Geoffrey Herbert Finch (1909-1984).
My great uncle.
Geoffrey was born on 3 July 1909 in Bynes Road, Croydon, Surrey, to parents Walter Finch and Annie Budgen. It was where they ran their bakery business. Geoff was baptised on 2 August 1911, at St Augustine’s Church in South Croydon.
He grew up first Bynes Road but then at 259 Brighton Road in Croydon, the shop, bakery and family home. In February 1934, at St James’ Church in Riddlesdown, he married dressmaker Marjorie Alice Coleman, who was born in 1911. Their daughter was born in 1948.
Geoff jointly ran the family bakery business in South Croydon with his brother Gerald and his mother Annie until it was sold in the 1970s, and lived opposite his brother in Greenhill Avenue, Caterham. He died early on New Year’s Day in 1984, while Marjorie died in 1997.
Marjorie’s birth was recorded in Croydon on 8 June 1911 – her parents being chauffeur William Albert Coleman and his housekeeper wife Laura Alice Butler. Her maiden name was listed in the birth register as Butter but I suspect this was a spelling mistake.
William was born in about 1879 and the census returns put his place of birth as Battersea, but the closest birth record I can find is for 1878 in Wandsworth. He married Laura in September 1899 at St Mary’s Battersea and at the time was a horsekeeper and groom, living for a time at Orbel Street, Battersea.
At the time of the 1911 census the couple were living with their two older children, Doris Laura and William Alfred, at 6 Salisbury Villas, Lower Road, Kenley, Surrey, but they later moved to Cross Road in Purley.
In October 1915, while living at 95 Lower Road, Kenley, Surrey, William signed up to serve in the First World War. Described as a motor driver, he was enlisted in the Army Service Corps (Motor Transport). His regimental number was 136577.
Assuming I have the right Laura, she was born in about 1881 in Chelsea to parents Alfred James Butler, a plasterer from Hounslow, and his Clapham-born wife Mary Ann, who’d married that year. They lived in Church Street. Laura died in 1966 while William died a year later, both events registered in Croydon, Surrey.
Marjorie’s brother William married his first cousin Florence Emily Butler, and they emigrated to Australia in 1948 under the Free Passage Scheme with their children Vera Rose, Shirley Margaret, Rita and Margaret Elizabeth. At the time of their application he was living in Purley Vale and documents show that he had worked as a milkman and painter/decorator. During the war he’d been a storeman with the Royal Artillery.
Marjorie’s maternal great grandparents (the parents of Alfred James Butler) were John and Sarah Butler. She was born in Isleworth in 1821.
William Albert Coleman’s parents (and Marjorie’s grandparents) were labourer William Walter and Mary Coleman. Both said to be from Chelsea, he was born in 1859, while she was a year older.
In 1881 they were living at 9 William Street, Battersea, but then moved to 7 Turks Row, Chelsea, and 10 Elcho Street in Battersea, by which time William was a horsekeeper/groom. William died in 1908.
Sources: Records held at Ancestry.co.uk and Findmypast.co.uk (BMDs and census, plus 1939 Register), Surrey Records Office, and family memories. Family papers.