Charlotte Andrews – Crimea War

Portrait of Charlotte Wilsdon by Guggenheim, Regent Circus, Swindon

 

The re-imagined story …

When dad took ill last January, Mrs Andrews sat with him through the night to give mum a break. She hadn’t lived in Spring Gardens for very long, but already we had a lot to thank her for.

She moved in with her daughter a few months ago and quickly became one of those women neighbours called upon in an emergency; although not many people could boast that they had a nurse who had served in Scutari Hospital under Florence Nightingale.

There were some who didn’t believe the stories, but I did, especially after she nursed dad through the deliriums of his illness. She was methodical and well organised and scrupulously clean, all habits she had learned from Miss Nightingale, she said. She told me about the awful conditions in the Scutari Hospital when the nurses first arrived and how more soldiers were dying on the wards there than on the battlefields during fighting in the Crimea War.

Listening to her talk I thought that somebody should be recording her stories. Surely we should be celebrating the life of this extraordinary woman.

Mrs Andrews was for me an inspirational character. I didn’t become a nurse, that was not to be my vocation, but I studied history and now I write and record the lives of amazing women like Charlotte Andrews.

The facts …

In June to August 1854 20% of the British Expeditionary Force in the Crimea fell sick with cholera, diarrhoea and dysentery. Almost 1,000 men died before a shot was fired in what was then called the Russian War.

On September 30, 1854 The Times correspondent in Constantinople reported that there were not enough surgeons and nurses; not enough linen for bandages; that wounded soldiers often waited a week before being seen by a doctor on board ship from Balaclava to Constantinople.

It was news reports such as these that galvanised Florence Nightingale into applying her nursing skills where they were so desperately needed. 

Together with a group of 38 women volunteers Florence left London Bridge Station early on October 23, 1854. From Folkestone the women boarded the Boulogne packet; then they travelled via Paris and Lyons to Marseilles where they took the mail steamer Vectis to Scutari. The journey lasted 13 days. Among these women was Charlotte Wilsdon, a woman born in Abingdon, who would end her days living in Spring Gardens, Swindon.

At the outbreak of war in 1854 Charlotte was living in Oxford with her two young daughters. She had been married and widowed twice and was then working as a tailoress, taking in lodgers to make ends meet. In October of that year Charlotte responded to Florence Nightingale’s appeal for nursing volunteers. Charlotte was recommended by Dr Henry Wentworth Acland, and it is likely she gained her nursing experience during the cholera epidemic that had swept through Oxford earlier that year.

Florence Nightingale and her corps of nurses arrived in Turkey on November 4, on the eve of a major Russian attack at Inkerman.

Following the battle the Rev Sidney Godolphin Osborne described conditions at Scutari, a former military building where those wounded at Inkerman were brought, as being totally unfit to serve as a hospital. Patients were lined up along the corridors, their beds mere thin stuffed sacking mattresses and rotten wooden divans. There was a shortage of medicines and food. Charlotte and the other newly arrived nurses began work immediately, attending to hundreds of casualties where deaths numbered 20-30 a day.

Florence Nightingale’s nurses were paid 12–14 shillings (60-70p) a week, which included their keep and a uniform, rising to 18-20 shillings (90p-£1) following a year’s good conduct. Drunkenness proved a big problem among the unqualified women and several were dismissed. However, it was with regret that Florence had to send the invalided Charlotte back to England. 

In a letter to Lady Cranworth, a member of the management committee, dated June 7, 1856 she writes:

‘Charlotte Wilsdon, I regret to say, I was obliged to invalid home 23 May by the advice of the medical officers. She is a kind, active and useful nurse, a strictly sober woman. And, I consider, well entitled to the gratuity of the month’s wages, promised by the War Office, and which I venture to solicit you grant her. I have directed her to apply to you.’

After more than a year of working in such dangerous and challenging conditions, her health compromised, Charlotte returned home to Abingdon. 

