Locating my maternal grandparents in the first month of World War II

I told in my last post about my grandfather David Scott Ritchie taking his family to England when he travelled on business in 1939. They sailed into Southhampton in July. Then England declared war on Germany on 3 September. I can only imagine their horror at the thought of what this might mean and how they were going to get back to Cape Town.

Since Grandad had meetings to attend in London, however, they could not depart immediately. They stuck to their plans for a holiday in the country and went camping and fossil-collecting instead. We know this because their names appear on the 1939 Register for Seadown Camp , Bridport Road, Dorset. This was another of the records found for me by Judy Lester.

According to the National Archives website, the 1939 Register was taken on 29 September that year. This surprised me as I thought it was taken much earlier in 1939, before war even seemed likely. Swift organisation and hard work must have accompanied the staging of the event and the nation is to be credited for pulling it off in such uncertain times. As for the information gathered, it was used to "produce identity cards and, once rationing was introduced in January 1940, to issue ration books. Information in the Register was also used to administer conscription and the direction of labour, and to monitor and control the movement of the population caused by military mobilisation and mass evacuation."

So to the register entries themselves. Grandad gives his name as David S. Ritchie, his date of birth as 31 March 1902 [the same date that appears on the statutory declaration made in 1918 by his mother Maude], and his occupation as "Electrical Engineer Accountant Machinery". Grandma gives her name as Florence M Ritchie, her date of birth as 28 Dec 1904, and her occupation as "Unpaid Domestic Duties". There are two redacted entries which presumably relate to Auntie Gill and my mother Wendy, aged 7 and 4 respectively.

Although David and Florence were not residents of Bridport Road, it is interesting to note the most common occupations of residents in that area. Men were typically retirees, farm labourers, gardeners, dairy owners, cowmen, general labourers, carters or carpenters. Women were typically involved in unpaid domestic duties, living by their own means, working as housekeepers, school teachers, cooks or house maids, incapacitated or retired. Clearly, this was where folks went to get away from the big smoke.

I'm pleased to see that Seadown Holiday Park is still going strong. According to write-ups and reviews, it offers families a simple, fuss-free holiday a stone's throw from the beach. Dogs are welcome so it could be a nice destination for me and my guide dog Tango when I visit the UK with my sister! Being there will allow us to vividly picture the family in their caravan listening to reports of the war on the radio. Also, to contextualise some oft-repeated stories featuring the campsite that have been handed down to us, but more about those in another post. For now, I'm just chewing on the fact that Mom and Gill were there when war broke out, rather than in far-off Fishhoek. How anxious Grandma must have felt, and how innocent the girls must have seemed as they hunted for shells, built sandcastles and scattered breadcrumbs for the visiting birds.

Photo credit: "West Bay, Bridport [Dorset]" by Michael Day.

A night at the Strand Palace Hotel

Because I've been doing a series of blog posts based on documents found by professional genealogical researcher Judy Lester, I'm going to stick with her list of findings even though there is a big jump in the timeline at this point. The research brief was to find a birth certificate for my British-born grandfather, David Scott Ritchie. Having located him living with his aunt and uncle in St John's Wood at the time of the 1911 census, the paper trail disappears for close on 3 decades and reappears in 1939.

Judy found a passenger list showing David Scott Ritchie, his wife Florence and 2 daughters arriving at Southhampton from South Africa on 5 July 1939. The ship they were on was called the Pretoria Castle and the address given for their stay was the Strand Palace Hotel in London. Clearly, the British Tabulating machine Company treated its agents well.

Here's some background to fill out the story: Grandad and Grandma left England in 1929. They settled in the small South African town of Fishhoek and Grandad ran the Cape Town office of Hollerith computers. They had two children, my auntie Gill in 1932 and my mother Wendy in 1935. Grandad visited the company's head office in London every 5 years and it was his practice to exchange his first-class business ticket for a second-class family ticket. This, then, was his second trip back to headquarters.

The first time the family returned to England, auntie Gill was a babe in arms. The second time, Gill and Mom were 7 and 4 respectively. I can only imagine what an adventure the sea voyage must have been for them! For Grandma and Grandad, too, sailing into Southhampton and thinking about all the exciting things that lay ahead for the girls must have been thrilling. Not to mention a comfortable first night staying at the Strand Palace Hotel close to the royal palace of King George VI.

