The Marriage Certificate (20 page)

‘Well, I reckon I ought to try and find out a bit more about
Harry Williams. There might have been some mention in the local press at the
time of his death. I’ve had a quick search online, but 1996 is a bit before the
modern Internet and I couldn’t find any information. It’s strange you know, his
house was sold in 2001 for £65,000. He must have owned it and the proceeds
formed the bulk of his estate. Then it was sold again in 2002 for £165,000. In
one year, that’s a massive increase.’

‘How old was he when he died?’ asked Felicity.

‘About ninety-five, I think … died at home.’

‘Well, maybe he lived there as an old man and the house was
run down, needing modernisation or something like that? Had he lived there
long?’

‘He was living there in 1962 when his mother died there …’
Peter considered Felicity’s idea. ‘You could be right, you know …’ His mind was
racing and with excitement in his voice, he added, ‘that would explain it … if
someone bought the house in need of renovation, did it up and then sold it on
quickly for a profit. I bet that’s the reason. Either that, or a dodgy estate
agent sold it cheaply to a mate, for a share of the profit.’

‘You’re always so suspicious,’ Felicity scolded.

‘I think my next move might be to go over to Leyton and see
if the nearest reference library keeps any back copies of the local paper. If
not, there’s bound to be a county archive. Perhaps they might have something. I
might be able to find a death notice for his mother from 1962. That might
mention siblings or close relatives, although I’m pretty certain that he didn’t
have any brothers or sisters.’

‘How far is Leyton? Where is it exactly?’ asked Felicity.
Geography wasn’t her best subject. Fortunately, she didn’t have to teach it at
school.

‘Well, it’s about two hours away, East London, north of the
river. We could make a day of it. I can look to see if there’s anything there
you could do. Maybe there’s a retail park. We could have a nice lunch out
somewhere. What about one day next week, during half term?’

‘Yes OK, but I’d ring up the library first if I were you …
might save a lot of time or a wasted journey.’

‘Yes of course I will, but you see where I’m going with
this. I’ll get onto it first thing tomorrow.’

The hunt was closing in at Highborn Research and Carol felt that
she was now making some real progress. She had identified the birth of the
deceased, Harry Williams. He’d been born Henry Williams, on 8 September 1900,
not 8 October 1900 as the coroner had said. Now she needed to identify any
brothers or sisters, for they or their descendants would be his heirs and
entitled to inherit his estate. She knew from the 1911 Census that he was an
only child, but what about after that date? She checked the birth indexes for
the next fifteen years to 1926, when Harry’s mother would have been fifty-five.
Her search proved negative and Carol was satisfied that Harry was Louisa’s only
child.

Meanwhile, Fred Howard, one of Highborn’s travelling
researchers reported on his enquiries in Stephenson Street. He’d managed to
speak with a neighbour but there wasn’t much to tell Carol. It seemed that
Harry had lived at number 59 from the 1940s up until his death in 1996. He
hadn’t married and had lived with his mother until she died there in 1962.
After his retirement, he became extremely reclusive and the house was in an
appalling condition at the time of his death. It was sold at auction, bought by
a builder who completely stripped and renovated it, before selling it on
eighteen months later.

The neighbour, an elderly lady, said that she thought the
Williams family had Welsh roots. She vaguely recalled a connection with
Kidwelly Castle or Pembroke Castle in South Wales, but wasn’t sure.

Carol thought that snippet tallied with the background
information from Leyton Council. She added Fred’s report to her growing file on
the Williams’ case. She decided to go back one generation to Harry’s parents,
to see if they had any brothers or sisters. If she could find any uncles or
aunts, their descendants would be rightful heirs and could legally inherit.

She found John Williams and his brother, Frank, living with
their parents on the Isle of Wight on the 1891 Census. Frank was fourteen at
the time, so she tried to find a marriage for him during a period of fifteen
years from 1895 to 1910, the years when he would have been most likely to
marry. There were nearly two hundred possible matches, far too many for her
purpose, so she considered another tack. It was a long shot, but breaks in
research often came from just such an idea.

Looking again at the marriage certificate of Harold
Williams’ parents, Carol noted the names of the witnesses. Frank was one of
them and likely to have been best man too. The other witness’s surname looked
like Price, Rosetta Price. Carol quickly identified her on the 1901 Census. She
was aged twenty-nine, living above a draper’s shop in Islington. She was single
and a draper’s assistant.

