RIDGERS FAMILIES

RIDGERS TREES A

ODIHAM AREA MAPA

OLD HAMPSHIRE MAPSI

YATELEY RECORDSA

OLD FLEET & CROOKHAMI

FLEET AND THE RIDGERS FAMILIES

You will not find the town of Fleet mentioned in any of the early Ridgers births, deaths and marriage or on census forms before 1891 but Fleet and neighbouring Church Crookham is the area between Yateley and Crondall that housed a number of the early Ridgers' families. 

Fleet is a fairly modern town. It did not exist before 1840 and in 1860 there were only about 300 inhabitants.

Isaac Taylor's Map of Hampshire drawn in 1759 shows Fleet Pond, Fleet Farm, the Mill north of the pond and Broomhurst Farm a little further west. These three habitations comprise the whole of Fleet until about 1840.

In 1871 there were 381 inhabitants and in 1885 the population was in the region of 700 persons.

The consecration of All Saints Church took place in 1862. In the first ten years after its opening there were only eighteen marriages. The first Register was not completed until 1922, and contains the records of less than 500 marriages.

			Until 1894 Fleet and Crookham were in the civil parish of Crondall, but in that year they became separated and each had its own parish council. In 1904 Fleet and Crookham were created an Urban District. Around 1912 there were about 3,000 people living in Fleet and a similar number in Crookham. In 1924 the greater part of Crookham was taken into the Fleet Urban District Council Fleet returned the highest birth rate in the country. Since then the district has continued to grow, and between 1946 and 1975 the population had grown from a little over 8,000 to over 23,000. The church of All Saints at Fleet was consecrated in 1862 and in the first ten years  there were only eighteen marriages. The first Church Register was not completed until 1922, and contains the records of less than 500 marriages.
	Fleet Mill in the early 1800s

A family living at  Fleet Mill would till 1881 be shown on the census returns as being from Hawley, which previously was part of Yateley parish, and in 1901 from "the Hamlet of Fleetbrooke" in the parish of Hawley. Neighbouring Dogmersfield, before becoming a part of Fleet, was in Crondall Parish.

Some Yateley marriage entries are erroneously ascribed to Hawley in the IGI (Hawley 1813-1838). Originally what are now Yateley, Hawley and Cove ecclesiastical parishes were all part of Yateley Parish. The Cove records start in 1844, and Hawley in 1838.

Our early families in some instances would only have to relocate a little over a mile to be in a completely different parish and county. Many were farmers who rented their farms and fields and would often move at the end of a lease. Those who were agricultural labourers would sometimes go to their new employers' tied cottages.

GRO records can also mislead  family historians from outside the area. Hartley Wintney is the district office for its surrounding Hampshire villages.   Easthampstead for Sandhurst, Bracknell and Ascot, and Chertsey for the Bagshot/Windlesham area. Farnham for those around Frimley.

Any in-depth County family research is  made more difficult by Yateley's geographical position. Being situated on the Hampshire/Berkshire/Surrey borders, viewing original parish records often requires visits to the Record Offices at Winchester, Reading or West Surrey. 

In 1870-72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Crondall like this:

"CRONDALL, a village, a tything, a parish, and a hundred in Hants. The village stands on the Roman road to Silchester, near the ancient British Maulth way and the Basingstoke canal, 3 miles W by N of Farnham r. station, and 4¼ ESE of Odiham; and has a post office under Farnham. The tything includes the village; and bears the name of Crondall and Swanthorpe. Pop., 492 Houses, 104. The parish contains also the tythings of Ewshott, Dippenhall, and Crookham. Acres, 9, 614. Real property, £9, 026. Pop., 2, 764. Houses, 563.

The hundred is in Odiham division; contains five parishes; and is cut into lower half and upper half. Acres, 12, 244 and 16, 025. Pop., 2, 633 and 3, 645. Houses, 528 and 696."

In his will dated 885, Alfred the Great, the Saxon King bequeathed the Hundred of Crondall to his nephew Eltham. A 'Hundred' being the Saxon division of land from which a hundred men at arms could be raised, (within this Hundred of Crondall lay the areas now known as Fleet and Crookham). 

The Hundred of Crondall included Yateley to the north, Long Sutton to the south, Farnborough and Aldershot to the east and extended westwards to the boundaries of Elvetham, Dogmersfield and Winchfield which came within the Hundred of Odiham. This area was divided into 'Manors', Itchell, Ewshot, Crokeham, Well, Feldmead, Dippenhall, Farnborough and Aldershot.

