The Grandchildren of Michael - the third child [3]

Michael England and Mary Bransfield had three children: Honora, Thomas and John. John, the youngest, had six children: Jane, Mary, John Joseph, Philip Augustus, Thomas Alphonsus and Patrick Joseph. This blog deals with the sixth child.

Facts known

●Patrick Joseph England                                     ●Josephine Mary Walsh

                                                                                                       

           (3.3.1871 - 12.5.1945)                   m   26.11.1904                        (about 1877 – June 1932)

                                                              

                                                                   ↓

                          Josephine     Patrick    ● Thomas     Bernard     Philip     Monica

[England family collection]

 Born at Sunday’s Well Rd, Cork, Patrick passed a second examination in medicine in 1894 and a third in 1897 [1] This was at Queen’s College Cork. He qualified as a GP on 4.10.1899 in Ireland. According to the UK and Ireland Medical Directories he was the medical officer in charge of the X ray department, North Infirmary, Cork. He didn’t appear in the 1901 Irish Census.

However, in the 1901 England and Wales census, a Patrick J. England, born 1871 in Cork, was registered in the Parish of Holy Trinity and St Mary, Hull. There were Englands in Hull. For example: “John England and son, Solicitors, Hull.” [2]

A closer examination of the Census revealed that Patrick Joseph England was at the household of a Doctor George Gautby.

Patrick Joseph was thirty, single, born in Cork in 1871 and a Bachelor of Medicine. He was an assistant to Dr Gautby and their address was given as 48, Carr Lane, Holy Trinity and St Mary, Hull, Yorkshire.

In September of the same year at Llandaff, Cardiff, The Cardiff Times reported  that an Eli Bennett was charged on remand with wounding Lottie Hickory. She had smashed a hatchet on Lottie's head at Maindy on the 17th of August. A Dr Patrick England said that the two scalp wounds could have been inflicted by the hatchet produced. He also stated that the wound on the top of the head was a dangerous one!

In Cardiff, Patrick lived in Neville St. This address was given on the marriage certificate as his residence before marriage. It was also noted in the UK and Ireland Medical Directories. Neville St is in the Riverside district of Cardiff and in the Evening Express of the second of March 1903 there was the following:

Dr. England, Riverside, Cardiff has been taken to the sanatorium suffering from typhoid, contracted in the course of his professional duties.

Luckily he survived and married Josephine Walsh at St David’s church - not yet a cathedral - on the 26.11.1904. The witnesses were Catherine Cantillon and T. A. England. Also attending were Matthew Morrissey [See observations on Josephine below] and Mary Christine Murphy. Fr Patrick O'Keefe was the celebrant.

In the 1911 Census, Patrick was living at 87, Cowbridge Rd – not 89. He signed the census form and wrote his postal address as 87, Cowbridge Road. Did he write the wrong number? He did not as the Medical Directory of 1910 also listed him as living at number 87, Cowbridge Road. However, in the 'Kelly's Directory, South Wales of 1910 his address was listed as number 89! Perhaps the Englands had two properties for a time as 89 Cowbridge Road is well known as the family home by Patrick's children, and grandchildren who continued to live there.

In the Census, Patrick was thirty nine and Josephine, thirty four. Other inhabitants were Josephine (Phina) aged five, Michael, two and a half and Tom, six months. Also, there were two domestic servants – Laura Greatrix, sixteen, general servant and Gwendoline Greatrix, sixteen, nurse maid.

Nicknamed affectionately 'Pop' by his children and 'Pop England' by close friends, he was an amiable, gentle and likeable character by all accounts. Josephine remains a mysterious lady as will be explained later in this blog.

Quite often, a Dr England was named in the Western Mail, a South Wales newspaper.

Under the headline: Cardiff Burning Fatality we learn that:

A little girl, aged two, named Nellie Rodgers of Mandeville St, Cardiff died on Saturday as the result of burns. She was in the back bedroom, when, somehow, her clothing became ignited and she was severely burnt. Dr England was immediately summoned to attend the little one but she succumbed to her injuries later in the afternoon. [3]

In February 1915 there was the: Tragic death of a Cardiff Engineer.