Meanwhile, David's mother Maude was still living alone and working as a cook. She would not have had space to accommodate the family from South Africa but they no doubt visited her and took her on outings with them. David's father, on the other hand, had been a patient in the London County Asylum [since renamed St Bernard's Hospital, Southall] for 30 years. Whether David saw him there or not I don't know. Judging from the fact that neither my aunt nor my mother even knew about the existence of a mentally-ill relative though, I suspect not.

Aside from a few days in the office then, this was to be an ordinary summer holiday. There would be beaches to explore, horses to ride, cousins to play with and ice cream and candy floss to eat. But if the family weren't troubled by the presence of a sad lunatic in a mental hospital, they were most certainly troubled by the threat of imminent war with Germany, as I will show in a future post.

Photo credit: "UK-London-The Strand: Art Deco on the River" by Wally Gobetz.

Another intriguing revelation on the 1911 census for Cleveland House

You will remember from a previous post that Maude Alice Ritchie was living at Cleveland House in St James Square in 1911. The census lists her as being a cook in domestic service along with 2 other female servants. David, her son, is not with her because he is living with his aunt and uncle, Emily and William Smith. And there is something else of interest as well.

Unlike previous censuses, the 1911 census included questions about the duration of a person's current marriage, the number of children born within that marriage, the number of children living and the number of children who had died. Thus, it reveals things we did not know before. Maude states that she has been married 10 years, which is about right as her marriage to David Scott Ritchie Sr took place in February 1902, 9 years and 2 months earlier. What we didn't expect to find, though, was that she had 2 children within that marriage. One of those children was still living and one was deceased. obviously, my grandfather was the one who survived, but what of the other?

There is no telling from the census when the deceased child was born. he or she may have come before David Scott Ritchie Jr, in which case he or she would definitely have been born out of wedlock. Or the child could have been David's twin since no proper record for David's birth has been located. The only document pertaining to David's birth is Maude's statutory declaration signed in 1918, and she would not have thought it necessary to refer to the deceased child at that point. Or the deceased child may have arrived after David. he or she would then have been a younger sibling to Grandad, an uncle or aunt to my mother and a great-uncle or great-aunt to me.

What the note in the census also communicates is that Maude knew loss even before her husband was admitted to the London County Asylum. now, it is well known that infant mortality rates at the turn of the 19th century were significantly higher than they are today and that mothers who bore children lived in constant fear of their infants contracting diarrhoea, tuberculosis, measles, mumps and other dread diseases. Even so, having a baby die always leaves an indelible mark on a person. How Maude must have suffered, asking herself what she could have done differently to save the baby's life! Did she ever find the grace that would let her peacefully accept the loss or was she forever haunted by grief, guilt or rage?

I would like to find out more about this deceased relative of mine. Judy Lester of Kerrywood Research ran a check to see if anything obvious turned up but nothing did. i expect the answer will come from an unexpected source, such as a long-lost diary, letter or fragment of family lore passed down to a distant living cousin. Or perhaps the answer will never come. But somewhere out there is a tiny grave, moving me to remember all the little ones who died before they had a chance to really live.

Photo: Maude Alice Ritchie

Revisiting the mystery of Maude's missing son

As mentioned before, there is a census record that places Maude Alice Ritchie, my great-grandmother, at Cleveland House in London's prestigious St James Square in 1911. Maude was a cook in domestic service at the time. The household was a small one, comprising George and Lucy Murray, their 18-year-old son Eric and 3 female servants. But there was no sign of David, her 9-year-old son, my grandfather.

This wasn't exactly surprising since servants who lived in a household did not generally have their children living with them. So, where was he? You may recall that I speculated about David possibly being at boarding-school, sponsored by some rich benefactor. But the mystery was solved when Judy Lester, the professional genealogist I hired to find Grandad's birth certificate, discovered David living with Maude's sister Emily and her husband William in St John's Wood.

