INTRODUCTION TO MY FAMILY: FOLWELLS By Jo Ellis, Apr 1994

THE FOLWELL FAMILY

Written by Josephine Mary Ellis (nee Folwell) in April 1994.

(B26/4/1930 – D9/9/2008)

Jo's 1^st husband Mark Gilbert (Gigiera), 2^nd husband Robert Ellis.

Jo is Mother to: Alexander, Boris, Antonia, Katherine and Andrew Gilbert

(Words in italics, are additions made by Kath Harpley. Photos and scans inserted in 2019)

There were 3 Folwell shops in Leicester.

Established in 1848.

Butchers and ham and bacon curers.

My grandfather, William Henry Folwell was born 21^st July, 1861 at Great Glen in Leicestershire. He was the third child and oldest son of his parents who had seven children in all.

I know very little of his early life, except that there was often not enough to eat, and that he got many a good hiding. When, as an old man he lay in hospital, another old man in an adjoining bed, asked if he knew Billy Folwell, (he was known as Billy or Uncle Billy in the family), It transpired they had played football together in their youth. The family moved to Leicester sometime in the early 1870's where his father started a small coal business. They moved to various parts of Leicester, gravitating to the Sanvey Gate and Soar Lane side of the city.

Whilst a young man, grandpa joined the Leicester constabulary, after trying a spell as a blacksmith. This hadn't suited him too well by all accounts, as it was too much like hard work. He rose to the rank of sergeant, and was in the force for many years. He was present at the opening of the Abbey Park by the then Prince and Princess of Wales, later King Edward V11 and Queen Alexandra.

He married (date unknown) Louisa Smedley. They had three children, my father Joseph being the youngest. More later.

Grandpa as I saw him was a straightforward sort of man who never had a day's illness in his life. He was no good at 'little jobs', but this was long before the days of D.I.Y. In his person, he was meticulously clean and smart. He pottered around the house in shirt sleeves and braces, but was always smart when he went out, which was often. He wore a suit and bowler hat, (a top hat at Christmas) and well polished shoes. Much of his time was spent cleaning and supervising mother's cleaning activities. He was a bit of a tyrant in this respect, and they had many an argument (She was his daughter-in-law).

This is Sarah Ann Smedley in 1929 or 1930. She is the mother of Uncle George and Aunty Vina and of my grandmother-Louisa Folwell.

My grandmother (Louisa, nee Smedley) died in the early 1920's and consequently I never knew her. The three children she and my grandfather had were Harry the oldest, about ten years older than my father, Eva who also died in the 1920's. Eva had been married to one, Charlie Marlow, who died before her. They had two children, Keith and Joan, who of course, were orphaned. Keith was apprenticed to a butcher where he lived in. It was expected that he would marry one of the daughters, but he didn't. When WW11 came, he went into the army and served in Italy, either landing at Anzio or Salerno. When he was demobbed, he set up in business on his own and

married a girl he had been at school with, who was widowed and who had a son. She was a nice women named Margaret; she helped him a lot in the business. Joan, Keith's sister, as a child had been fostered by her father's relatives. Grandpa obviously couldn't look after these children, but he contributed financially, as did other members of the family. Joan, when she was older, told my mother that relatives bought clothes for her which were taken from her when they had gone, and given to their own children. She worked in Freeman Hardy and Willis shoe shop in Leicester until she went into the W.A.A.F.'s during the war. She spent years in Lincolnshire, I believe in Bomber Command. She married a chap called Leslie (I don't remember his surname) whom she had met during the war. He came from Durham, and she went to live up there. I last saw her in 1950.

I understand that when Keith retired, he too went to live in Durham, where he had a leg amputated, and that he has since died.

My grandfather took great interest in these two, and they visited regularly. Although they were cousins, they were much older than we were, and we were in awe of them. Keith liked to play cards as did grandpa, so they often played when Keith came.

