go to bed, I had a little drink about an hour ago, And it’s gone right to my head.”  I’ve looked online for that song, and have not found it anywhere!

Grandma didn’t just make sandwiches for picnics, there were extra containers of lettuce, tomatoes, pickles and so on.  I used to love to wash up the picnic plates in the little brook on the Clee Hills, near Cleeton St Mary.  The close cropped grass was ideal for picnics, and Mop and the sheep would Baaa at each other.

Mop would base the days outting on the weather forcast, but Grandma often used to say he always chose the opposite of what was suggested. She said if you want to go to Derbyshire, tell him you want to go to Wales.  I recall him often saying, on a gloomy day, Look, there’s a bit of clear sky over there.  Mop always did the driving as Grandma never learned to drive. Often she’d dust the dashboard with a tissue as we drove along.

My brother and I often spent the weekend at our grandparents house, so that our parents could go out on a Saturday night.  They gave us 5 shillings pocket money, which I used to spend on two Ladybird books at 2 shillings and sixpence each.  We had far too many sweets while watching telly in the evening ~ in the dark, as they always turned the lights off to watch television.  The lemonade and pop was Corona, and came in returnable glass bottles.  We had Woodpecker cider too, even though it had a bit of an alcohol content.

Mop smoked Kensitas and Grandma smoked Sovereign cigarettes, or No6, and the packets came with coupons.  They often let me choose something for myself out of the catalogue when there were enough coupons saved up.

When I had my first garden, in a rented house a short walk from theirs, they took me to garden nurseries and taught me all about gardening.  In their garden they had berberis across the front of the house under the window, and cotoneaster all along the side of the garage wall. The silver birth tree on the lawn had been purloined as a sapling from Kinver edge, when they first moved into the house.  (they lived in that house on Park Road for more than 60 years).  There were perennials and flowering shrubs along the sides of the back garden, and behind the silver birch, and behind that was the vegeatable garden.  Right at the back was an Anderson shelter turned into a shed, the rhubarb, and the washing line, and the canes for the runner beans in front of those.  There was a little rose covered arch on the path on the left, and privet hedges all around the perimeter.

My grandfather was a dental technician. He worked for various dentists on their premises over the years, but he always had a little workshop of his own at the back of his garage. His garage was full to the brim of anything that might potentially useful, but it was not chaotic. He knew exactly where to find anything, from the tiniest screw for spectacles to a useful bit of wire. He was “mechanicaly minded” and could always fix things like sewing machines and cars and so on.

Mop used to let me sit with him in his workshop, and make things out of the pink wax he used for gums to embed the false teeth into prior to making the plaster casts. The porcelain teeth came on cards, and were strung in place by means of little holes on the back end of the teeth. I still have a necklace I made by threading teeth onto a string. There was a foot pedal operated drill in there as well, possibly it was a dentists drill previously, that he used with miniature grinding or polishing attachments. Sometimes I made things out of the pink acrylic used for the final denture, which had a strong smell and used to harden quickly, so you had to work fast. Initially, the workshop was to do the work for Uncle Ralph, Grandmas’s sisters husband, who was a dentist. In later years after Ralph retired, I recall a nice man called Claude used to come in the evening to collect the dentures for another dental laboratory. Mop always called his place of work the laboratory.

Grandma loved books and was always reading, in her armchair next to the gas fire. I don’t recall seeing Mop reading a book, but he was amazingly well informed about countless topics.
At family gatherings, Mops favourite topic of conversation after dinner was the atrocities committed over the centuries by organized religion.

My grandfather played snooker in his younger years at the Conservative club. I recall my father assuming he voted Conservative, and Mop told him in no uncertain terms that he’s always voted Labour. When asked why he played snooker at the Conservative club and not the Labour club, he said with a grin that “it was a better class of people”, but that he’d never vote Conservative because it was of no benefit to the likes of us working people.

Grandma and her sister in law Marie had a little grocers shop on Brettel Lane in Amblecote for a few years but I have no personal recollection of that as it was during the years we lived in USA. I don’t recall her working other than that. She had a pastry making day once a week, and made Bakewell tart, apple pie, a meat pie, and her own style of pizza. She had an old black hand operated sewing machine, and made curtains and loose covers for the chairs and sofa, but I don’t think she made her own clothes, at least not in later years. I have her sewing machine here in Spain.
At regular intervals she’d move all the furniture around and change the front room into the living room and the back into the dining room and vice versa. In later years Mop always had the back bedroom (although when I lived with them aged 14, I had the back bedroom, and painted the entire room including the ceiling purple). He had a very lumpy mattress but he said it fit his bad hip perfectly.

