Clearing out my house has unearthed things I had forgotten I had. I cleared my mother's home in 2012 after she went into a nursing home at the end of 2011. Things got put in boxes to be dealt with another day, time was short. And now I am rediscovering all these things. Great Aunt Sarah Ellen, or Helen, or just Aunt Helen, or Ellen, it varied a lot, was my mother's aunt. She had been married and widowed three times, and in the latter part of her life lived in Morecambe (also known as Bradford by t'sea). She was known for her love of "bling". Her second husband must have been a man of substance as she had fur coats (which created a headache for my mother to dispose of after her death, they were no longer in fashion), she had jewellery and loved cut glass and collected lots of it. She turned up at my wedding wearing one of her fur coats, such things were just beginning to be frowned upon, and husband number two wearing a toupe, (why did men do this ?) and I shudder now when I see the photographs. But she was a very, very jolly person, had a lovely laugh and a great sense of fun. She never had any children. This is an application for her birth certificate, her parents must have lost the original. At the time of the application in 1915 they were living at 5 Woodyard Road, West Bowling, Bradford but Sarah Helen had been born at Smithsons Row, Southowram Bank in Halifax. This is the other side of the application, so when she was born in 1903 she was Sarah Ellen, but in 1915 she was Sarah Helen. The certificate must have been needed to enable her to leave school and go to work. Her mother Emma could not write when the birth was registered, but signed the form for the copy of the birth certificate. Aunt Sarah Ellen would have been twelve years old when she started work. This is a picture of Southowram Bank, Halifax, from a page called www.halifaxpeople.com which has a blog about Southowram with lots of old pictures. This next image from the same source gives an idea of what the residences were like. This is the 1901 census and shows Sarah Ellen's parents John and Emma, her sisters Elizabeth and Evelyn and brother Norman. They were at 32 Mill Lane, Boothtown, Halifax. As a young woman Aunt Sarah Ellen was very good looking, and her first husband was called Lance, full name Lancelot Farish Unruh, born in Carlisle in 1899. Who were the Unruh family and where had they come from ? This is what I have tried to discover. Lance's father was German. Oscar Adolph Edmund Unruh was born in 1865 in Berlin the son of August Wilhelm Unruh and his wife Wilhelmine Hulda Schwabel who had married on the 13th March 1864. Oscar Adolph Edmund was born on the 7th of April and baptised on the 14th of May. When he came to England he mostly used the name Edmund. In 1891 Edmund Unruh, although below it was written as Unrich, was in London lodging with a German family and was a Chrome Lithographer. There is a description of chrome lithography here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chromolithography This mentions how Germans dominated this particular trade and how many came to England because of the political situation in Germany. How or why he came north to Carlisle I do not know, but in the summer of 1895 Oscar Edmund Unruh married Hannah Farish. They then had three sons all born in Carlisle, William Oscar Edmund Unruh in 1896, Lancelot Farish Unruh in 1899 and Leonard Unruh in 1902. Here they are in 1901 at 3 Wigton Road in Carlisle. By 1911 they were at 39 Arthur Street, Carlisle. Edmund the father was a Litho artist in a Printing Office and the eldest son Oscar was a designer in a Carpet Factory. All looked good. But the family moved to Bradford, and in 1920 the death of the youngest son Leonard was registered, he was only seventeen years old. In 1927 the eldest son William Oscar Edmund married in Preston to Maggie Kirkham, and then in 1933 Lancelot married Sarah Ellen Fletcher. Whilst they were at 39 Arthur Street in Carlisle the father applied to become a naturalised subject. This document states that - Oscar Adolf Edmund Unruh an Alien now residing at 39 Arthur Street, Carlisle ... alleged that he was a subject of Germany being born in Berlin, the son of [hidden word] Oscar and Hulda Unruh, that he was 43 years old and married with three children under age residing with him viz Oscar Edmund Unruh aged 12, Lancelot Farish aged 9 and Leonard aged 6. He then had to swear the oath of allegiance - I Oscar Adolf Edmund Unruh of number 39 Arthur Street in the City of Carlisle Lithographic Artist do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to his majesty King Edward, His heirs and Successors. So help me God. 9th January 1909. There is so much unknown. But at some point the family, or at least some of them, had returned home to Germany. This rather tatty looking document is part of a Passenger List for a ship named "Stockport" sailing from Hamburg to Grimsby in 1924. On board were Edmund Unruh born 7 April 1865 in Berlin, a Lithographic something in German, and Oscar Unruh born 6 May 1896 in Carlisle whose occupation was also written in German. They had both visited Berlin. They may have travelled back and forth on other occasions. Great Aunt Sarah Ellen also went to Germany on at least one holiday, she may have gone more often, I don't know. This postcard was sent from the Black Forest to my grandmother in Bradford. Addressed to Mr and Mrs Stocks, the message was "Dear Sister & all, Having a good time & lovely weather this is part of the place we are staying it is beautiful Forests for miles & staying at a lovely hotel just going to the bathing pool, Best Love Helen & Lance". Well that must have been quite an adventure for Great Aunt Sarah Ellen born on Smithson Row in Halifax. And guess what, there is another Birthday Book ! This one does not have texts out of the Bible, but against each date there are quotations from the bard Robert Burns. This does sort of fit with a family from Carlisle, although he was universally popular. This must have belonged to Great Aunt Sarah Ellen's mother in law or at least someone in the Unruh family, as there are the birthdays of the Unruh boys, and also of several different Carlisle families, Normans, Johnstones, and several addresses. These are all in a small, fine hand, then my aunt used the book as an address book, and she had large flourishing handwriting which filled all available space. I wish I knew more about Lance. Why the family moved from Carlisle to Bradford, what they did. But so much is lost. There are some very faded, tiny snaps with happy people on holiday. Here is one. Great Aunt Sarah Ellen is in the middle. They all look very jolly. Who were the men ? Was one of them Lance ? Are these the same young men? I wish people would write on the back of photographs ! What happened to this family during the Second World War ? Was Edmund the father interned ? I would love to know if there is any way of finding out. Edmund Unruh the Lithographer died in Bradford in 1946 aged 81 and his wife Hannah died in 1947 aged 81. Sadly their son Lance did not live such a long life. Great Aunt Sarah Ellen did live a very long life, and here she is with some of her much loved cut glass.
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AuthorThis is where you can share creativity with me. I believe that everyone has something creative within them, and it is a joy to find ways of being creative. Blogging is NEW to me, so here goes ..... Archives
January 2024
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