Mr Andrew Kneath, aged 53, an engineer employed in a Cardiff printing office, was discovered lying unconscious in Westgate St at about 8.20pm and was conveyed to the City Lodge but on examination by Dr England, on arrival, showed life to be extinct.

In the following day’s paper a few more details were known.

Dr England who had attended Kneath for some years attributed death to cerebral haemorrhage. [4]

So, was Dr England employed at City Lodge or did he have a general practice at Cowbridge Road only to be called in, in an emergency? We know the City Lodge became St David’s Hospital and we know that Dr Patrick England lived opposite in Cowbridge Road.

In May of the same year, another Cardiff Burning Accident where a twelve year old girl, who lived in Duffryn St, Adamstown, was lighting a fire. Using some paper in front to draw the fire, her clothes were set alight. Her mother tried to extinguish the flames but the girl was badly burnt. Dr England and Dr Martin’s assistant were called and “ordered the girl’s removal to the infirmary where she is in a serious condition.”[5] City Lodge was an infirmary and there was another, in Cardiff, called The Royal Infirmary so we are unsure which of these she was taken to.

In the same year he was conducting post mortems at City Lodge Hospital [6]

The next year there was the headline: Cardiff Man’s Strange Habit.

Following the death of 77 year old Thomas Cartwright of Railway Street, Splott, who had a fall, his daughter reported that her father was in the habit of walking about the house all night. Dr England attributed death to syncope following softening of the brain, accelerated by the fall. [7]

In 1917 it was reported that Dr England was the house surgeon at City Lodge Infirmary. [8] This would seem to indicate that he was working full time there.

The Death in a Cardiff Cab and Cardiff Man’s Frenzy were also due to syncope.

However, Dr England, in the Cardiff Man’s Frenzy case, stated that pneumonia and the shock of falling out of a window whilst delirious also accelerated things! [9]

Other newspaper headlines mentioning Dr England included: Brutal Chastisement, Pedlar's Sudden End, Lodging House Tragedy, Seaman's Death at Cardiff, Accident at Cardiff Docks, Fresh Blood Stains, Smallpox Surge, Baby's Body in Lane and Fatal Game of Touch.

Gwen England, 'Pop's' daughter in law, wrote of him in her story The Welsh Connection.

Pop was a good doctor, a quiet man who had been touched by tragedy. He loved music and his old Airedale dog 'Bobby.' At some time every day he walked up to St Mary's. [Canton] Everyone in the parish knew 'the Doctor' was inside the Church because Bobby was lying on the mat outside the door.

  Patrick died on 12.5.1945 at Cowbridge Road, aged seventy three. Causes of death were given as cerebral thrombosis and arteriosclerosis. Tom England was present at his death. The Requiem mass was at 10.00am at St Mary of the Angels, Canton. No flowers were requested. [10] 
He was buried at the old part of Cathays Cemetery.in a grave that held his wife Josephine. (Plot Number D929A)

Probate was granted on 17.9.1945 to medical practitioners, Patrick England and Thomas England. The effects were £2,638 8s 7d.

Bernard, Monica Daly and Philip England were the three entitled to the residue of the estate.

Footnotes

[1] Freeman’s Journal, 8-10-1894 and the Dublin Daily Express in 1897.

[2] Hull Advertiser, 23-9-1853

[3] Western Mail, 25-5-1914

[4] Western Mail, 19/20-2-1915

[5] Western Mail, 10-4-1915

[6] Western Mail, 8-12-1915

[7] Western Mail, 10-4-1915

[8] Western Mail, 31-1-1917

[9] Western Mail, 18-7-1917 and 18-10-1918

[10] Western Mail, 15-5-1945

Syncope: fainting, loss of consciousness.

Place names

Sunday’s Well: a suburb of Cork.

Westgate St: right in the heart of Cardiff city centre and home to the famous Millennium stadium – now named the Principality stadium. In Dunraven House, a block of flats on Westgate St lived great friends of Tom and Gwen. They were James and Margot Desmond, always referred to as Uncle Des and Aunty Margot.

City Lodge, Cardiff: In 1839 a workhouse was built in Cowbridge Road, Canton. The Poor Law Commission approved an expenditure of £5,500. The original buildings had accommodation for 250.