This made perfect sense in light of the fact that Maude's husband, David Scott Ritchie Sr, had been admitted to the London County Asylum 2 years earlier. Obviously, Maude had needed to work to earn a living. Emily, who was 8 years older than Maude with children of her own, was in a position to take David in and give him a normal childhood. William, for his part, was a taxi driver which presumably meant he could afford to have his nephew staying for an extended period.

We can assume, I think, that the new living arrangement began in 1909 when David's father was admitted to the asylum. David himself would have been 7 at the time. William and Emily had 5 children, although only Alice, Ivy and Richard were still living at home. David and Ivey were the same age and could attend the same school. Interestingly, David's surname is given as "Ritche" in the census yet his relationship to the head of the house is shown as "son".

Whether this was some sort of adoption arrangement or not, it allowed Maude to earn a living and gave David a secure and stable home life. Emily and William Smith surely deserve some recognition for what they did. Why, then, didn't Grandad ever talk about it? Surely the experience of living with an aunt and uncle for several years was worth sharing, if only to honour the people who took him in? Was he so ashamed of the circumstances that made it necessary that he blotted out the memory? Were that the case, it would make the whole story very sad.

Photo credit: "Pre-war kitchen" by EllenM1

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Early days in the London County Asylum

Judy Lester of Kerrywood Research found a 1911 census record listing a David Ritchie as one of the inmates of the London County Asylum in Hanwell, Middlesex. Aged 37, born in Tottenham, married and a butler, this David Ritchie was definitely our man.

This was his second year under lock and key. He had been admitted to the London County Asylum in June 1909, the year that Ernest Shackleton's expedition to the South Pole was forced to turn back and the department store Selfridges opened in London. What was life like for him within the institution's walls? Did he dread the heat of the approaching summer? Was he in touch with his wife Maude and son David Scott Ritchie Jr? There is no way of knowing for sure but I can certainly inform my imagination with facts.

The London County Asylum was opened in 1831 as a home for the treatment of insane paupers. For the first time, the government took responsibility for lunatics by covering the cost of their keep and shifting the emphasis from long-term care to treatment and recovery. The use of mechanical restraints was phased out in 1839, thanks to the progressively-minded superintendent John Conolly, who believed that kindness worked better than cruelty. There were courtyards in the centre of the building where patients could get fresh air and sunshine. Work was encouraged and the asylum had its own bakery, brewery and workshop for carpentry. Overcrowding was avoided by continually extending and improving the buildings.

Even though conditions at the asylum were fairly humane, however, David Ritchie Sr must have suffered. As I try to imagine what thoughts swarmed inside his mind, I am reminded of the fact that his young sister, Susan Elizabeth, died at the age of 11. Her death took place just 2 years after the 1891 census in which David had stated he was a junior clerk. Had that tragic event destabilised him? Was he somehow responsible for her death? Is that why he became a footman? Now, 18 years later, was his sleep disturbed by nightmares about demons feasting on his flesh, his daytime fantasies haunted by memories of how he treated Susan while she still lived? Perhaps he felt so guilty and worthless that he shook with fear at the thought of being released from the asylum's highly-regulated environment back into the chaotic and stressful world.

What, meanwhile, was everyone else in his family up to in 1911? I've mentioned before that his wife Maude was working as a cook in Brown Street. As for his son David Scott Ritchie Jr and his mother Emma Eliza Ritchie, those stories will have to wait for another day.

Photo credit: "Park bench" by Bradley Gordon

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A tragic turn of events that led to insanity

I've told the story of how my great-grandmother Maude Alice Parker married a fellow servant, David Scott Ritchie Sr, in the house of the Viscount Hood in February 1901. Whether or not this was a marriage of convenience to legitimise my grandfather is uncertain. What is certain is that the marriage was fraught with problems, as evidenced by documents unearthed by professional researcher Judy Lester.

She found a record showing that David Scott Ritchie of Tottenham was admitted to the London County Asylum in Hanwell, Middlesex on 5 June 1909. He was 36 years old and had been married for just 8 years. Since his marriage, he had worked his way up from being a footman to being a butler, but now something had happened to cause a complete mental breakdown.