Carol decided to look for a marriage for Rosetta
Price during the following ten years. It was a gamble, but what if Rosetta had
met and married the best man at the wedding? It had happened to one of Carol’s
friends the year before, so why not in 1900? People travelled little and tended
to have a smaller circle of acquaintances and less opportunity to meet a
potential spouse.

Carol noticed from the census that Rosetta Price had been
born in Llanelly. She knew Llanelly was in South Wales.
Could that be the
Welsh connection?
she thought. Searching through the marriage index, she
found a Rosetta Price marrying in Llanelly in the last quarter of 1903. She
studied the results of her query and clicked on the link to see all of the
names on the relevant page of the Llanelly marriage register. There were eight
names: four female and four male, making four married couples. Carol scanned
the four male names. She knew that one of them would be Rosetta Price’s spouse,
but which one? One in particular – Francis Williams – jumped out at her.
Got
you!
she thought. Carol was satisfied. Rosetta Price married the best man
Frank Williams in her hometown of Llanelly in 1903. She ordered the certificate
immediately.

Peter and Felicity arranged to go to Leyton on Wednesday of the
following week, during Felicity’s half-term holiday. They left at about nine.
The early morning fog had cleared and the day promised to be cold and bright.
They found the motorway traffic was relatively light after the morning rush
hour and made good time. Even the notorious M25 was running smoothly and two
and a half hours later, they were pulling into a large retail park on the
outskirts of Leyton.

Peter dropped off Felicity, leaving her to enjoy some
shopping for an hour or so, while he went to have a look at Apsley Street and
Stephenson Street. He wanted to get a first-hand feel for the area. He arranged
to pick up Felicity later for lunch.

He had previously looked up the postcodes for both addresses
and entered them into the car’s navigation system. The car was a BMW coupe,
powerful and comfortable, not the sort of car he liked to just leave anywhere,
but he had checked out the areas online beforehand. He felt reasonably sure
that the car would be safe, if he needed to leave it unattended for a while.
Otherwise, he would have driven their other car: a scruffy little hatchback.

Peter found Apsley Street within ten minutes and started to
search for number 15. Apsley Street had a gentle slope to it, the upper part
being furthest from Leyton town centre. He noticed straight away that the
houses at the elevated end were grand Victorian constructions. It looked as if
many had undergone conversion into flats, but there were a few which had
escaped the developers’ attentions and remained as large, substantial family
homes. He drew up outside number 15 – the home of Thomas Crockford in 1901 –
and pulled in to the kerb. There were parking restrictions and he did not have
a residents’ permit, so he left the engine running while he surveyed the scene,
keeping one eye out for parking wardens.

He could see a call panel just to the right of the front
door of number 15. It had four buttons, which indicated that the imposing house
had probably been subdivided into four flats. It did seem rather on the large
side for a widower with a married daughter. Then Peter remembered that there
was a son too – David. He’d brought along the printout of the relevant page of
the 1901 Census and he looked down to check. No son was listed, so he realised
that he must have been thinking of the 1891 Census, when they all lived above
the shop. In 1901, Mr Crockford did live alone at number 15, because his
daughter had married and moved further down the street to number 46. The single
occupant of number 15 was in marked contrast to the adjacent properties. The
census record showed a couple with six children and a servant living on one
side, and a doctor, his wife, five children and two servants living on the
other side.

Peter scribbled a few notes regarding the house. He took his
camera from the glove box and opened the car door. He got out and stood on the
pavement, looking to see if anyone was around. There wasn’t. If there had been,
he would have explained his interest. He took a several photographs of the
house and of the street as it sloped away towards the town centre. The top end
certainly had a view and that must have determined the location of the more
expensive and prestigious residences.

Thomas Crockford was doing rather well to live here in 1901,
Peter reasoned. He must have been the owner of the house, because he couldn’t
see why a man on his own would rent a house of this size. He had the shop for
accommodation and may have bought the house as an investment or perhaps he
intended to remarry. Peter could only speculate.

Next, he decided to locate number 46, the home of John and
Louisa Williams after they married in 1900. It was obviously towards the lower
end. He got back in and pulled away, cruising gently towards the bottom of the
street. He was right and again he was lucky to find a parking space to pull in
to. Most people, along with their cars, were at work at this time of day so
there were plenty of spaces. He stopped directly outside number 46.

It was part of a terrace of five similar houses and the
Williams’ house was in the middle. It was much smaller and much closer to the
road than those at the top of the street. It had a waist-high brick wall
fronting the pavement, with a small wooden gate leading just a few yards to the
front door. The downstairs front room had a bay window, just as in the agent’s
photograph he’d seen on the property website. Some of the neighbours had
extended into the roof to create more space, but the former Williams’ house
appeared unaltered.

