John Edward Paintin was born on September 6, 1883 and baptised at the ancient church of St. Aldgate, Pembroke Square, Oxford. He was the second of six children born to John Edward Paintin Snr and his wife Julia Betsey.
In the summer of 1906 John Edward jnr married Florence Alice Hazlewood. In 1911 the couple lived with their two young children (a baby had recently died) at 54 Sunningwell Road, Oxford. But by 1913 the family had moved to Swindon and were living at 84 Beatrice Street. John had arrived in Swindon not in search of a job in the GWR Works but as an attendant in the Electric Palace [cinema] in Gorse Hill. A daughter Dorothy Lorna Mary was born on May 3, 1913 and baptised on July 12 at St. Barnabas Church, Gorse Hill. A last child, Gordon, was born and died in 1917.
It is likely John was conscripted in 1916 but unfortunately his military records have not survived and we only know the briefest details about his service from the UK Army Register of Soldiers’ Effects 1901-1929. He died on December 31, 1918 at the Military Hospital, Chiseldon. The hospital was established at the training camp in June 1915 and was soon receiving casualties from the battlefields in France and Flanders. The hospital opened with six wards and 24 beds but was soon extended and supplemented with tented accommodation. By 1917 an additional hospital was built on the site, reserved for patients suffering from sexually transmitted diseases and known locally as the ‘Bad Boys’ Camp.’
John Edward Paintin was buried in Radnor Street Cemetery on January 6, 1918 in a public grave with four others. His last address is given as 15 Handel Street. He was 35 years old.
Florence Alice quickly remarried, as did many young war widows with a family to support, but she was sadly misled by her second husband. Austin Oliver Rogers was a Corporal in the South African Native Labour Corps and the couple met while he lodged with Florence awaiting demobilisation. They married on April 7, 1919 and sailed for South Africa that September. But when they arrived at Barberton in the Eastern Transvaal, Florence discovered Austin’s circumstances were not as he had described. He had promised her that he was well off and that he could provide for her and her children, giving her boys a college education. But the reality was quite different. Austin and his widowed mother lived as tenants on a small farm. The marriage broke down because Austin’s mother refused to accept Florence and her children.
Florence left the family home, placing her children in lodgings, but despite her best efforts and working two jobs her three younger children ended up in a children’s home. Florence died in 1925 in the Johannesburg General Hospital as a result of pneumonia contracted in hospital following an appendectomy.
The two sons that John barely knew both joined the military in their adopted home of South Africa. Edward James joined the SAMC Active Citizen Force later enlisting with the South African Permanent Force.
Radnor Street Cemetery 