Joseph Lesley Folwell circa 1910

Harry, my grandparents oldest child, I gather, was a disappointment to them. There had been some unpleasantness with the Smedleys relatives, for whom he worked, and he had been dismissed. This was a shame as it was at that time a thriving coal business, and my father would have liked to go into this business, but they were not keen to employ another relative. Harry served in the army during the first world war, and was gassed. He was also a heavy smoker. He never appeared robust in health. He served in Sierra Leone at some point, and later married a women called Evelyn who was divorced, a heinous crime in those days. He always seemed to be at cross purposes with people. He and his wife seemed to be trouble makes, although I have heard since that he was not as black as I had been led to believe. He outlived my father by a number of years, and had no children of his own.

L. Harry Folwell-L Corporal in Army

R. Joe Folwell-Cadet during WW2

My father, Joseph was the youngest, born on 27^th February, 1903 at 159 Tudor Road, Leicester, when his father was in his 40's. More of him later. The Smedley's, my grandfather's in-laws, lived at 227, Fosse Road North, Leicester. A substantial house owned by uncle George. My great grandmother and great grandfather Smedley and family also lived in the Sanvey Gate, Soar Lane area of

Leicester. They had five children that I know of; Louisa, Emma, Vina, George and James. GG-father Smedley was a carter, but GG-mother bought coal and sold it at 1d per bucket to her neighbours. This was the beginning of the family business, which was sold in the 1950's. Smedley's horse and carts were a familiar sight in my childhood in Leicester. GG-mother Smedley however, was a tyrant. She ran the business (I don't know anything about her husband), and her two sons went into it. James was married with two or three children. One day he just left home and never went back. Emma was an invalid and she and Vina never married, neither did George. He had a fiancee who was a school teacher. His mother sent someone to vet her, a move she very much resented. She broke it off. Joseph Lesley Folwell circa 1927

George and Vina lived together in his house, until their deaths in the late 1950's and early 1960's. GG-grand mother died in the early 1930's. I'm told I saw her as a baby, but of course I don't remember. Emma too died in the 1930's. My grandmother had been a cigar maker before her marriage. She made the hand rolled kind somewhere in Leicester.

Grandpa Folwell was very close to these relatives, and went to play cards with them every Monday night. My father went, and Keith sometimes as well. Grandpa was also close to two brothers and one sister, Arthur, Ernest and Eliza. Arthur had been married twice. His first wife had had twins and had died. They were brought up by their aunt Eliza. She (Eliza) had been a staunch socialist all her life, and had visited Russia in the early 1920's. Arthur remarried (Auntie Lizzie) a nice round cheerful lady, and they had two sons, Alan and Roy. Roy was a bit older than me, (I have since found out that he is only about 6 months older) and Alan about 11 years, having been born in 1919.

Alan was in the RAF (746844) during WW2 and was a flight sergeant. He went early in the war to South Africa to help train aircrew. On returning to England, he was out with a trainee pilot, he was the navigator. They took off from RAF Swanton Morley, Norfolk, in a Mosquito HR179 when they ran into trouble. The weather was reported as bad. This resulted in a crash at Oaklands Farm, New York, Boston. Both Alan and the pilot F/Lt (48791) Frank Dare Holdsworth were killed along with the farmer who was in his barn. Having made it through the war it seems unjust to be taken out at the last post.

He had been engaged to be married. The family lived at 18, Andrews Street, off King Richard's Road, in Leicester. I loved to visit, as they had a cellar. I was fascinated. I don't remember much about Ernest, but he had a son about my father's age, and a daughter who went to Newarke Girls School as I did, but years before. What I remember about Arthur and Ernest was their likeness to each other, and they had the same timbre of voice. The voice particularly.