Yateley

The bulk of Ridgers family research shows Robert Ridgers, a shoemaker, who was born at Yateley in 1706 as the common ancestor. Married to Mary Nicholson in 1743 and living at Yateley, they  produced at least 12 children.

He  was the son of Yateley born John Ridgers (1659-1747) who married Sarah Whinyard (1672) at Ockham near Guildford in 1694. John's father was Lawrence Rydyar (1635) from Crondall. His father was also named Lawrence and was born at that parish in 1610.

1788 Map - Yateley top right corner. Crondall bottom right.

Of Robert's family, eldest son Robert Ridgers , born at Yateley in  1745, married Sarah Knight (1742) from Farnborough in 1771 and his youngest son Lawrence, born 1764, married  Martha Batten (baptised 1768 Enborne, Berks) at Farnborough in 1788. Martha was 'of this parish' in her Farnborough marriage entry.

Currently, most family trees I have researched lead back to one of those two sons.

Brothers Robert (1745) and Lawrence (1764) both married at Farnborough. All Robert's children were baptised there and the first three of Lawrence's eleven children. The wheelwright's business was in Somerset Road, Farnborough. Records do not indicate when it first started, and we can only speculate that this was the area both families lived and perhaps their parents Robert & Sarah. We do know from the 1891 census that situated only one house down from the Ridgers wheelwrights in Somerset Road was a group of dwellings named  1, 2 and 3 Ridgers Cottages.

Lawrence Ridgers (1764) and Martha Batten (1768) moved from Farnborough to the Crondall area  around 1797 and their remaining eight children were baptised in Crondall parish.

Their first son John Ridgers, a farmer who was born at Crondall parish in 1797, married Lucy Phillips (born 1810) from Old Basing at that village in 1833. They had nine children.

Another son, farmer Richard Ridgers (1801-1877), married Martha Raggett (1801-1871) from Long Sutton in Crondall parish, in 1827 and produced six children. His son Robert (1828) and two of his sons were wheelwrights. His daughter Martha (1836) married Mattingley born Thomas Hulford (1833) 

Manor Farm today

Richard's brother, farmer Matthew Batten Ridgers (1808-1899), married Mary Croombs (1815) a farmer's daughter from Odiham in 1832 but only had two sons, George (1833) and Thomas (1836) before Mary ran off  with Thomas Steer an Odiham blacksmith in 1835 . Matthew's second marriage after his divorce in 1858 was to  Ann, a Mapledurwell farmer's daughter in  1859. He had farmed at Grubb's Farm, Dogmersfield, (now Ormersfield Farm?) in the 1850s and Manor Farm, Mapledurwell  from the 1860s to the 1880s. He retired to the Hartley Wintney area and died there in 1899. (see link below to Manor Farm fire)

His younger son Thomas Ridgers (1836-1893) lived with his father and step-mother for most of his life and remained unmarried.

MANOR FARM FIRE

Matthew's son labourer George Ridgers (1833) had eight children with his wife, an Odiham wheelwright's daughter, Ann Rowell (1835).   Sarah Ann Ridgers (1858) was born at Battersea, and George Matthew Ridgers (1860) in South Lambeth. 

The other six were born at Fisherton Anger near Salisbury in Wiltshire. They were Henry (Harry) Ridgers (1862), Mary (1865), Susan (1867), Emily (1870), Flora (1872), and Annie (1878).

Flora Ridgers (1872) was married at Wandsworth in 1896. He was Middlesex born George Edmund Williams (1871). Her sister Sarah Ann (1858) married Chatham, Kent  born Edward Venn (1861-1914) at Walworth, Surrey in 1880. They had 6 children, all born at Lambeth. 

Matthew's sister Louisa Ridgers (1811) married Isaac Cranstone (1803-1866) at Crondall in 1829.

Matthew's brother Charles Ridgers (1812) married Eliza Terry from Crondall in 1831 and they had five children. His son James who was baptised at Church Crookham in 1837 was named as the employer at the wheelwright's business in Somerset Road, Farnborough in the later 19th century. He married Ellen Smith (1836) at Poplar in Middlesex in 1865. They had four children, James (1866), William (1867), Ada (1869) and Charles (1870). Ellen unfortunately died in 1870 after the birth of Charles. James remarried at Reading in 1879. She was Hartley Wintney born Hannah Frost (1836).