It is worth remembering that David's father was a commercial clerk, his older brother William was a furniture dealer, and his younger brother Thomas Scott was in advertising. David himself had been a junior clerk at the age of 17, as recorded in the 1891 census. How then did he end up as a footman in 1901? Did he begin to manifest signs of mental instability in his teens, forcing him to choose a less demanding career? I somehow doubt it. Being a footman and later a butler still demands dillegence and attention to detail. Besides, doctors had not yet come up with treatments for psychiatric conditions that would allow sufferers to continue leading a normal life in society. No, I suspect he found himself in a servant's role because he, like Maude, had done something which caused him to fall from grace.

Scuppered chances of a good career have been known to ruin men before. Particularly if a person has a sensitive nature, disappointment and despair can cripple him. Vincent van Gogh, a highly talented artist, was one such individual who ended up in an asylum. Which leads me to believe that David Scott Ritchie Sr may have been a frustrated genius who could not cope with the prospect of forever serving the gentry when he knew he was capable of more.

Call this wishful thinking, but it makes sense if he is my biological great-grandfather. Grandad, as I've said many times before, was an unusually brilliant man who had far-reaching interests. Had he been locked up in a lunatic asylum, he would have gone mad, especially given his thirst for travel and experiencing life in all its fullness.

I'll come back to the possible reasons for David Scott Ritchie Sr's breakdown in a future post but today I just want to pause and ponder the shocking event of his being diagnosed a lunatic. His freedom was completely taken away. He could no longer hope to regain his respectability in business nor even as a butler. Maude would have to raise her son alone and work hard to keep food on the table. A catastrophe if ever there was one, and no hope of recovery in sight.

Image Description - Corridor in the Asylum (1889) by Vincent Van Gogh. Original from the MET Museum. Digitally enhanced by rawpixel

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A key Paddington address in my grandfather's story

The statuary declaration that states my grandfather's date of birth was signed by his mother, Maude Alice Ritchie, when David was 16 years old. We are now fairly sure that the given date of 31 March 1902 is incorrect, but the address is probably the one where Maude and her husband David Scott Ritchie Sr lived in that year. The address is 22 Albert Street, Paddington.

You may remember me saying in a previous blog post that I didn't find this address when I visited London recently with my husband and daughter. My sister had identified it on a satellite map as the first in a row of Victorian terrace houses which is now a national heritage site but there was some confusion when it came to locating it on a different map. I told myself it didn't matter. There would be time enough to visit Albert Street on another trip. Nevertheless, it was disappointing not to have a sense of the place, a physical context to which I could pin the information.

Than I received the report I had ordered from Judy Lester of Kerrywood Research. She had turned up the 1901 census record for the Albert Street house. This was a record I had tried hard to find when I was putting together a timeline for Maude's life. Where I had failed, Judy succeeded, and the image and transcript she provided confirmed that number 22 was a multi-family dwelling with rooms to rent.

I should mention that Maude and David were already living there on 20 February 1902 when they got married. This is known because both their addresses are written on their marriage certificate. To my mind, this reinforces the theory that David Scott Ritchie Jr had already been born, otherwise their given addresses on the marriage certificate would probably have been different. Be that as it may, my grandfather did live here for a time, and the 1901 census provides insight into his immediate environment.

The house could accommodate 2 families, presumably one upstairs and one downstairs. In 1901 there was a small family called ling [or Long] from Suffolk and a larger family called Dawkins from Kent. Frederick Ling was a contractor's clerk, and he lived with his wife Rachel and sister Mabel. They were all under 35. Valentine and Sarah Dawkins, on the other hand, were in their forties and had 5 children, comprising 4 boys and a girl. Valentine and his two older sons were farriers, his younger son and 10-year-old daughter were scholars, and his youngest son, Francis, was 5 years old.

I suppose, if I may be permitted some creative licence, that Maude and David, along with their infant son, took the place of the Ling family on the upper floor. Maude stayed home to care for the baby while David went to Chesterfield Street to continue working as a footman for the Viscount Francis Hood. Perhaps Sarah from downstairs took the baby from time to time, and perhaps her daughter Dorothy came upstairs to entertain him. But, overall, it would have been a tough time, with David working long hours and Maude feeling shunned by relatives and friends for having a child out of wedlock.