After leaving the Police Force, my grandfather ran an off licence at the corner of Flora Street and King Dicks Road. He was not a serious drinking man, but enjoyed a glass of beer. He was very sociable and visited all the relatives I've described, and they all visited him. I remember, just before the war being allowed to stay up. Grandpa was giving a supper at Christmas time to some of his relatives. The table groaned under the pork pies, ham, turkey, pickles, cake, tarts etc. A very jolly family affair

Joseph and Mary Folwell Joe, Grandpa (William), July 1929 Mary and Josephine (baby)

25 Upperton Road, Leicester. 1930

25 Upperton Road, Leicester Anthony, Josephine, Margaret Grandpa (William, Folwell 1936

Josephine, Margaret Folwell

1/3/1934

When my parents married in 1929, the arrangement was that they should live with Grandpa. Mother to keep house, and he would leave the house to them when he died. It was not so common to own houses in the 1920's and 30's as now; grandpa had done well considering his childhood, and so had his relatives.

Grandpa made it plain when we were small, he would not look after us or take us out, but as we got older, he would do so. He would give mother money to buy us a coat or whatever, and take us to visit his relatives. Many a scratchy horse hair chair have I sat and squirmed on in consequence. They were good kind people. Their houses were dark with coal fires in the grate, tables with chenille cloths, ornamental over-mantels, mirrors and sofa's covered in plush velvet. Cold when you moved from the fire, outside lavatories and cellars. The two abiding pictures I have of this grandfather, are sweeping snow whilst it is falling, and dressed in a top hat to go Christmas visiting. He always walked to relatives houses, to town, and anywhere else he wanted to go.

He was not a reader, indeed, the News of the World and the Leicester Mercury were his sole reading material. In 1931, he accompanied my parents to Paris for a holiday. As far as I know this was the only foreign travel any of them took. They went to the Opera House, for a Wagner performance. Heavy going for a music lover, never mind grandpa. Halfway through the performance, he asked my father if he had the Mercury on him. He had. So grandpa sat in a box at the Paris Opera House reading the Leicester Mercury. He had the forethought to save coins of the realm when they became obsolete; thus he had a sovereign, a half sovereign, a crown and four shilling piece. I now have the sovereign and the crown. I don't know what happened to the half sovereign, but Joan had the four shilling piece.

25 Upperton Road, had typically Victorian furniture in my childhood, a lot of which was disposed of when he died. I had a chest of drawers and a small pretty inlaid wooded box which had been my grandmother's work box. There was also a superb writing box which contained a secret drawer, and the list of policeman present at the opening of Abbey Park which has already been mentioned. Anne Folwell (my brother's wife) now has this. Grandpa's much decorated truncheon now belongs to Greg Folwell (my brother's son), grandpa's great grandson and the only direct male Folwell descendant of his (incidentally this branch of Folwell's dies with Greg as he has no male heirs. A search on Facebook reveals that Folwell is by no means an unusual name and there are many Folwell's).

The Folwell's at the beginning of the 19^th century, lived in Fleckney, and it is believed they came north from the Northampton-Leicestershire border. That they had been drovers (droving is the practice of moving livestock over long distances, possibly to market, by walking them, often with the aid of dogs), and moved north with the coming of the canal or railway. More research needs doing on this point.

The first recorded couple, Sam and Anne lived in Fleckney and had several children, one of whom was another Sam. Sam no. 1 and his wife were both alive in 1841. He was dead by 1851 census, he died about 1845 in Fleckney. Anne his wife, was still alive in Fleckney in 1851, but I can find no further mention of her.

Son, Sam married another Anne and fortunately for us, he moved to Great Glen. He was there by the time his family were born. He seems to have worked as a railwayman, and my father told me that he worked on the construction of Swannington Tunnel near Ashby de la Zouch. He too came to Leicester, and worked with coal. He died as a result of an accident. He was crushed by coal wagons 27th Jan 1877.

Abner, Sam and Anne's oldest son was born 4^th April 1834, and was married to Eliza Wickens who was a year older than he, at the County Register Office in Leicester, and his witnesses were his younger brother, George and George's fiancee, Kezia Mugglestone. (Around the 1850's). Abner and his growing family moved to Leicester in the early 1870's. His brothers George and James had already moved there. He then became a coal merchant in a small way of business in Charnwood Street before starting the Co-op coal business in Leicester.