Son James Henry Ridgers (1866) who married Edith May (1869) at Farnborough in 1888 was also there at Somerset Road in the same trade with a family of thirteen children at the turn of the 20th century. His daughters married into local families. Ivy (1889) to Edwin Goddard in 1908, Daisy (1893) to Charles Fulbrook in 1918, Winifred (1898) to policeman Ernest Ayres in 1922, Elsie (1900) to Edward Clancy in 1936, and Gladys (1908) to Hector Wilson at Staines in 1930.

Other children were Edith Hilda (1891) who married Arthur Harvey in 1911, Freda (1894), William H Ridgers (1896) who married Mary A Lea in 1919 , twins Sidney Walter (who married Elsie Orford) and Frederick Harold (1903), Vera Ethel (1909), Maisie (1912), and Albert (1915).

Their great-granddaughter Brenda recalls..

My grandmother May (Doll) married Harry Emery a policeman from Botley in Hampshire. My father was Harry (known as Son) their only child.

I always understood that James and Edith had 18 children. The name of their house in Farnborough was 'Wisteria', I believe I visited it one time but am not sure my visual memories of it are correct as they may be muddled with those of my maternal grandparents home at Farnham.   

Apart from the wheelwright business I also understood that the family owned a grain and corn merchants business, a shop on the corner of the main Farnborough/Cove road, near Somerset Road comes to mind. 

I remember seeing Great Grandmother Edith when she visited my grandmother with her daughter Maisie sometime in the mid to late 1940s. She was in a wheelchair. 

I knew the following members of the family: Win and Ernie. (Ernie had been a policeman. He was a double amputee and used to tap is his legs and say 'listen they are made of tin'. )

Together with my second cousin Ann Ridgers I spent many a happy hour playing cards with  Elsie (Ridgers) and John Clancey at their home in Aldershot. 

Freda (Ridgers) and Jim (forgotten their surname) who lived in Aldershot. 

I knew Bert Ridgers and his wife. They visited my parents quite often in the 1950s. Bert was the youngest child of James and Edith. In fact he was younger than my own father, but died quite a few years before my dad. 

There was also son named Frederick (Ann's father) who also had a twin brother.

Brenda Emery with her grandparents in 1942

How Edith and James and other past generations would have marvelled at the way we are now able to communicate with those to whom we may be related without even knowing each other personally.   Brenda 

Another of Charles (1812)'s sons was Lawrence Ridgers (1860) he was a carpenter who married Harriett Wren from Reading in 1894. He had his own carpentry business at St Giles, Reading in 1901 and was listed as an employer.

 A couple of miles away, another of Charles's (1812) grandsons, Lawrence Arthur Ridgers (1853) had a wheelwright's shop in St Michael's Road, Aldershot  at the time of the 1901 census, and his 16 year old son Arthur was listed as a sign-writer.

The Long Sutton Wheelwrights

Robert Ridgers (1828) a son of Richard (1801) was trained as a wheelwright but around 1850 leased Hide Farm, Long Sutton. His sister Martha (1835) and five labourers helped him to run the 118 acres.

In 1860 he married Louisa Porter who was born at Freshwater, Isle of Wight in 1835. The ceremony was registered at The Strand in London. In 1861 they were sharing a Crondall house with her widowed mother, 44 year old Crondall born dressmaker, Harriet Martin and her unmarried daughter, 22 year old Ellen. Robert gave his trade as wheelwright on the census form.

In 1871 they have three children, Robert (1863), Lindsay (1866) and Thirza (1869).Their address is in the same locality as his mother-in-law in 1861. His occupation is given as wheelwright.

In 1881 he is now living at Long Sutton and both his sons are also wheelwrights.

By 1891, still at Long Sutton, he is shown on the census form as a widower (Louisa died in 1889), and his wheelwright son Robert and dressmaker daughter Thirza are living with him. Lindsay (1866) had left home to join the 3rd Dragoon Guards but had died while serving at Rawal Pindi, India in 1890. 

1901 has the 72 year old (he died in 1904) living with his daughter Thirza Yalden and her husband William with grand-daughter Louisa at the Long Sutton family home. In the same road wheelwright son Robert (1863) is living with his wife, Jane Sutton and their 7 year old daughter Isabel.  