Charlotte was born in Abingdon in 1817, the daughter of Stephen Cox, a carpet weaver, and his wife Ann.  She married and outlived three husbands.  Her first was William Higgins, a carpet weaver, who died leaving Charlotte a widow at the age of 26 with two young daughters, Harriet and Selina, to support.  She married William Wilsdon two years later but by the age of thirty-three Charlotte was widowed for a second time. In 1859 Charlotte married William Andrews.  Widowed for the third time in 1869, Charlotte lived independently for many years until old age and infirmity caught up with her.  Sometime during the early 1890s she moved to Swindon to live with her daughter.

She died on March 22, 1896 at her daughter Harriet’s home, 3 Spring Gardens, Swindon. She was buried on March 27 in Radnor Street Cemetery in plot C772 which she shares with Hannah Richards who died in 1944 and is probably a family member.

 

Christ Church – The Old Lady on the Hill

In previous years Andy and I have conducted the occasional guided churchyard walk at Christ Church. Built in 1851 the churchyard is the final resting place of many of Swindon’s Victorian entrepreneurs and, of course, the ordinary, working class people as well. Our much loved and sadly missed Radnor Street Cemetery colleague Mark Sutton rests here.

By the 1840s the medieval parish church of Holy Rood, close to the Goddard family home at The Lawn was proving inadequate to cater for the needs of the rapidly growing industrial Swindon.

A church had stood on the site since the end of the 12th century, possibly longer, but with the arrival in 1847 of an energetic young clergyman Rev. H.G. Baily came the impetus to build a new church.

Fashionable architect Gilbert Scott received the commission to design the new church hot on the heels of his success at St. Mark’s in the Railway Village.

The new church was built at a cost of £8,000, funding was originally sought through the Church Rate, a tax imposed on all householders whether or not they attended Church of England services. Unpopular, especially among non-conformists, this was eventually abandoned and the debt remained outstanding until 1884.

The consecration ceremony at Christ Church took place on November 7 1851 officiated by the Rt. Rev. Dr. Ollivant, Bishop of Llandaff, a mere 17 months after the foundation stone was laid on land at the top of Cricklade Street donated by Ambrose Goddard.

Pew listings for the newly opened church record that Ambrose Lethbridge Goddard paid for the first two pews on the south side of the Nave to seat twelve family members and another nine sittings in the South Transept for his servants.

The Goddard family are remembered in many of the fixtures and fittings in the church. In 1891 the reredos (panelling behind the altar) was presented by Pleydell and Jessie Goddard in memory of their brother Ambrose Ayshford Goddard. In 1906 the brother and sister dedicated the pulpit to the memory of their parents while the previous year Edward Hesketh Goddard presented the font in memory of his wife.

Despite the grandeur of the building, the people of Swindon preferred their order of service to be plain and simple. While Rev. J.M.G. Ponsonby battled to maintain unpopular High Church ritual at St. Mark’s, at Christ Church there was an absence of all pomp. Documents reveal that there was no surpliced choir, that altar lights were never used and that the preacher dressed in a black gown.

Builder Thomas Turner and his wife Mary. The Turner home is now the site of Queen’s Park.

The Toomer family memorial. The Toomer family home was the former Swindon Museum and Art Gallery in Bath Road.

This is the New family memorial. Swindon school teacher Edith Bessie New moved to London and joined the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) becoming an active, militant Suffragette, continuing a personal campaign for women’s rights throughout her lifetime. She is buried in the cemetery at her last home Polperro, Cornwall.

The Morris family memorial. William Morris was the founder of the Swindon Advertiser.

Mrs Annie Brooks – a remarkable family longevity

When Annie Brooks died in 1907 The Gloucester Citizen published some interesting facts and figures and it would appear that Annie came from a line of long lived ladies. Her mother died at the age of 98 and her grandmother at 105. Now of course, I wanted to know more about these women and it would have helped me enormously if someone had thought to insert a few names, but I was up for the challenge!