Back to grandpa. He had a stroke in 1940, I think. The first illness he had ever had. He was, before his illness about 6ft tall and weighed around 16-17 stones. He always walked and without a stick. However, he lost a considerable amount of weight, when he then resembled his brothers Arthur and Ernest. The district nurse came and did the necessary, but grandpa had diabetes which, with the stroke caused gangrene in one foot. He was admitted to hospital, where he had the offending leg amputated. He was in a lot of pain, and mother found it difficult to look after him. He went to Harry's, but wasn't there long before he was admitted to Swain Street, the workhouse. I never saw him again after he left hospital. This must have crushed him, as this was the fate that everyone of his generation dreaded and feared most. He died in 1942. A sad and unfortunate end to a proud and independent man.

Joseph Folwell mid 1920's, back row, 2nd from right.

My father, Joseph Leslie Folwell went to grammar school in Leicester. The City Boys school I think. He took no exams, and I believe he worked as a clerk for several years. I know very little about his early life; he played the piano rather well, and football. He followed the Test Matches before the war. As a boy he had sung in Leicester cathedral choir. He loved music. Where this came from is a mystery as no one else in either the Folwell or Smedley family seem to have had much regard for it. It seems that he had not got a true ear as indeed neither have I. He later learned to play the cello, and it could be truly excruciating to listen to him, but he enjoyed it. His big passion was chamber music, in which we children were expected to participate. I'm afraid I did so with an ill grace, as it was no pleasure to me then or now. I particularly must have been a disappointment on this level. However, he and mother had friends who played and were happy to play. They mostly came to our house. This was after grandpa died and we were a bit older. I particularly remember Arthur Fields who played the clarinet. Schubert's clarinet quintet was often our lullaby. It went on interminably. Mother was a competent viola player by this time and they both belonged to local orchestras. Margaret too, as she got older.

Sherbourne 1946. Margaret Folwell (front left). Leader of the orchestra.

My parents met when my mother, Mary Thompson, took lodgings in the house next door. She came from Birmingham in about 1923-4 to work in the Midlands Red Offices. She was a secretary with the Midland Red at their head office in Bearwood, Birmingham near her home. I don't know what the circumstances were under which she came to Leicester, but she and my father courted for five years before finally marrying in 1929 in Birmingham and honeymooning in Cornwall. My father was a difficult man to know. Fine whilst we were small, but seeming to become aloof and remote with a communication problem as we grew older. Anthony found this too, but Margaret never did. As grandpa (and we children) grew older, he became more tetchy and he and mother had many a battle. Dad would walk out and leave them to it, never taking sides.

Dad became a catholic before marrying mother; whether this was by conviction or because mother wanted him to, I do not know. He certainly practiced his religion, but he didn't hold with the introspection of the Catholic church at that time.

As we children grew older, we were taken to concerts at the De Montfort Hall, bike rides out into the countryside and Sunday evening walks, when we behaved abominably, shoving and pushing each other, tripping each other up. We were truly awful. Summer Sunday afternoons spent at Kenwood swimming pool were wonderful. This was an open air pool which drew Leicester on hot days. How we loved it. During WW2 local girls brought G.I.'s there. They thrilled us with their diving displays, the likes of which we had never seen.

Josephine (oldest), Margaret and Anthony Folwell. 1936

Mary, Josephine, Anthony, Margaret & Joseph Folwell - 1940 or 1941

(you can just hear Mary saying to her daughter Josephine - don't cross your legs!)

I do not know in what circumstances my father left school and went to work. He was an insurance agent for all of the years I knew him. Mother said that he would have liked to go into Uncle George's coal business, but after the uncle Harry affair, George would not employ relatives again. Uncle George however vouched for dad when he approached one of the local charities that help young people start out in life. He bought an insurance book. A practice that no longer exists. He plodded on with this until his death. He toyed with buying a motor bike, but mother was not keen. I think his work bored him, but he was thoroughly conscientious. Fridays and Saturdays were the busiest days of his week. He often didn't get home until 11.00pm, as he said you had to call whilst people still had money after being paid for the week. He had a lot of calls on Braunstone Estate, a pre war slum clearance of some of the worst slums in Leicester. When WW2 came, he was too old for military service, but volunteered for the Civil Defence. He worked at this full time, and employed a women to do a good lot of his collecting. He did some, and I did a monthly round at Wigston, on a Sunday morning for the princely some of 6d (pre 1971 currency, equivalent to 2.5p).