Charles (1812) had another grandson, Frederick David Ridgers (1873) who left Long Sutton, Crondall to be a gold miner in Wickenburg, Arizona  around 1893 and appears on the local 1900 census. He was followed there by his brother, painter Leonard  Ridgers (1872), who sailed on the "SS St Paul" to New York in 1897 with 40 pounds in his pocket. but was back on the farm in Long Sutton with his recently widowed mother Ann at the time of the 1901 census.

The town was named after Henry Wickenburg who came to the area in search of gold. During the 1860s he was rewarded with the discovery of Vulture Mine, where over $30 million in gold was found.

Nowadays Wickenburg, an historic mining town just 25 miles north of Phoenix, is known as the "Dude Ranch Capitol of the World." It has a  Western museum and hosts rodeos and Wild West festivals.

Frederick (1873) was born at Aldershot Park, Hampshire where his father Charles Ridgers (1832) was farm bailiff. Two of his brothers Lawrence Arthur (1853) and Lindsay (1870) were wheelwrights. 

A Google search also found - "My grandmother Edith Emmeline RIDGERS was born in Crondall, HAMPSHIRE, 1858. This remarkable lady lived to a great age despite giving birth to eighteen children, the last of which was my father who reached the age of 92 years."   Edith E  Ridgers (1856) who married James Terry (1854) from Worpledon at Farnham Primitive Church in 1880, was a sister of  the above Lawrence, Frederick, Leonard and Lindsay.

Bullocks Farm. Near Odiham, Hampshire. The farm is still shown on modern OS maps. It is a listed building - 16/17th Century. 2 storeys. Brick with string course between ground and first floor. Old tile hipped roof.

The Ridgers family were there from the 1840s till around 1898.

Richard Ridgers (1801) moved to Bullocks Farm in the  1840s. He and his wife Martha Raggett had previously farmed a couple of miles away at Grubs Farm, Dogmersfield near Winchfield, where  four of their six children were  born. In 1851 his brother Matthew Batten Ridgers was the tenant at Grubs Farm.

In the late 1850s Richard and Martha had taken another farm lease, this time at Long Sutton, and left son Richard (1833) to run Bullocks Farm in partnership with his sister Jane (1831) and her husband James Fulbrook.

By 1871, Richard (1833) and his wife Sally - Sarah Ann Clarke (1836) were managing the 117 acre farm with the help of 5 labourers and a boy, and had 3 children, Alfred (1862), Rose (1864), and Sarah (1866). They must have been reasonably prosperous as they were employing four servants, two for the house and two for the farm.

The 1881 census shows four more children, Fanny 1869, Richard 1870, George 1872, and Frederick 1875.

In 1891 five of the children were still living at home. Alfred (26) is listed as a farmer's son on the census. Fanny (22) is given no occupation. Charles (20) is a baker. George (17) a wheelwright and Frederick (15) had no occupation listed.

By 1901 the family are no longer at Bullocks Farm. Widower Richard (1833) had retired and was living at King Street, Odiham with his daughter Rose Guppy and family. His son, coal merchant Frederick, is married to Tryphena Pitts and their home is nearby West Street. Fanny has married grocer Thomas Wheeler and their shop is in the High Street.

George, a wheelwright has married Harriet Trusler and moved to Wisborough Green, near Petworth in Sussex.

A branch of the family appeared in Ontario, Canada when Charles Ridgers (born 1893) migrated on the "Ausonia" to Cornwall, Ontario in 1912 and married a Canadian girl, Sarah Ellen Keyes from Hamilton in 1915. He was from nearby Ascot and the son of Samuel Ridgers (born Yateley 1861), a blacksmith, and  Rose Paradine (1864) from Hendon in Middlesex. 

Samuel was the son of carpenter Henry Ridgers (born Yateley 1836) whose father John Ridgers (1804) a journeyman carpenter, was apparently  from a Yateley family, but born in Bloomsbury, London. John's wife Mary (1808) was born at Yateley and in later years lived at Yateley Green's Cricket Hill. Her mother-in-law, a carpenter's widow, Ann Ridgers (born Yateley in 1788) was listed as a Yateley grocer in 1859.

