The much travelled Criswick family

When Helen Criswick died in 1907 the first name placed on her headstone was that of her husband, although he was not buried with her.

Henry Charles Criswick died at Axim, West Africa on October 6, 1895. Henry, a civil engineer, had spent many years working in West Africa. Infact, he had only recently returned there just two months prior to his death.

Henry Charles Criswick was born in 1838 in Sherborne, Dorset, the son of James Criswick, a printer, and his wife Eleanor. By 1861 Henry and his brother George were lodging in a property in Greenwich where both brothers worked as assistants at the Royal Observatory. This is the last time Henry is captured on a UK census.

In 1868 Henry married Helen Elizabeth Ihler at Monrovia, West Coast of Africa and for most of their married life he worked in West Africa. The couple’s first child, Frances Helena, was baptised at St Alphege Church, Greenwich on March 21, 1871 but at the time of the census taken just a few days later she was living with her grandfather and aunt, without her parents. Perhaps they had returned to West Africa?

How Helen and her children came to be living at 41 Belle Vue Road, Swindon remains unknown. Was Henry working for the GWR at the time? He doesn’t appear with the family on the census returns. By 1891 Helen was living at 11 Claremont Crescent, Weston Super Mare. She must have seen her husband sometime during the intervening 10 years as by then she had two more children, Charles and Margaret. She declares that she was living on an allowance from absent husband – I’m assuming this means absent as in ‘working away’ and nothing more sinister.

On July 31, 1895 Henry sailed on the SS Nubia from Liverpool for Axim where two months later he died from tuberculosis.

So, how did Helen come to be buried here in Radnor Street Cemetery? Had her visit in 1881 endeared her to the town? In 1902 her daughter Helen married Frederick William Yoell, a watchmaker and jewellery dealer. By 1907 they were living in Swindon and premises at 25 Fleet Street, which is the address where Helen Elizabeth Criswick was living at the time of her death.

Helen Elizabeth Criswick was buried in grave plot B2692 on August 25, 1907 – without her husband.