On the whole, the house looked to be in quite good order. It
had retained its original cast iron gutters, sash windows, and part-glazed
wooden front door. In the brickwork between two first floor windows, Peter
noticed a stone. It read ‘BHD 1898’. Most likely the initials of the builder
and date of construction, he thought, and that explained why he hadn’t been
able to find Apsley Street on the 1891 Census.

Once again, he got out of his car and took some photographs.
No one challenged him, but he couldn’t help feeling a little furtive, even
though his motives were completely innocent. It was that camera-induced guilt
thing again, but this time he was holding the camera rather than being watched
by one.
Well
,
bizarre or what?
he thought, using a phrase his
teenage nephews and nieces would recognise.

He tried to picture the scene back in 1901. The street would
have looked quite different, notably the absence of cars, parking restriction
lines on the road and traffic signs. Instead, he could imagine a black and
white photograph, showing a daytime scene of a horse drawing a carriage, gas
lamps, and a few pedestrians on the pavement, with perhaps children playing in
the middle of the road.

Once back in the car, he selected the Stephenson Street
address on the satnav and set off again. Five minutes later, he was directed
into a cul-de-sac and told that he was arriving at his destination.

Stephenson Street was different to how he’d imagined it. He
thought it would look very similar to the railway village in Swindon. That was
built by the Great Western Railway to house its workers, but he could see that
Stephenson Street was probably built much later in the 1920s. The houses were
terraced, but they had private front gardens and possibly rear gardens as well.
He drove slowly down towards the end counting the odd numbers. They were on the
left. He stopped outside what should have been number 59, but there was no
number on the door, just the name
Milton
. It was at the end of a terrace
and had a garden at the side too.
Of course
, he realised –
that’s why
it was described on the property website as semi-detached
.

Peter parked and again noted the parking restrictions. This
time however, the sign allowed him thirty minutes. He switched off the engine
and got out, taking the camera and his leather jacket. It had turned even
colder and he zipped up his jacket, tucking a scarf around his neck. Number 59,
or
Milton
, was almost at the end of the cul-de-sac. Immediately in front
of the car, the road opened out into a ‘bulb’ shape, to allow a U-turn. Here
the houses fanned out in a radial pattern with front gardens, which grew in
width as they went back towards the front of the houses. Most of them looked
tidy; just one house let the side down. Children’s bicycles were strewn on the
mud in front of the porch and an old van took up much of the front garden. The
van’s tyres were flat and it obviously hadn’t been driven for some time.

Peter took some photographs of
Milton
and the street.
He was reviewing them to check their quality, when an old man walked up to him.

‘Got your number I ’ave; written it down and everything.’

Peter noticed the strong cockney accent. ‘What do you mean?’
he asked politely.

‘Your car’s registration number, and the make, and the
colour. I’m in Neighbour’ood Watch, you see. They asks us to take note of
strangers and anything unusual going on, you see.’

‘Oh right, Neighbourhood Watch. I’m in that as well, in our
village.’

The old man seemed a little deflated. He’d obviously hoped
for a more confrontational reaction. Still, not to be deterred, he was straight
back with, ‘Not one of those DHS snoopers are you, checking up on those
claiming benefit, like?’

‘No, no, nothing like that. I’m doing some family history
research. I’m interested in number 59, where someone called Harry Williams used
to live, until about 1996. This one here, called
Milton
, was it number
59?’

‘What, you mean like that television programme – where do
you think you came from?’

‘Well, sort of, but not quite the same,’ answered Peter.

‘You’re not the first you know, what’s come snooping round
’ere asking about Mr Williams what died in number 59. Mind, it ’as been a
while. Early on, we ’ad several asking and such like.’

‘Did you now? So how long ago would the last one have been?’

‘Well, it must ’ave been seven or eight years, but funnily
enough I tell a lie, there was a bloke ’ere last week.’

‘Last week! Really?’

‘Yeah, I didn’t see ’im, because I was in town at the time.
I always goes into town on Thursday mornings, but Mrs ’iggins at number 56, she
challenged ’im and then she let me ’ave the details for my report. All this
street is my watch you see,’ he said proudly. ‘I send anything of interest up
to my local coordinator, you see.’

‘And what did Mrs Higgins say?’

‘Only that ’e was asking about old Mr Williams and said ’e
worked for some London firm who was trying to trace any relatives. She told ’im
they all gave up years ago because there weren’t none.’