One of the Windlesham family, Frederick Ridgers (1843) also migrated to Canada. He wed Elizabeth Shairback, his second marriage, at York, Ontario in 1882.

Sunninghill, Ascot was the home of some of the above family in 1901. Blacksmith Samuel Ridgers (1861) and Rose had at least five children, Samuel H (1886), Percival (1888), Frederick G (1890), Charles Henry (1893), and Florence C. in 1896.The first three were born in Rose's home town of Hendon in Middlesex and the two youngest at Sunninghill.

Samuel (1861) had a brother Henry Ridgers (born Yateley in 1856) who was apprenticed as a carpenter. In 1901 he and his wife Emily Lloyd (born Winkfield in 1857) with their six children all born in Sunninghill, Walter J (1883), Emily (1886), Willie (1888), Florence M (1891),Gertrude C (1893), and Ethel (1896) were living a few doors from Samuel's family.                    

A Google search brought this quote from Tony Ridgers ...

"As far as I know, my branch of the family comes from Ascot/Sunningdale which is near Windsor, England. My father is John Percival Ridgers. He had a sister, Phyllis and their father, ie my grandfather, was Percival Ridgers. I know he had at least one brother who I think emigrated to Canada just before the 1st World War.
My grandfather had an electricians business in Bracknell, Berks and was involved in airship design at Vickers, Barrow in Furness during the !st World War"

Nigel Ridgers' family -  Father - James William Percival Ridgers (1916-1996), Mother Lilian Dougherty married in 1939. Grandfather - James William Percy Ridgers (1887) married  Mabel Kate Henning (Born Hampshire 1887) at South Stoneham, Hants in 1914.

The Ridgers family of Hobart, Tasmania are part of the Ian Ridgers' Yateley family tree. (see www.ridgers.org.uk/index.htm) 

I quote Christine Watson..."William Ridgers came to Tasmania on board the ship Wanderer arriving in Hobart 13th Feb 1855. He was aged 25 years, Church of England religion, could read, native place was Hampshire, trade a shepherd. He came with his sister Elizabeth age 30, farm servant, & her husband William Rapley, farm labourer of Berkshire. Both C of E and could read. The Rapley children who travelled with their parents were Thomas age 10, William 5, George 2, & Ann who was born on the voyage out. They all came as assisted immigrants. Cost 71 pounds 10 shillings for the Rapley family & 22 pounds for William. Walter Synnott applied to bring them out and he would have paid for their passage. He would have been (haven't chased after Synott as yet) a landholder in Tasmania. Labour was short at the time so the landholders paid the passages out for the migrants. The migrants then worked for the landholder for a time in payment for the passage."

William Ridgers (1830) married Mary Ann McCann at Bothwell, Tasmania in 1856. They had a total of eighteen children of whom twelve survived.

William Ridgers and Elizabeth Rapley  were the children of Ian's Yateley ancestor, John Ridgers (1801-1877) and Hannah Etherington. Elizabeth married William Rapley at Yateley in 1852.

Another of John and Hannah's sons George Ridgers (1833), who died in 1903 at Bognor Regis, has their family bible at the West Sussex Record Office. Quote : "A family bible of the Ridgers family of Mid Lavant, Funtington, West Dean, and South Bersted, containing inscriptions commemorating the dates of the births, marriages, and deaths of the descendants of George Ridgers and Emma Gilbert, who married at Mid Lavant church on 22 November 1854. The entries cover the period from the birth of George Ridgers at Yateley, co. Hants. on 13 February 1833 to the death of Mary Munday née Ridgers, at South Bersted on 6 September 1949."

George Batten Ridgers 1853 and the Greenwich family

George Batten Ridgers was born at Marshall Farm, Swanthorpe near Crondall, Hampshire in 1852, one of  Charles Ridgers (1812) sixteen children.

In 1871 he was a single man boarding in the Limehouse dockside area and employed as an engineer's labourer. He married Ann Hovell from Denver, Norfolk at Greenwich in 1878.

His seven children, Sarah (1878), Maud (1880), Charles (1882), Lawrence (1884), James (1886), Alfred (1893), and Ethel (1896) were all born in Greenwich.

Charles (1882) married Elizabeth Henrietta Smith in 1903 at Greenwich and their son Frederick (1908) married Rose Rashley.

Marianne Ridgers 1864 (Stevens)     Greenwich Licenced Victualler

George had a sister Marianne Ridgers (1864). She was also born at Swanthorpe.