First I began to pin down Annie’s son George. George had been resident in Swindon since at least 1871 when he appears on the census returns as living at 20 Fleet Street with his first wife Elizabeth and their baby daughter Adelaide.

George was born in Bristol in 1846 the son of Joseph and Annie Brooks. In 1851 the Brooks family were living in Berkley Square, Bedminster and continued to live at various addresses in Bedminster through the 1850s, to the 90s when Joseph died. Annie moved to Swindon to live with George and his family and appears with them on the 1901 census returns. So now I needed to find Annie and Joseph’s marriage to discover her maiden name and possibly access her mother’s name.

Joseph and Annie were married in Bristol at the church of St. Philip and St. Jacob on September 4, 1842. Annie’s maiden name was Stock and when George gave her details to the enumerator at the time of the 1901 census he said his mother’s birthplace was Tidenham, Gloucester. It was here that I found her baptismal record on 29th December 1811. Her parents were Nicholas and Joan Stock so now I needed to find their marriage. This took place on April 4, 1795 at Kenn Juxta Yatton when Nicholas Stock married Joan Taylor.

Now you’d be surprised at just how many Joan [Joanna] Taylors there were living in Somerset/Gloucestershire in the second half of the 18th century (and we know this family moved about a bit) which rather put the kibosh on tracing the last lady in this trio of long lived lovelies. And I was beginning to wonder about the great ages too.

On May 24, 1841 the widowed Joan Stock (Annie’s mother) married William Rawling at Kenn. Widowed for a second time, Joan Rawling formerly Stock nee Taylor was living with Annie and Joseph Brooks in Bedminster at the time of the 1851 census when she was 85 years old. She died six years later, which would have made her 91 so not quite the legendary 98, but an impressive age nonetheless, don’t you think? And as to her mother, well I’ve had to give up on that lady for the time being, but I’d like to think she did make it to her 105th birthday!

Remarkable Family Longevity

There were laid to rest in Swindon Cemetery this week the mortal remains of the late Mrs Anne Brooks, mother of Mr George Brooks, a Great Western Railway official, of Park-lane, Swindon, who passed away at her son’s residence at the ripe age of 96 years. It is interesting to recall the fact that the deceased old lady’s mother died at the advanced age of 98 years, that that lady’s mother, Mrs. Brooks’s grandmother, lived to be 105 years old, so that the united ages of mother, daughter, and granddaughter totalled 298 years.

The Citizen, Friday April 5, 1907.

Burial Registers

Brooks, Annie   97 years   22 Park Lane  burial 30th March 1907  grave plot E8522

Mary Gibbs – A Swindon Octogenarian

The re-imagined story …

Do you believe that a house can retain memories? Have you ever visited a house and felt it had an atmosphere?

“Can’t you feel it?”

“All I can feel is damp. I bet this place hasn’t got a damp course.”

The row of stone-built cottages had once overlooked the canal before it was filled in, but it wasn’t damp that I was feeling.

“This could be a happy home,” I suddenly blurted out, but that wasn’t the plan. We were looking for a cheap property to renovate and sell on. “I could happily live here.”

“Really! Have you seen the bathroom?”

I wondered who had once lived here. Not recently, we knew who the vendors were, I mean in the past. Who had lived here when it was a brand-new property? How many children had squeezed into the bedroom upstairs, one of only two in the beginning? I bet there was a clothes line running the length of that long garden, full of washing every Monday; pinafore dresses and shirts, lots of shirts and overalls. I wondered how many meals had been eaten around the kitchen table? How many prayers had been said in this house?

I wasn’t quite sure what I was feeling – well, I did but if I blurted it out Darren would think I’d lost the plot. Ha, I know he sometimes has his doubts about me anyway.

This had been a busy house, but there was something else about the place, a sense of serenity. This was a house of God, a house where God had resided. I could just imagine telling Darren that.