As other documents will show, the family did not survive the pressure. Everything would fall apart by the time David started school. But were the couple happy for a while, at least? Did David get taken to the park on weekends and to the beach for holidays? Or was his love of travel the result of an overly confined childhood, where he was kept out of sight in order to avoid public scrutiny? That's what makes this whole investigation so fascinating.

Image Description - Vintage Victorian style chair engraving. Original from the British Library. Digitally enhanced by rawpixel

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A census record that conveys the promise of a good career

Another document that Judy Lester of Kerrywood Research turned up for me was an 1891 census record for David Scott Ritchie, my great-grandfather. It shows him living in St Ann's Chambers in Blackfriars, City of London with his widowed mother and 9-year-old sister, Susan Elizabeth Ritchie. David Scott is 17 years old and working as a junior clerk.

This makes sense but is also surprising. His being a junior clerk is in keeping with his father William's occupation as a commercial clerk for an oil merchant. Evidently, David showed some acumen in mathematics and record-keeping which allowed him to find an entry-level office job. On the other hand, it is surprising because the following census, taken in 1901, lists him as a footman in Mayfair. His occupation on his marriage certificate a year later confirms the footman position. What brought about this change in fortune? Here is a riddle to puzzle over!

For today, though, I want to concentrate on circumstances as they were for David in 1891.

With his father gone and his older brother William chasing his own career, David and his mother must have found it hard to make ends meet. The census shows that Emma Eliza Ritchie worked as a tie maker. Between her earnings and the money David made from his bookkeeping job, there could hardly have been enough to pay the rent on their rooms and meet their basic needs.

As if struggling financially wasn't enough, David had another problem. His 9-year-old sister Susan wasn't well. She had, according to the census, suffered from epilepsy since birth. In those days, this would have been a serious and worrying complaint. Seizures were untreatable by medication and would have put young Susan in constant danger of hitting her head against a hard corner or falling into the fire.

Nevertheless, the City of London was where everything happened. Even if "junior clerk" only meant sitting at a desk and writing down names and addresses of job-seekers in a book, David was on his way to becoming a respectable office worker. Perhaps he dreamed, as he strode across Blackfriars Bridge, of one day owning a newspaper or running a transport business. Perhaps he gazed at beautiful women in passing carriages and pictured himself marrying into an aristocratic family. Despite the hardships at home, he was almost certainly ambitious and impatient to follow in his successful older brother's footsteps.

Photo credit: "A writer's friends" by Caseywest

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Found: An 1882 baptism record for David Scott Ritchie Sr

In my previous blog post I mentioned that Judy Lester, the professional genealogist I enlisted, accompanied her report about my grandfather with several other interesting documents for our perusal. One of them was the baptismal record for my great-grandfather, David Ritchie Sr.

This baptismal record, sourced from the London Metropolitan Archives, is new to me. I have David Sr's birth record from the third quarter of 1873 and a census record for 1881 in which he is listed as the middle son of William and Emma Eliza Ritchie. The 1882 baptismal record is definitely for him as the parents' names match, yet it means he was baptised at the age of 8. From what I know, this is very unusual.

Also of interest is the location of the baptism. It took place at the Church of St John the Divine in Kennington, lambeth. It stands on Vassall Street near the Oval tube station and the Oval Cricket Ground. Built in the Victorian Gothic style, it had the tallest spire in south London, yet it was hardly older than David himself, having been built between 1871 and 1874. I wonder what prompted William and Emma Eliza to join this new congregation? Did they intend to become fully-involved members or were they just nominal Christians following the prescribed rituals?

When I looked up the exact date of David's baptism, 8 March 1882, I was surprised to find that it fell in a week of national drama. Six days earlier, on 2 March 1882, an attempt had been made on Queen Victoria's life by a 28-year-old Scotsman named Roderick Edward Maclean. The incident happened at Windsor train station just as the queen was walking across the platform. Maclean tried to shoot her with a revolver but was prevented from doing so by the swift action of onlookers. Now, I can't be sure, but I imagine the streets and schoolyard would have been buzzing with gossip about what would happen to the offender. No doubt the presiding priest at David's baptism, Father Day, gave thanks to God that the sovereign's life had been spared.

