Edmund Miller Odey – 50 years in the railway works

In 1924 King George V and Queen Mary made a visit to Swindon and the GWR Works. The town definitely pushed out the boat for the royal visit and there are numerous photographs of them on their tour of the railway factory. This photograph is entitled Swindon Works Veterans Inspected by Their Majesties the King and Queen April 28, 1924. The photograph shows 75 men who had completed 50 years in the railway works. In the back row, second from the right, is Mr Edmund Miller Odey.

Edmund was born in Chiseldon in 1859, one of John and Matilda Odey’s five sons. As a sixteen-year-old Edmund began his 5-year apprenticeship in the Smith’s shop on March 20, 1875. Boys were often employed in the Works at a younger age but could not officially begin their apprenticeship until their 16th birthday. His daily rate of pay was 10d (that’s about 5p today) in the first year rising to 2/6 (about 13p) in his final and fifth year. Edmund worked all his life as a Smith’s striker, a physically demanding job, which he was still doing up to his 65^th birthday at the time of the royal visit.

He married in 1892 and he and his wife Mary Ann had 10 children of whom 6 had died by 1911. The family lived at a number of different addresses across Swindon – their first home together was in Radnor Street, then by 1901 they were at 3 John Street, in 1909 they were at 4 John Street and in 1911 they were at 5 John Street. All this suggests to me that they did not own their own home but were renting, probably moving frequently.

Mary Ann died in 1914 and she is also buried here in Radnor Street Cemetery but not with Edmund.

So, where does Edmund lie after all those years of hard graft in the mighty GWR factory? He died in July 1928, not many years after that feted royal visit, and he is buried in grave plot C219 a public grave, once commonly called a pauper’s grave.

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