“Let’s get back to the estate agent. See if there’s any movement on the price. Personally, I think they’re asking too much for it. And I bet it hasn’t got a damp course.”

The facts …

Death of Mrs Gibbs

Interesting Reminiscences

Rode on a Stage Coach and Electric Trams

There was laid to rest in Swindon Cemetery on Thursday in last week the mortal remains of Mrs Mary Gibbs, late of 120 Broad Street, and widow of the late Mr William Gibbs, who resided for many years at 46, Cambria Place, Swindon. The deceased lady, who had attained to the great age of 88 years, and retained all her faculties to the end, was an interesting personality. She was probably the oldest member of the Baptist community in Swindon, and was in the service of the Rev. Richard Breeze, before he came to Swindon and opened a Baptist Church here at the corner of Fleet Street and Bridge Street. Her late husband, who died 17 years ago, was one of the pioneers of the Ancient Order of Foresters in Swindon, and assisted at the opening of Court “Briton’s Pride,” A.O.F., and also the “Vale of White Horse” Court, Shrivenham. He was himself initiated a member of the Order at Abingdon, when he was residing at Sutton Courtenay, and remained a Forester until his death, having been a member for over fifty years.

The deceased lady was born at Lechlade, and her earliest recollections of Swindon was riding through this part of the country on a stage coach. What is now known as New Swindon then comprised only green fields. She lived to see the whole of the land built on, the electricity works opened in the neighbourhood where she resided, and more than once rode on the electric trams, notwithstanding her great age.

Her husband worked on the GWR during the construction of the line between Didcot and Swindon. He was connected with the Baptist Church, and took a leading part in the opening of the Rehoboth Baptist Chapel at the top of Rolleston Street, Swindon.

At the funeral of the deceased lady the burial service was conducted by Mr. S. Chappell, of the Rehoboth Baptist Church. The mourners included deceased’s five sons, Charles, William, Harry, George and John Gibbs, a grand-daughter, two grand-sons, and other relatives and friends.

There were many beautiful wreaths and other floral tributes placed on the grave.

The Swindon Advertiser, Friday, July 16, 1909.

Mary Gibbs 88 years 120 Broad Street burial 8th July 1909 plot number B2073

1871 census

Cambria Place

William Gibbs Head of household 47 Platelayer born Swindon

Mary Gibbs wife 49 born Berks Coleshill

Charles H. Gibbs son 21 Boiler Smith born Berks. Sutton

William J. Gibbs son 19 Boiler Smith born Stratton

Henry H. Gibbs son 17 Moulder born Stratton

Mary J. Gibbs daughter 15 Domestic Servant born Stratton

Edward J. Gibbs son 12 Scholar born Stratton

George Gibbs son 9 Scholar born Stratton

John Gibbs son 6 Scholar born Stratton

Disgraceful scenes in the cemetery

When my much loved Auntie Ruth died more than thirty years ago I was surprised at the number of ladies who attended her funeral and sang with great gusto. It was unexpected as I was her only living relative and she had few friends, so I was anticipating a small and sad funeral. I later discovered that these ladies were members of the church, and although my auntie had not attended for many years, they accompanied every funeral, adding their voices to the hymns and responses.

Andy Binks, my cemetery walk colleague, likes to read out a letter published in the Swindon Advertiser in 1902 where uninvited mourners were definitely not appreciated. Our next guided walk is on Sunday June 1, meet at the chapel at 1.45 pm for a 2 pm start. I’m sure Andy will ready out this letter; it’s the reference to womanly instincts that amuses him.

Correspondence

Disgraceful Scenes

To the Editor of the Swindon Advertiser

Sir, – It has been my sad duty to visit the Swindon Cemetery rather frequently of late, and I have been struck with what I can only call the disgraceful scenes which are allowed almost daily to take place in what should be a sacred ground. Whenever there is a funeral, one notices the same crowd of women trampling over the graves to obtain a sight of the mourners and to discuss the qualities of the deceased. One day last week I happened to be there whilst three funerals took place, and the crowd appeared quite to forget the sadness of the occasion, their only object being to get a glimpse of all three gatherings.