So, here we have a school-age boy being baptised in a smart new church amidst a flurry of news about the queen's narrow escape. But why the late baptism? Looking back at my notes, I discovered that Emma Eliza was pregnant in early 1882 with her daughter, Susan Elizabeth Ritchie. The child was born sometime in late February, which means it would have made sense to have David baptised at the same time as his sister if he hadn't been christened already. Also noteworthy is that William Ritchie, Emma Eliza's husband, died in the first quarter of that year. Either the couple rushed to get the children baptised before he passed away or or Emma saw to it herself soon after she was widowed. Again, more documentation is needed to arrive at a firm conclusion.

Photo London, Church of St John the Divine, Kennington, Lambeth by Michael Day

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Assistance from a professional genealogical researcher

On returning to South Africa after our family holiday in the UK, I was thrilled to receive an email from Judy Lester, the researcher I enlisted to help me find a birth registration for my grandfather, David Scott Ritchie. Judy is a member of the Association of Genealogists and Researchers in Archives [AGRA]. Her company, Kerrywood Research,, is based in London.

The brief was straightforward; to find documented proof of Grandad's birth to support my application for UK citizenship. I had a certificate for his parents' marriage in 1902 and a timeline for their early lives but there were big gaps in the story. For example, I wanted to know why my great-grandmother Maude was shown to be living apart from her husband and son at the time of the 1911 census. The biggest question, though, was why it had been necessary for Maude to sign a statutory declaration of David's birth when he was 16 years old.

Judy had said she was requesting two separate searches to be done, one at the General Register Office [GRO] and the other at the Westminster Register Office. The second request was initially rejected because pre-1909 records for Paddington are held off-site. Since this fact was not stated on the website, however, Judy took the matter up with the records officer. He eventually agreed to search in Westminster's "deep store" off-site repository but even this extensive search yielded no results.

The report I received convinced me that what we were looking for simply does not exist. As Judy said, it's highly likely that David was born before the date given by Maude on the statutory declaration. Back then, it was very uncommon for a marriage ceremony to be conducted when the bride was seven or eight months pregnant. The date of 31 March 1902 was chosen because it legitimised David's birth.

While I felt disappointed that Judy's investigation hadn't unearthed the missing birth registration for my grandfather, I was nevertheless excited by the conclusion she reached. My sister and I had already speculated at length about the possibility of Grandad being born earlier than Maude claimed. It also lent credence to our conviction that David was the son of someone other than Maude's husband. He had probably been registered under a completely different name. That most certainly deepened the mystery.

Judy Lester's report contained a lot more information besides, which I will share in future blog posts. For now, let me just say that I was more than happy with her services. If you too would like professional help in finding your English ancestors, visit Kerrywood Research and drop Judy Lester a line.

Photo credit: Westminster Walk by Catherine Poh Huay Tan.

Contemplating time in St James Square

The last address I had on my list to visit in London was for a house in St James Square. This was the house where Maude Alice Ritchie was employed as a cook in domestic service at the time of the 1911 census. She was 33 and married, but neither her husband David Scott Ritchie Sr nor her son David Scott Ritchie Jr were recorded as living with her.

Walking into St James Square is a slightly surreal experience, especially when you know your great-grandmother once presided over a kitchen in one of these regal-looking houses. The square is bounded by very solid-looking Victorian-style buildings with columns and steps leading up to large, imposing doors. There isa garden surrounded by a wrought-iron fence in the centre, and when you walk through the garden, which isn't very big, it takes you out onto the street that leads to Pall Mall. There's no doubt about it, this is a very fancy part of london. Even being employed there as a servant must have afforded a certain status. For Maude, growing up as the second youngest of 10 children in a small apartment in Huntsworth Mews, the house and its location must have inspired awe.

The head of the household at the time of the 1911 census was George Sheppard Murray. His wife was Lucy Mary Joanna Murray. The couple were 59 and 43 respectively. George Murray was a retired bank manager from Jaffna, Ceylon, while Lucy was a resident of Hong Kong. Also living in the house in 1911 was their 18-year-old son, Eric Dennys Murray, who is listed as an army student and resident of Singapore.