She appears on the 1891 census as a 27 year old single woman. Her trade is listed as licenced victualler at the Prince Arthur public house in Greenwich Road, Greenwich.

On the 1901 census she has married fellow Crondall villager Lindsay Stevens (1852) the son of a basket maker and they are living at a public house in Gravesend, Kent where Lindsey is the licencee.

They had a daughter Minnie Stevens (1886) who was born to Lindsay's first wife Sarah Elizabeth Ridgers (1853) at Greenwich. Sarah & Lindsay in 1891 were running a public house at St Martin in the Fields, London. 

I have been unable so far to trace Sarah's birth or death but the 1891 census form indicates she was born in Crondall. She could possibly be Marianne's sister. 

George's son Charles Ridgers (1882) worked for the railways. When 18 at Greenwich in 1901 his occupation was  listed as railway porter. He was later to be an engine driver. His son Frederick (1908) who married Rose Rashley (1911) had at least three  children, all born in the London area, June (1932), Jean (1934) and Alan (1938).   Alan married Jill Tucker.

The Wokingham, Windsor and Richmond Family

Henry Ridgers 1841   Henry Ridgers who was born at Binfield,near Wokingham, Berkshire in 1841 was another the son of John Ridgers (1797) and Lucy Phillips (1810) who had nine children.    Henry married Ann Kendrick (1843) from Morton, Shropshire at Easthampstead near Wokingham in 1869. He was listed as a coachman on the 1881 census living at Lyall Mews, Westminster. He died at Lingfield in 1890. His widow Ann remained in Lingfield according to the 1891 & 1901 census and died there in 1913.
Their only son  Herbert Henry Ridgers (1869) was born at Moulsoe in Buckinghamshire.    I have a letter sent by him dated 1883 from Claremont School where he was a boarder. He served in the 3rd Voluntary Battalion Royal Fusiliers from 17th April 1886 to 9th march 1893,then joined the Navy serving on HMS Victory, Vivid and Northampton between 1894 and January 1898. (Alan Ridgers)   HMS Victory   He married Portsmouth born Minnie Cox (1876) at Portsmouth in 1895. His  first child Minnie (1899) was born at Devizes, Wiltshire. They had  two more children. Herbert Henry (1901) whose birth was registered at St Pancras, and Charles Edward (1903) at Marylebone. He is buried at Ruckinge in Kent.
		Herbert Henry Ridgers (1869) with Minnie (Cox)
Charles Ridgers (1903) married Doris Rachel Rowley born Brome St Mary Suffolk on the 25th of June 1905.  I think she married  Charles in 1948. She was originally from Suffolk. They lived at Mead Road Folkestone where he worked for the Post Office on the telephones. They had no children.   (Alan)
		Herbert Henry Ridgers was born 4th July 1901 . He was married to Charlotte Maud Gwynn on 11th March 1923. Their only child Herbert Henry Gwynn-Ridgers was born at Southwark on the 26 July 1925.  He was born in London and has some memory of Ham Street. He went to school in Cheriton, joined the Navy and later the Police force serving at Dover, Deal and Gravesend. (Alan) This photograph was taken at Folkestone I guess about mid 1930's (Dad born in 1925). My grandfather Herbert Henry Ridgers (1901), and  grandmother Charlotte Maud (nee Gwynn) with my father Herbert Henry Gwynn - Ridgers.
Alan's grandfather Herbert (1901) lived at Stockwell, and later moved to Hamstreet  near Ashford in Kent. He settled at Cheriton near Folkestone where he worked at Folkestone Power Station. He later ran the Morehall Public House, retiring in the 1970's.  He died 18th December 1972 and was cremated at Barham Crematorium.
		It appears that there was a family migration to Ruckinge Kent in the early 1920's. They built their own houses and dug their own wells. My grandfather, my grandmothers brother and the old Mr and Mrs Ridgers (my great grandparents) all had property there. This  is the bungalow my grandfather built single handedly called The Brambles at Ruckinge. The boy is my father Herbert Henry Gwynn - Ridgers (born 1925) My mother was Thelma Olive Sherwood from Walton Road Folkestone Kent. Born 10th April 1925. She married my father at Christchurch (Church) Folkestone.
My sincere gratitude to Alan Ridgers for sharing his memories and photographs.