Grandma used to alternate between the tiny bedroom and the big bedroom at the front. (this is in later years, obviously) The wardrobes and chests of drawers never changed, they were oak and substantial, but rather dated in appearance. They had a grandfather clock with a brass face and a grandmother clock. Over the fireplace in the living room was a Utrillo print. The bathroom and lavatory were separate rooms, and the old claw foot bath had wood panels around it to make it look more modern. There was a big hot water geyser above it. Grandma was fond of using stick on Fablon tile effects to try to improve and update the appearance of the bathroom and kitchen. Mop was a generous man, but would not replace household items that continued to function perfectly well. There were electric heaters in all the rooms, of varying designs, and gas fires in living room and dining room. The coal house on the outside wall was later turned into a downstairs shower room, when Mop moved his bedroom downstairs into the front dining room, after Grandma had died and he was getting on.

Mop was 91 when he told me he wouldn’t be growing any vegetables that year. He said the sad thing was that he knew he’d never grow vegetables again. He worked part time until he was in his early 80s.

Florence Nightingale Gretton

1881-1927

Florence’s father was Richard Gretton, a baker in Swadlincote, Derbyshire. When Richard married Sarah Orgill in 1861, they lived with her mother, a widow, in Measham, Ashby de la Zouch in Leicestershire. On the 1861 census Sarah’s mother, Elizabeth, is a farmer of two acres.

(Swadlincote and Ashby de la Zouch are on the Derbyshire Leicestershire border and not far from each other. Swadlincote is near to Burton upon Trent which is sometimes in Staffordshire, sometimes in Derbyshire. Newhall, Church Gresley, and Swadlincote are all very close to each other or districts in the same town.)

Ten years later in 1871 Richard and Sarah have their own place in Swadlincote, he is a baker, and they have four children. A fourteen year old apprentice or servant is living with them.

In the Ashby-de-la-Zouch Gazette on 28 February 1880, it was reported that Richard Gretton, baker, of Swadlincote, was charged by Captain Bandys with carrying bread in a cart for sale, the said cart not being provided with scales and weights, according to the requirements of the Act, on the 17th January last.—Defendant pleaded guilty, but urged in extenuation of the offence that in the hurry he had forgotten to put the scales in the cart before his son started.—The Bench took this view of the case, regarding it as an oversight, and fined him one shilling only and costs.  This was not his only offence.

In 1883, he was fined twenty shillings, and ten shillings and sixpence costs.

By 1881 they have 4 more children, and Florence Nightingale is the youngest at four months. Richard is 48 by now, and Sarah is 44. Florence’s older brother William is a blacksmith.

Interestingly on the same census page, two doors down Thomas and Selina Warren live at the Stanhope Arms.  Richards son John Gretton lives at the pub, a 13 year old servant. Incidentally, I noticed on Thomas and Selena’s marriage register that Richard and Sarah Gretton were the witnesses at the wedding.

Ten years later in 1891, Florence Nightingale and her sister Clara are living with Selina Warren, widow, retired innkeeper, one door down from the Stanhope Arms. Florence is ten, Clara twelve and they are scholars.
Richard and Sarah are still living three doors up on the other side of the Stanhope Arms, with three of their sons. But the two girls lived up the road with the Warren widow!

The Stanhope Arms, Swadlincote: it’s possible that the shop with the awning was Richard Gretton’s bakers shop (although not at the time of this later photo).

 

Richard died in 1898, a year before Florence married Samuel Warren.

Sarah is a widowed 60 year old baker on the 1901 census. Her son 26 year old son Alf, also a baker,  lives at the same address, as does her 22 year old daughter Clara who is a district nurse.

Clara Gretton and family, photo found online:

 

In 1901 Florence Nightingale (who we don’t have a photograph of!) is now married and is Florrie Warren on the census, and she, her husband Samuel, and their one year old daughter Hildred are visitors at the address of  Elizabeth (Staley)Warren, 60 year old widow and Samuel’s mother, and Samuel’s 36 year old brother William. Samuel and William are engineers.

Samuel and Florrie had ten children between 1900 and 1925 (and all but two of them used their middle name and not first name: my mother and I had no idea until I found all the records.  My grandmother Florence Noreen was known as Nora, which we knew of course, uncle Jack was actually Douglas John, and so on).

Hildred, Clara, Billy, and Nora were born in Swadlincote. Sometime between my grandmother’s birth in 1907 and Kay’s birth in 1911, the family moved to Oldswinford, in Stourbridge. Later they moved to Market Street.

1911 census, Oldswinford, Stourbridge:

 

Oddly, nobody knew when Florrie Warren died. My mothers cousin Ian Warren researched the Warren family some years ago, while my grandmother was still alive. She contributed family stories and information, but couldn’t remember if her mother died in 1929 or 1927.  A recent search of records confirmed that it was the 12th November 1927.

She was 46 years old. We were curious to know how she died, so my mother ordered a paper copy of her death certificate. It said she died at 31 Market Street, Stourbridge at the age of 47. Clara May Warren, her daughter, was in attendance. Her husband Samuel Warren was a motor mechanic. The Post mortem was by Percival Evans, coroner for Worcestershire, who clarified the cause of death as vascular disease of the heart. There was no inquest. The death was registered on 15 Nov 1927.