From my research I knew that the house had once been the site of Cleveland House,, home of the Dukes of Cleveland from 1720 to 1894. When that house fell into disrepair it was demolished and replaced by the house in which Maude worked. That house stood for almost 100 years before being knocked down again. The brick-clad office building which stands there now is the headquarters of the Rolex Watch Company in London, and very impressive it is too.

We didn't go into the building although we could have, I think. It wasn't yet the end of the business day. But it had been a long and tiring walk. Tempers were getting a little frayed and I know when enough is enough. Besides, I definitely want to do another trip to London with my sister, so there will be ample opportunity to fill in all the gaps.

Young love in the streets of Mayfair

After walking through Marylebone and seeing the modest houses where Maude had lived as a child, we found Knightsbridge and Mayfair striking in their grandeur. We were approaching Chesterfield Street where my great-grandmother and great-grandfather were in service together. How they must have congratulated themselves on landing such enviable jobs!

As explained in an earlier blog post, the census record in which they both appear was hard to trace. I had been looking for Maude Parker in the 1901 census and eventually found her listed as Alice Parker. David, for his part, was listed as Daria. Finding them living and working in the same household was an incredible surprise. Better still, it explained how they must have met.

The census record revealed that they were both single and occupied as household staff. They were listed along with 10 other staff members, the most senior being Charles Dixon, aged 55, who must have been the butler. The head of the house was the Viscount Francis Wheler Hood and the only other family members living there were the Viscountess Edith Hood and their adult daughter, the Honourable Dorothy Hood.

We found the address very easily because I had researched the property and discovered that it was now the premises of the High Commission of the Bahamas. Although the house looks fairly compact from the front, it is apparently very spacious inside. In addition to the rooms having high ceilings, the property stretches far back, affording ample space for entertaining and accommodating guests.

In my imagination I can see Maude Alice Parker standing just behind the butler, Charles Dixon, as he holds open the front door. She is ready to take the cloaks and hats from the arriving visitors and show them into the parlour. Meanwhile, David, serving as footman, directs the carriage and horses to the courtyard at the back. Outside on the street, a young boy in heavy boots lights a row of oil lamps. From a house across the way, a silver-haired man with a walking-stick steps out for an evening of high-stakes gambling at his nearby gentleman's club.

I may not be accurate in my depiction of the details of this scene but the exercise is fruitful in making me contemplate

the actual lives of my ancestors. Standing in the street where they had possibly stolen kisses late at night, I came face to face with the fact that Maude Parker and David Ritchie were far more than names on a census. Nor were they staid and starchy as we tend to think the Victorians were. No, the young couple were adventurous, passionate and idealistic, no doubt as full of big dreams for the new century as I once was for the new millennium.

When finding the right location evokes discontent and puzzlement

The address we have for Maude Alice Ritchie in 1918 comes off a statutory declaration she made at the Marylebone Police Station. In it, she states that her son, David Scott Ritchie, was born in Paddington on 31 March 1902 and that her present address is 40 Brown Street. This, then, was where my husband, daughter and I headed after leaving Paddington Green.

Brown Street is near the Marble Arch tube station but not that far from the Marylebone tube station and Huntsworth Mews. It felt like a long way, although it wasn't really. I think the distance felt great because we had already covered several kilometres on foot and I'm unaccustomed to so much walking. A timely reminder that my great-grandparents' lifestyle was substantially more strenuous than ours.

Leaving the busy thoroughfare and passing a quaint-looking pub, we reached an intersection with brick terrace houses to the left and right. Everything was quiet, it being the middle of the afternoon with no-one around. I had the feeling that this was a neighbourhood of reserved, hardworking people who prized their little corner of tranquility in a sprawling, fast-paced city.

The house we were looking for was close to the intersection with an unassuming front door. I was sorry I hadn't done more research about the impact of the Second World War on Brown Street, since it would have been useful in ascertaining whether what we were seeing was the original facade of the house or something that had been added later. Then again, this could not have been Maude's own house since she wasn't a property owner. This was just another place of work for my great-grandmother. Grandad himself had probably never lived here.

All I could glean from my visit was a sense of how close Maude had lived to her childhood home and her siblings, if indeed they had all remained in the area. What I really wanted to know was why her own little family was so split up. Walking the streets she walked and seeing the house where she worked didn't really satisfy my curiosity. If anything, it raised more questions than it answered.