Surely the officials must know these heartless gossips by now, and they should be given the power to prevent their admittance to the Cemetery grounds.

To any person who has a dear one resting there, it is painful to think that his or her last resting place is being trampled upon by women whose curiosity tide what should be their best womanly instincts.

Thanking you in anticipation. – I remain, yours truly,

A RATEPAYER

Swindon Advertiser October 1902.

Chapel of St John the Evangelist

It’s an extraordinary fact that for more than 600 years the Chapel of St. John the Evangelist in the Tower of London was used to hold important documents. It has to be conceded that there was probably no safer place in London for them.

The 11th century chapel situated on the first floor of the White Tower was built for William, the conquering Norman king. However, by the 13th century the chapel was used less frequently until it became a repository for documents of national importance.

The chapel was restored in the 1860s and once again became a place of worship, used initially by non-conformist and Catholic members of the Tower’s community. It is now used by all members with regular monthly services.

Today the beautiful chapel is on the sight seeing tour and it is sometimes difficult to find the peace and quiet in which to appreciate the building. But visitors are suitably awed and generally more subdued when they come across the breathtaking Romanesque architecture with soaring columns and vaulted roof.

From May to November 2025 the Tower of London is yet again the setting for a national war memorial.

More than 30,000 ceramic poppies, made by the artist Paul Cummins, are displayed cascading from the Tower. Cummins and designer Tom Piper were the same team responsible for the Blood Sweat Lands and Seas of Red installation at the Tower in 2014 to commemorate the centenary of the beginning of WWI.

The new installation to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the end of WWII symbolises ‘a wound at the heart of the Tower’ which itself was hit by a bomb during the London Blitz on October 5, 1940, killing two people.

The installation opened on May 6 and will remain open until November 11. Visit https://www.hrp.org.uk/tower-of-london/whats-on/tower-remembers-2025/#gs.lrc6ji for further details.

Dibsdall family

Dibsdall 2

This magnificent cross is a memorial to members of the Dibsdall family.

Susan Dibsdall is the first member of the family to be buried here. Susan was baptised on November 8, 1809 one of James and Susanna Pope’s six children to be baptised in the parish church at Sherborne, Dorset. Susan married Thomas Dibsdall at the parish church in Bedminster on May 13, 1830.

At the time of the 1841 census the couple were living in Cheap Street, Sherborne with their seven children where Thomas worked as a smith. By 1851 they were living in the Parade, Sherborne where the couple’s eldest three sons, Thomas, Charles and William, worked alongside their father as smiths. The family now comprised 11 children, but Thomas would die shortly after the census was taken that year.

In 1861 Susan was living at Green Hill with her two youngest sons Henry and Godfrey. Ten years later she was working as a housekeeper for Mary Thomas, described on the census as ‘Lady’.

By 1881 she had left Sherborne, her home for more than 60 years, to live with her son Woodford Dean Dibsdall. Woodford, who was married with his own large family, had lived for a few years in Camberwell. It is thought he moved to Swindon and a job in the Works in about 1874.

The Dibsdall family have a double size burial plot in Radnor Street Cemetery and a large memorial. Edward Dean Dibsdall died in the University Hospital London aged 19 and was buried on April 30, 1902 alongside his grandmother Susan in plot E7039. Ellen, Woodford’s wife, died in 1920 aged 81 years and Woodford in July 1928 aged 83. They are buried together in plot E7040.

Susan Dibsdall – Personal Estate £966 3rd August.