I looked for a photo of 31 Market Street in Stourbridge, and was astonished to see that it was the house next door to one I lived in breifly in the 1980s.  We didn’t know that the Warren’s lived in Market Street until we started searching the records.

Market Street, Stourbridge. I lived in the one on the corner on the far right, my great grandmother died in the one next door.

 

I found some hitherto unknown emigrants in the family. Florence Nightingale Grettons eldest brother William 1861-1940 stayed in Swadlincote. John Orgill Gretton born in 1868 moved to Trenton New Jersey USA in 1888, married in 1892 and died in 1949 in USA. Michael Thomas born in 1870 married in New York in 1893 and died in Trenton in 1940. Alfred born 1875 stayed in Swadlincote. Charles Herbert born 1876 married locally and then moved to Australia in 1912, and died in Victoria in 1954. Clara Elizabeth was a district nurse, married locally and died at the age of 99.

Gretton Tailoresses of Swadlincote and the Single Journalist Boot Maker Next Door

The Purdy’s, Housley’s and Marshall’s are my mothers fathers side of the family.  The Warrens, Grettons and Staleys are from my mothers mothers side.

I decided to add all the siblings to the Gretton side of the family, in search of some foundation to a couple of family anecdotes.  My grandmother, Nora Marshall, whose mother was Florence Nightingale Gretton, used to mention that our Gretton side of the family were related to the Burton Upon Trent Grettons of Bass, Ratcliff and Gretton, the brewery.  She also said they were related to Lord Gretton of Stableford Park in Leicestershire.  When she was a child, she said parcels of nice clothes were sent to them by relatives.

 

It should be noted however that Baron Gretton is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom, and was created in 1944 for the brewer and Conservative politician John Gretton. He was head of the brewery firm of Bass, Ratcliff & Gretton Ltd of Burton upon Trent. So they were not members of the Peerage at the time of this story.

What I found was unexpected.

My great great grandfather Richard Gretton 1833-1898, a baker in Swadlincote, didn’t have any brothers, but he did have a couple of sisters.

One of them, Frances, born 1831, never married, but had four children. She stayed in the family home, and named her children Gretton. In 1841 and 1851 she’s living with parents and siblings. In 1861 she is still living with parents and now on the census she has four children all named Gretton listed as grandchildren of her father.
In 1871, her mother having died in 1866, she’s still living with her father William Gretton, Frances is now 40, and her son William 19 and daughter Jane 15 live there.
By the time she is 50 in 1881 and her parents have died she’s head of the house with 5 children all called Gretton, including her daughter Jane Gretton aged 24.

Twenty five year old Robert Staley is listed on the census transcription as living in the same household, but when viewing the census image it becomes clear that he lived next door, on his own and was a bootmaker, and on the other side, his parents Benjamin and Sarah Staley lived at the Prince of Wales pub with two other siblings.

Who was fathering all these Gretton children?

It seems that Jane did the same thing as her mother: she stayed at home and had three children, all with the name Gretton.  Jane Gretton named her son, born in 1878, Michael William Staley Gretton, which would suggest that Staley was the name of the father of the child/children of Jane Gretton.

The father of Frances Gretton’s four children is not known, and there is no father on the birth registers, although they were all baptized.

I found a photo of Jane Gretton on a family tree on an ancestry site, so I contacted the tree owner hoping that she had some more information, but she said no, none of the older family members would explain when asked about it.  Jane later married Tom Penn, and Jane Gretton’s children are listed on census as Tom Penn’s stepchildren.

 

It seems that Robert Staley (who may or may not be the father of Jane’s children) never married. In 1891 Robert is 35, single, living with widowed mother Sarah in Swadlincote. Sarah is living on own means and Robert has no occupation. On the 1901 census Robert is an unmarried 45 year old journalist and author, living with his widowed mother Sarah Staley aged 79, in Swadlincote.

There are at least three Staley  Warren marriages in the family, and at least one Gretton Staley marriage.

There is a possibility that the father of Frances’s children could be a Gretton, but impossible to know for sure. William Gretton was a tailor, and several of his children and grandchildren were tailoresses.  The Gretton family who later bought Stableford Park lived not too far away, and appear to be well off with a dozen members of live in staff on the census.   Did our Gretton’s the tailors make their clothes? Is that where the parcels of nice clothes came from?

Perhaps we’ll find a family connection to the brewery Grettons, or find the family connection was an unofficial one, or that the connection is further back.

I suppose luckily, this isn’t my direct line but an exploration of an offshoot, so the question of paternity is merely a matter of curiosity.  It is a curious thing, those Gretton tailors of Church Gresley near Burton upon Trent, and there are questions remaining.