Numbers seeking relief were swelled during the years of the Irish famine. (1845-1850) In 1848 The Manchester Guardian reported that,

200 Irish paupers, men, women and children, landed from Cork on Penarth beach and instantly proceeded to demand relief at the Cardiff workhouse.

The vast majority were returned to Ireland.

An infirmary with 164 beds was added in 1872 and a major rebuild of the workhouse was completed in 1881. By 1908 the total capacity of the workhouse was over 1,000.

After 1930 control of the site passed to Cardiff City Council and the workhouse became the City Lodge Public Assistance Institution.

In 1948 it joined the newly formed National Health Service as St David’s Infirmary. The hospital closed in 1995 and the site was redeveloped.

Splott: a suburb of Cardiff in the south of the city. John Humphrys, BBC radio and television presenter was born there and Shirley Bassey, though born in nearby Tiger Bay, moved to Splott aged two. She was a patient of Dr Tom England, Pop's son.

Canton: an inner city district in West Cardiff about two miles from the city centre.

Josephine M. Walsh: (1877-1932) 

Believed to be Josephine with 'Pop' England [England family collection]

 

Her surname varies in official documents as we will see. 

Her residence, before marriage, was given in the marriage certificate as Cappoquin, County Waterford. Her father was the “late David Walsh, a shopkeeper” at Millstreet cross roads, Farnane, who married Ellen O'Keefe and had nine children. David's father was John Walsh who was born in Ballybrusa, Grange, Co. Waterford in 1770 and died in Farnane on 11.4.1838. John had married Johanna Sheehan of Knockgarraun, Cappagh, and they had six sons and one daughter.

Josephine married Patrick in Cardiff in 1904. She was twenty seven. The witnesses were: Thomas Alphonsus England and Catherine Cantillon. Mary Christine Murphy and Matthew Morrissey also attended the wedding which was undertaken by Fr Patrick O'Keefe.

In the 1911 Census (UK) Josephene , spelt with an ‘e’, was thirty four and it stated she was born in Waterford, Ireland.

All attempts to find her birth certificate in Waterford have failed so far. It has not been possible to trace her father, David, through his birth or marriage certificates either. Therefore we don't know her mother, or if she had any brothers or sisters. There is no anecdotal information about her family background within the family either. Hence she remains a mysterious lady!*

Josephine died in Cardiff aged fifty five. The date of registration of death was June 1932. Her birth date was given as “about 1877” and the death certificate mentioned myocardial degeneration and Raynaud's disease. [A constriction of the blood supply to fingers and toes due to a disorder of the arteries] Her name on the death certificate - Josephine Mary Welsh! She was buried in the old part of Cathays Cemetery, Cardiff. (Plot Number D929A)

Possible links to Josephine

In the 1901 Irish Census a Josephine Walsh, twenty four, [thus born in 1877] single, born in County Waterford, a trained nurse, able to speak Irish and English lived by herself in a four roomed flat in Spring Duke, Dungarvon No 1, Waterford in the parish of Kilrush. This data was collected 11.4.1901. Mention was also made of a Dungarvon workhouse.

In the same census a Michael Walsh (37) was living at Ballynoe, Cappoquin, Waterford. With him was his wife Katherine Walsh (38) their six children and Mary Browne, William Coleman and finally a Thomas Morrissey. A Matthew Morrissey attended  Josephine’s marriage in 1904. Could these two be related?

In the 1911 Irish Census there was a Josephine M. Walsh (27) living in Main St, Cappoquin and married to a Michael F. Walsh (37) giving him a birth date of 1874. Could he be related to Josephine?

*New information has come to light in April 2019. Carol Jones has discovered that Josephine was one of nine children and that a sister known as Sis, married a Pat Walsh, a native of  Clogheen, Co. Tipperary who had an agricultural supply business in Cardiff and several branches in the surrounding towns. This is 'Uncle' who lived with Tom and Gwen England at 65, Cardiff Rd, Llandaff.

Place names


Cappoquin: a town in west County Waterford. Its railway opened in 1878 and was served by the Cork to Rosslare boat train. The ferry operates from Rosslare to Fishguard, West Wales.

Kilrush: a district north west of Waterford City centre

Patrick Joseph England and Josephine Walsh had six children. They feature in the next blog.