About the family
For Henry Lockett, the archive begins with four familiar faces. Here are his parents and maternal grandparents, in family photographs and in the words he uses to remember them.
Henry’s granda
Harry served in the RAF and later worked as a policeman in Northumberland. Henry remembers a tall, slim man with a quick wit. “Harry was the kindest soul I’ve ever met, and one of the wittiest. Everyone loved my granda.”
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Henry’s nana
Mary and Harry raised Chris and Margaret. When Henry pictures his nana at home, she’s making turnip soup. She loved babies and children, and he remembers how she greeted him: “She loved me a lot and she would light up when I was with her.”
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Henry’s mum
Born Christine Mary Brown, Chris trained as a nurse in Newcastle. She went on to see the world as an air stewardess before returning to nursing. Henry remembers her ENT work and later health visiting. In his words, “My mum was beautiful and loving.”
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Henry’s dad
At eighteen Stuart left Bristol to study metallurgy at Imperial College London. Henry remembers him playing cello in the London Philharmonic Orchestra and going on to a long career at Alcan. At home, he was the dad who “always encouraged me to do whatever I wanted.”
Open profileHexham, 1975
Chris grew up with David McDonald. Their fathers worked together in the police, and the two families were close. At David’s wedding in Hexham, Chris met Stuart. Henry remembers exactly where one photograph fits into their story: the next day, they were at Hadrian’s Wall, reaching across a gap to touch hands.
That November, Chris and Stuart married in Acomb. David became Henry’s godfather. On Stuart’s side were Isabel Carslaw and Frank Lockett, the Glasgow and Bristol branch of the family.
See Chris and Stuart’s wedding photograph ↗
Suffolk · 1778–1828
Mary Cousins and Simon Blaxall married at St Mary Quay in Ipswich in May 1778. Their son Simon and daughter Esther were born in Rushmere. Another son, Frederick, was born in Eyke, where both his parents had been born.
When Mary died in 1828, a notice in the Bury and Norwich Post devoted a line to the village inn. It named Simon as her husband and recalled forty-five years of keeping the Elephant and Castle. Almost two centuries later, a family photograph shows the inn’s name still painted above the doors.
Mary and Simon’s marriage record in Christree, the family transcription of Mary’s death notice in the Bury and Norwich Post of 5 March 1828, and the dated photograph of the inn.
Cumberland · 1899–1923
In the 1911 census, eleven-year-old Thomas Dinwiddie appears below John and Alexander Keddie on a household form. Beside his name someone wrote “nurse child”, a term the family tree helps explain. William and Margaret Keddie had fostered Tom from infancy.
Ten years later, William Keddie’s name appears in Tom’s life again. When Tom married Margaret Scott at Cotehill in July 1921, William was a witness. The other witness was Hannah Scott, Margaret’s twin sister.
The Keddie household’s 1911 census schedule, RG14/31251, schedule 48, and the foster-family and marriage-witness entries in Tom’s profile.
Carlisle to Canada · 1911–1921
In April 1911, Elizabeth Roe left Liverpool aboard the SS Corsican, bound for Quebec. She had grown up in Belle Vue, Carlisle. By the 1916 census she was living in Saskatoon with her husband, John William Howe.
A photograph in the archive shows their daughter Jennie in a long white dress, held up by her aunt Sally, John’s sister. In the 1921 Canadian census, Jennie appears in the Howe household with her brothers Joseph, Harry and Robert. Sally, recorded in the tree as Sarah, was living farther west in Redcliff, Alberta.
Elizabeth Roe’s voyage entry, the 1916 and 1921 Canadian census entries, and the family captions for Jennie’s photograph and the Howe family postcard.
Wolverhampton, Glasgow and Bristol · 1877–1966
William Major Lockett was born in Wolverhampton in 1877. The family’s 1911 census notes put him in Dalton-in-Furness, working as a coachman. Six years later, his army papers still gave coachman as his trade. Other family records preserve a second job, tending an electric motor at the city waterworks.
His son Francis, born in 1917, worked as a colour printer. During the Second World War he served in Italy with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers. In October 1945 he married Isabella Carslaw in Glasgow, and Francis was still living in the city in 1947.
By the time their son Stuart was born in February 1948, Frank and Isabel had a home on Ilchester Crescent in Bristol. Their grandson Henry remembers Isabel working for Imperial Tobacco and Frank working for a Bristol printing firm.
Henry recalls that his dad, Stuart, could hardly wait to leave Bristol. At eighteen he went to London to study metallurgy at Imperial College. Henry also remembers another part of his dad’s life in London: he played the cello in the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
William’s 1911 census and 1917 occupation entries, his surviving army attestation, and the service, occupation and Glasgow marriage entries in Francis’s profile. Henry Lockett’s recollections of his grandparents and father, and Stuart’s GEDCOM university entry for 1966–1969.
