Cottell Brothers- marking time

The re-imagined story …

I once asked my pa if I could have a watch for my birthday. After a brief silence he replied: “Isn’t the hooter loud enough for you lad?”

The Works hooter punctuated our days, its blast heard across the town, even out into the countryside as far as Lydiard Park. Old Lord Bolingbroke fought a long battle with the GWR in his attempt to have it silenced. He said it disturbed his sleep. It disturbed ours as well – that was the whole point of it!

My heart’s desire as a fourteen year old was to own a pocket fob watch. I would wear it in my waistcoat pocket attached by a gold chain. Before you scoff, I did have a waistcoat, all of us lads did. It was a part of the Works unofficial uniform in my day; not the old fashioned white ducks nor the boiler suits that came much later. No, we wore trousers, a jacket and a waistcoat – and a cap, mustn’t forget the cap.

The clock on the Rolleston Arms keeps poor time these days. I’ve just checked it against my pocket watch and its running five minutes slow. That would never have happened in Mr Cottell’s day.

The facts …

The Cottell family have left an enduring legacy with their clocks and watches, which occasionally appear for sale online, but unravelling their burial history has been less straightforward.

Image published courtesy of Local Studies, Swindon Central Library.

Buried in plot A174 is James Hall Cottell and his wife Ann. The family does not appear to have a long association with Swindon nor the clock and watch making industry come to that. James worked as a clerical assistant most of his life, later becoming a brewer’s manager. He died in February 1891 at Bedminster, Bristol. His father, James Cottell, was a Captain in the Royal Marines, as is mentioned on the headstone – see below.

Joseph’s son Arthur William Joseph Cottell pops up in Swindon on the 1881 census living at 32 Carfax Street. He is working as a Railway Clerk as is his eldest son also named Arthur William Joseph. The younger children are Charles 15, Lydia 12, Walter 10 and Frederick 7 who are all still at school.

By 1891 the census reveals that the family are now living in Regent Street where Charles and his younger brother Walter are both working as Watchmakers & Jewellers.

When Mary and Arthur died in 1892 and 1897 respectively they were buried in grave plot E8150.

Their son Charles James of clock and watch making fame died in 1916 and was buried with his grandparents in plot A174. His name was not added to the headstone, presumably because there was no room on the front.

Their only daughter Lydia married first Henry Herbert Oswald and secondly Frederick William Roger Williams. She died in September 1925 in Clapham Park. She is not buried in Radnor Street Cemetery.

Youngest son Frederick died in Swindon in 1953 but he is not buried in Radnor Street Cemetery.

Eldest son Arthur died in Worthing, West Sussex in 1958 and he is not buried in Radnor Street Cemetery either.

Arthur and Mary’s third son, Walter Henry, an engineer, died in 1968 in South Africa where he had lived for a number of years, apparently having forsaken the clock and watch making business, too.

For a family who once marked time in Swindon their individual deaths passed with little notice.