‘I don’t suppose he told her which firm he worked for?’

The old man paused and thought for a moment. ‘Something like
High Holborn Research I think.’ He pronounced the name of the firm slowly with
great emphasis the letter ‘h’. ‘Like I say, some London firm.’

‘Have you lived around here for long? Did you know Mr
Williams?’

‘Yeah, I remember ’im, but I was a lot younger then and I
knew ’im a long time before ’e died too. He kept ’imself to ’imself later on,
you see, never went out, ’ardly.’

‘Was Mr Williams married, or a widower perhaps?’

‘Nah, ’e was never married … ’e lived with his mother most
of ’is life … sort of looked after each other, really. She was a widow.’

‘What happened to his father?’

‘No idea, must ’ave died a long time ago.’

‘Did Harry have any brothers or sisters?’

‘Nah, can’t ’ave done. No one never found any. I’m pretty
sure ’e was an only child.’

‘Your information could be really helpful to me. I don’t
work for anyone or do this professionally … it’s just a hobby really, but if
you could spare me a few minutes, to tell me a bit more, I’d be more than happy
to give you a drink, if you follow.’

‘Yeah, OK. Can we sit in your car? Ain’t never been in one
of these.’

‘Of course, no problem,’ Peter said, as he opened
the door and invited the old man to take the front passenger seat. Peter came
back around to the driver’s side and sat beside him. The interior of the car
was still warm and cosy despite the cold.

‘So what was he like then, Harry Williams?’

‘Normally ’e was OK … was a senior patternmaker at the works
… a foreman when ’e retired.’

‘Would that be the Falcon Foundry works?’

‘Yeah, that’s right. Harry was OK and then ’e ’ad this accident
at work and lost some fingers off ’is hand. ’e couldn’t carry on after that and
Harry ’ad to retire early.’

Peter kept his amusement to himself at the effort
made to pronounce the ‘h’ of Harry.

‘Course, ’is mother ’ad died a few months before. They said
’e took his mother’s death bad and ’ad a problem concentrating, you see. Maybe
that caused ’is accident, but I don’t know for sure. I mean, I worked at the
foundry, but I was in the copper shop, so I never knew what ’appened directly.’
The old man wriggled and settled down in the comfortable leather seat. ‘Thing
is, after ’e retired and what with his mother dying and such, ’e went right
peculiar … stopped going out … never spoke to no one. Harry kept ’imself to
‘imself … very private ’e was. You should ’ave seen the state of this place
when ’e died,’ he said pointing towards
Milton
. ‘Just let it go ’e ’ad,
even though ’e’d bought it like, when ’e first became foreman. But ’e ‘ad more
money then I suppose, but when ’e retired, ’e just didn’t want to spend on
anything.’

Peter digested the information he’d just been given.
So, Harry’s accident in which he lost three fingers definitely had occurred at
work.

‘Were you around here when he died?’

‘Yeah, we’d been moved in ’ere about eighteen months I
think. I’d just retired myself, that was in 1995. I’m nearly eighty-one now you
know … ’adn’t seen him mind. I’d been over a couple of times to see if ’e was
OK, because Mrs ’iggins had told me who lived there, and I remembered ’im like,
but ’e wouldn’t answer the door. Mind you, even if ’e ’ad seen me, I doubt ’e
would have recognised me, because it would ’ave been about thirty years since
’e’d last seen me, 1963 I should think …’e left not too long after we finished
building the
Cambria
, the very last steam locomotive we did at the
Falcon. After that, it was all diesels and they weren’t ’alf so interesting.’

Peter interrupted at this point, because he could see the
conversation heading towards the merits of steam versus diesel. He hadn’t much
time left; for either parking, or before he had to meet Felicity, but the
information he’d gleaned so far was really useful. ‘When you say he never went
out or talked to anyone, would you say he was a sort of recluse?’

‘Recluse, that’s the word. Never wanted nothing to do with
no one, apart from ’is milkman and the man at the corner shop. Used to go there
late for ’is shopping. The doctor called occasionally but apart from that, he never
talked to no one. Proper recluse ’e was … the ’ouse was in a shocking state
too. The local paper ’ad a field day … tried to blame the social services and
us neighbours. They reckon ’e’d been dead three weeks before they found ’im
like, but ’e just wouldn’t let nobody ’elp ’im … preferred to be left alone.
It’s strange, you know, because before ’e retired ’e was quite sociable like …
used to run the bingo at the works social club. Collected ever such a lot for
the lifeboats, but after ’e retired, like I say, ’e just went all recluse
like.’