Geographical gaps and genealogy guesswork

Paddington wasn't the pretty, upmarket neighbourhood I had envisaged when planning my trip to London. Somehow I had merged my impressions of the old Victorian tube station with those of paddington Bear and come up with a picture of bright windows and cosy interiors. What I found was a bleak area crouching under a leaden sky, foul-smelling gutters and lots of traffic noise.

What was more, we were coming to a location that was extremely significant in terms of my genealogical research but for which I had very few addresses.

Here's what I knew about Paddington:

First, Maude Alice Parker and David Scott Ritchie had been living here at the time of their wedding in February 1902. In particular, they had been living in Albert Street. However, my husband and daughter had struggled to find an Albert Street address that seemed to fit the facts. So we could not visit the place where David and Maude had first lived as a married couple.

Second, their marriage had happened in Paddington. But I had forgotten to write down any details. My daughter had said something about a registry office, I thought, but none of us could be sure. So visiting the location where the couple signed the marriage register was out of the question too.

Third, my grandfather David Scott Ritchie had been born at Paddington Green, but that could either refer to the Paddington Green Children's Hospital or the general vicinity of Paddington Green. The fact that we had not yet found a birth certificate could suggest that David had been born at home and his birth not registered at all—except that, as I said elsewhere, Maude came from a family where such events were scrupulously recorded. Whether or not David was born at the hospital, though, that building still stands. it is now a health centre offering daytime consultations and its interior has no doubt been significantly modernised. nevertheless, the inscription that identifies it as once having been the Children's Hospital can be clearly seen.

The entrance to the building is directly opposite an entrance to Paddington Green, the park, so we paused there to take photographs. If my grandfather was indeed born there at the end of march 1902, I reflected, the weather in London would not have been very different from today. Perhaps it would have been a bit sunnier and the grass would have sprouted clumps of cheerful daffodils, but the wind would still have plucked at David Scott Ritchie Sr's coat as he turned into the gate

and hurried up the steps.

Of all the images that stayed with me after we left Paddington Green, this is the one that remains. A young father going to see his wife and newborn baby. Feelings of excitement mingled with guilt at having made her pregnant before they were married. Anxiety about whom he might meet in the maternity ward and what he should say to them. Worry about whether this inauspicious start would lay a burden on the child and what, if anything, he could do to make that burden lighter.

Help wanted with the history of Broadley Street

Maude Alice Parker, my great-grandmother, lived in Earl Street at the time of the 1891 census. Today the street has been renamed Broadley Street. I visited there on my recent trip to England, although I doubt it resembles the old Earl Street much these days. A wide, attractive road with good pavements now runs where, probably, a couple of narrow lanes wove before.

If anyone can contribute information about when and why Earl Street became Broadley Street, it would be of great help to me. At this point, I only have suppositions to go on. The following are some thoughts currently brewing in my mind:

Maude and her family lived in a house that is not numbered in the census. I assume this means the houses didn't have a proper numbering system. It is unlikely, therefore, that the family occupied rooms in a large boarding establishment. More likely, they lived in a cottage in a row

On a more whimsical note, the new name "Broadley Street" calls to mind something I read in a wonderful Phil Rickman novel entitled Curfew

. The novel features a gentleman who is investing money into the resuscitation of a depressed town in Herefordshire based on what he knows about ley lines. ley lines are generally regarded as pseudoscience because of the tendency of New Age enthusiasts to equate them with pathways of spiritual power. Yet when Alfred Watkins first coined the phrase in 1921, he was thinking more in terms of ancient trackways for navigation in a densely forested landscape. What is especially interesting is that Watkins coined the term "ley" because the first line he discerned passed through several towns whose names contained the syllable "ley", suggesting that the towns were named thus because they "lay" on the ancient trackways.

So, I'm posing the question: does the name Broadley Street have deep, prehistoric roots? Was there once a marker, such as a standing stone or spring, to guide the footsteps of Britain's early inhabitants? Or is the name simply derived from a certain mr Broadley who happened to live nearby? I rather like the idea that the street in which my great-grandmother came of age was an ancient trackway, but if she only ever knew it as Earl Street, that's okay too.