The will as contained in Writings A and B of Susan Dibsdall late of 8 Vilett Street New Swindon in the County of Wilts Widow who died 1st January 1882 at 8 Vilett Street was proved at the Principal Registry by Thomas Dean Dibsdall of 28 Lambeth road Lambeth in the County of Surrey Blacksmith Henry Pope Dibsdall of 22 Denmark Street St Giles in the Fields in the County of Middlesex Carpenter and Woodford Dean Dibsdall of 8 Vilett Street Engine Fitter the Sons the Executors

Dibsdall, Woodford Dean of 4 Sheppard Street, Swindon, Wiltshire died 18 July 1928 Probate Salisbury 20 August to Arthur George Dibsdall railway works inspector Effects £1089 12s 4d.

Rehoboth Chapel

The Rehoboth Chapel following damage during major redevelopment at Regent Circus in 2014.

The dissenting congregation in Swindon was a relatively small one until the GWR Works came to town, attracting workers from across the country, many of whom were non-conformists.

By the end of the 19th century it could seem as if every street of red brick terraces had a chapel.

Many of these buildings still survive, some used as community halls, some occupied by small businesses and others converted into private dwellings. Perhaps even more surprisingly some continue to be used as a place of worship.

One of these chapels came under threat when the Regent Circus development shook the foundations of the Rehoboth Chapel at the bottom of Prospect Hill and almost caused its demolition.

The Chapel was closed for more than two years while the Regent Circus developers ISG undertook the extensive repairs needed on the 132 year old building. One of the corners of the chapel had subsided and had to be rebuilt while 38 new piles were driven into the foundations to which the walls were fastened.

The chapel reopened in 2016 and today looks good enough to last another 130 years.

Opening of a New Baptist Chapel

A new Baptist chapel which has been erected at the top of Rolleston-street, in an admirable position between Old and New Swindon, by a section of the Strict Baptist denomination, which seceded some four or five years ago from the church worshipping in Prospect, was open for public worship on Wednesday. Since the split the seceders have held their services in a hall in Bellevue-road, which has, however, become too small to accommodate the worshippers. The new edifice, which is a small, plain structure, in the Gothic style of architecture, will seat 200 persons, and is a light and well ventilated building. A considerable portion of the cost has yet to be raised. The opening proceedings commenced by a short religious service in the chapel, after which the worshippers adjourned to the Central-hall (which had been placed at their disposal by Mr C. Hurditch, of the Evangelistic Mission) where three sermons were preached in the course of the day to full congregations by Mr C. Hemington (Devizes) Mr W.S. Ford (Bath), and Mr A.B. Taylor (Cirencester). A tea meeting was held in the afternoon.

The Swindon Advertiser, Saturday, May 20 1882.

Margaret Davies – Late of Great Hoaten

A trip away from Swindon is a good excuse to go cemetery crawling and during a visit to Pembrokeshire I managed to squeeze in a quite a few.

The church of St Ishmaels was founded in the mid 6th century by the son of a Cornish prince. A notice in the church tells how Ishmael and two of his brothers along with SS Teilo and Aidan founded a monastery at St. David’s. The small church has been much enlarged across the centuries. A short walk leads to Monk Haven cove, named after a monastic settlement that once existed here.

St Ishmael’s churchyard was very overgrown but it was still possible to catch a glimpse of some of the headstones. Online parish registers are available dating back to 1761 but I wasn’t able to see any memorials that old.

One that did catch my eye was a headstone dedicated to Margaret Davies who died in 1869. Someone had made sure that it was mentioned on her headstone that she was ‘Late of Great Hoaten.’ Great Hoaten Farm has been associated with the Davies family since at least 1792 and a mortgage drawn up by Joseph and Dinah Davies.

The last census on which Margaret appears is the 1861 when she was living at Little Haven and described as a retired farmer. Living with her was her 12-year-old son Thomas, the youngest of her 10 children.

