Finding Frank and Charlie …

Charles Bateman (1852-1919) and his grandchildren 1917

Many years ago I inherited this photo from my grandmother, Irene, the little girl in the picture. She’d labelled a drawing for me, so I’d know who was who. Up until recently I thought I’d connected all the people in it so I hadn’t looked at it for a while. Then earlier this year I was approached by a journalist who’d read some of my blog posts and was interested in writing an article, which was subsequently published in “Woman’s Weekly”, the photo was used to illustrate it. It inspired me to recheck what I knew about the people in it and I soon realised that I didn’t have any information on the two boys at the bottom of the picture, Frank & Charlie, so decided to see if I could find out who they are.

I started by rechecking all the others & their connections first and realised that only possible parent to these boys was Bertie Fawcett Bateman, born in 1882, the only son of Charles Bateman. I hadn’t done much research on him; I knew in 1911 he was working in the workhouse at Bagthorpe, Nottingham, as a storekeeper. I’d also tracked down a marriage for him in 1920 in Nottingham to Hilda Hemsley, too late for this photo which was taken in 1917. And in the 1939 Register he & Hilda are living in Nottingham but not with any children.

Could he have been married to someone else prior to his marriage to Hilda Hemsley?

Checking the 1921 Census I found Bertie living in Nottingham with Hilda and two boys, William Frank and Charles John, and a girl, Maud Lillie all described as his children. The boys fit with the names in the photo, so I’m now happy I’ve found those, but Maud Lillie, apparently born in between the boys, is not on the photo. So who is Maud? My grandmother had been positive she was the only female grandchild of Charles Bateman.

I searched FreeBMD for a marriage for Bertie before 1920 and found a marriage to Ophelia Beatrice Hughes in Bethnal Green, London, in 1913. I’m lucky that he has an unusual name so am reasonably sure that this his him. Next, I searched the births for children born to Bateman & Hughes and found William Frank born in 1913 and Charles John born 1915, but no daughter. I also found Ophelia’s sad death at the age of 37 in 1918.

Following advice on the RootsChat forum, suggesting that Hilda Hemsley may also have been married before, I found a Lille M Hemsley born in 1914 in Nottingham, with the mother’s maiden name as Cooper. So she is the daughter of Hilda Hemsley, nee Cooper, from a previous marriage to William Hemsley in 1913. Lillie is also in the 1939 Census, married to John Pratt and living in Nottingham.

So with that solved I’ve decided to look more at Bertie and his family & also post about the other children in the photo in later posts.

• 1921 Census – Find My Past
• 1939 Register – Find My Past
• Births, Marriages,Deaths – FreeBMD

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© Caroline Cox and Caroline’s Chronicles. 2011 – current year