Towards the end of the war, he was drafted to Power Jets at Whetstone as a storekeeper. This was one of the sites for testing jet engines, where Sir Frank Whittle was a frequent visitor. (Air Commodore Sir Frank Whittle, OM, KBE, CB, FRS, FRAeS was an English Royal Air Force air officer. He is credited with single-handedly inventing the turbojet engine.) At the end of the war, of course, he resumed full time insurance work. This left him time early in the week for other enterprises. He started to collect books and music in a modest way. He and mother both read a lot. He had collected quite a range of sheet chamber music, which he had bound in individual parts, thus a Haydn quartet was half bound in leather and buckram. There was a lot of music. Some of this was destroyed in a fire we had soon after the end of the war. It proved difficult to replace as the music had been printed in Leipzig, Germany, before the war, and was just not available. After mother's death, we were told the University was interested in acquiring this music. As none of us particularly wanted it, that's where it went to. Gregory Folwell said recently, he had played from this music at the university. That must have been quite something, knowing this was his grandfathers collection.

At some point, my father bought himself an Italian Cello and had lessons from his friend, Harry Biggs who was a good cellist. He taught Anthony later on and he performed quite proficiently. Anthony kept the cello and played from time to time. Gregory now has it and I believe plays in much the same way. Mother played the violin and had done so since girlhood. She took up the viola when we were children and became proficient enough to be in demand for local orchestras and chamber music groups.

Dad bought or commissioned a viola (Made by Richardson's in Devon) from a renowned violin and viola maker before or just after the war. They had to wait about five years for this instrument as he had such a full order book. This too was sold when mother died.

When Richard Strauss the composer made his final concert tour after the war, performing at the Royal Albert Hall in London, dad went on his own. Mother wasn't even asked if she would like to go. I think she was rather hurt by this. (Kath's note: On a visit to see Aunty Margaret in 2020, she added to this tale. Apparently, my mother's dad did not go alone to London. He went with a Miss Brown. No wonder his wife Mary was not a happy bunny. I will just leave that revelation hanging there).

As children, we were taken to parks, museums, concerts, swimming and cycling more so than most people took their children out. We walked to town, seldom riding on bus or tram. We had a happy childhood, were well fed and cared for and educated to the best of our parents ability. We had much to be thankful for, but as children of course, were unaware of this. There were dreadful slums and ignorance until well after the war. TB was prevalent. Infectious diseases were killers. Margaret had diphtheria and had to go into the isolation hospital, and the house was fumigated. Cousin Joan had something wrong with her eyes as a result of childhood measles.

Mother of course, gave up work when she married. However, we three children were born in fairly quick succession. Mrs Shilton, grandpa's cleaning lady stayed on, coming twice a week. She gave the house a going through every week. Coal fires, two a day in winter were hard work, as was washing. This took the best part of a day, from lighting the fire under the copper, filling it with water, before starting washing. You couldn't see across the kitchen for steam in the winter. There was washing for three adults and three children, plus drying and ironing. Not the doddle it is nowadays with automatic washing machines and dryers. Mother worked quite hard, despite not going out to work. Shopping though was easier. Sid came in the morning for an order. He was 'the boy', although he was probably 40. He rode a traditional delivery bike with a basket in the front. He waited while mother gave the order and delivered it later in the day. Bread was delivered every day before the war, and on alternate days during and after the war. Milk also of course was delivered. Mother did call at the butchers. She would place an order and it would be delivered as required. She did call at the greengrocers for vegetables, or we were sent on errands as they were only around the corner.