Margaret was born at Penally Court Farm in about 1810, the daughter of Rev Thomas Rowe and his wife Patty (Martha) Cornock. Margaret married farmer Thomas Davies in the church of St. Ishmaels on August 17, 1829 and after several years living at Gilton Farm, Walwyn’s Castle, the family make their appearance at Great Hoaton Farm on the 1841 census. The establishment at Great Hoaton comprised approximately 140 acres and in 1841 Thomas employed four female servants, two male servants and a governess to teach his rapidly growing family.

When Margaret died in 1869 her last address is given as Bicton. Despite having such a large family, the sole executor of her will was William John, a grocer from Quay Street, Haverfordwest.

However, the Davies family connection with Great Hoaten Farm continued and in 1939 Margaret’s grandchildren were running the farm. Thomas 55 and his brother Claudy 51 along with their sisters Maud 54, who was housekeeper and Elsie 40, who worked as a dairymaid.

I’m not convinced that this headstone has not been moved. It looks as if it is leaning up against the tree rather than being in situ.

Reminds me how lucky we are to have access to so much information regarding Radnor Street Cemetery.

Celia Morkot – the first woman employed in the Works

The re-imagined story …

I started in the Works in the polishing department in 1937 and stayed for two years. I hated every day I was there.

French polishing sounds as if it might be a delicate, artistic occupation. I suppose there was an element of artistry about, it but it certainly wasn’t delicate. French polishing involved stripping back to the basic wood, making good any damage and then building up the polish again, brushing and sanding, brushing and sanding. A door could take you five days, on and off. We worked on anything made of wood, everything from panels and partitions to toilet seats.

12A Shop was in the Carriage Works along London Street and it was cold and filthy. We were quite separate from the men in the railway factory and had our own facilities. That’s a laugh, one toilet with two washbasins and some disinfectant soap useless at getting all the muck off our hands. Methylated spirits worked much better but it was hard on your hands and left them red and raw.

The mess room was under the workshop but no one wanted to spend their lunchtime there. When the weather was good me and Ivy used to walk to the GWR Park and eat our sandwiches on a bench. It got you out of the dirt and fumes for a bit.

In those days, just before the Second World War, jobs in the Works were few and far between for women. In fact, the polishing department was the first to employ women back in the 1870s. A big deal had been made about ‘the comfort of the women.’ Ha, well by 1937 that had all gone by the board.

My dad used to keep on about getting a trade and being set up for life, as if I were a man, but I couldn’t wait to get out of that place. All I wanted was a nice, clean little job before Ted and me got married. I looked forward to polishing my own furniture and it would be a sight easier than French polishing railway carriage doors, I can tell you.

London Street

The Carriage and Wagon Works, London Street published courtesy of Local Studies, Swindon Central Library.

The facts …

By the 1870s the railway factory had been in operation for some 30 years but the GWR were finding it difficult to recruit skilled men. The problem was a shortage of jobs in Swindon for young women, the railwaymen’s daughters. The men wouldn’t move their families to Swindon if there was no work for their daughters.

Joseph Armstrong, the Locomotive, Carriage and Wagon Superintendent, the top man, addressed the problem by extending the Carriage Works on London Street and creating a separate upholstery department for the employment of girls only. By the end of 1874 five women were employed in the new trimming department.

Celia Folland was born in Tredegar, Monmouthshire in 1857, the daughter of Richard Folland, a rail sawer, and his wife Margaret. By 1871 the family had moved to Swindon and were living at 1 Reading Street in the railway village.

Celia Folland was the first woman to be employed in a GWR workshop where she worked as a French polisher, checking in for the first time on July 18, 1874.

Celia married George Morkot at St Mark’s Church, Swindon on July 19, 1883 and by 1891 they were living at 31 Chester Street with their three children, Charles 6, Nellie 4 and George 2. Celia would go on to have another four children.

Celia died aged 65 years old in February 1922 at 31 Chester Street where the family had lived for more than 30 years. Her funeral took place at Radnor Street Cemetery on February 15 and she is buried in plot D1613.

Celia Morkot