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BURFORD BOYS on Leave in U.K. Visit Their Ancestral Scarborough,
During Two World Wars: Part 2 ------------------------ The following is Copyright
© 2015 by Clayton Barker, all rights reserved. It was published on the
editorial page of The Burford Times, Nov. 12th 2015, in Burford,
Ontario, Canada.
#8 & #9 Barwick Terrace, Scarborough, U.K. Where Alice Ann Sawdon and her three daughters kept a boarding
house during two World Wars. Photo by C. Barker, 2015. The first time I ever knew about these relatives,
the, Sawdons of Scarborough U.K., was from my
grandfather Luther Barker, who knew of them through his first cousins,
Maitland Brooks and Howard and William Disher who had been stationed in
England during the First World War and billeted at their place. I was helping
my grandfather compile his memoirs at the time and was interested in also
compiling a family history to go along with it. Maitland
Brooks (my first cousin twice removed) used to be a “fixture” in Burford
Village, after he retired from farm life, and would walk up Maple Avenue
every day to get the mail and gossip and tell his yarns and funny jokes. I
had many a “chin-wag” with him in 1985 while I was a college student
surveying the Congregational Cemetery for the Township of Burford. He would
stop at the fence to tell me a joke and would point out that at some funerals
he had attended, there at the Congregational Cemetery (pointing to the front
row of tombstones) there was at least one or two more bodies below the one
being buried…whether this was a joke, I’m not so sure now after visiting my
ancestral area of Scarborough, England, because I was shocked to learn that
they weren’t kidding when they said they buried their dead on top of each
other sometimes three-deep or more! Edwin Cooper was also heavily involved
with recording the history of the church and cemetery there at Staxton and
is, or perhaps was, the Clerk of Willerby Parish (the parish of which my
ancestors belonged) and Edwin told me that there could be about 8000 people
buried in his churchyard at St. Peters Church yard, which is only a couple
acres in size but is over 600 years old. Down the lane from that church,
there is actually a Roman cemetery which is now a farm.
St. Peters Church,
Willerby Parish, Yorkshire England. Photo by C.
Barker, 2015. Maitland
loved telling funny yarns, but when his yarns seemed to originate from actual
genealogical facts, I would pressure him for the truth and more details! He
told me that while stationed at Scarborough Yorkshire England, during the
First World War, he walked up the beach to Scarborough Castle, where he came
across a human skull. He said that “half its jaw was worn away, so it must
have been a woman, because she was a real talker!” I thought it was funny,
but he went on to tell me that he was billeting with two other soldier
relatives of ours, at a distant Barker relatives’ place there when he was on
leave in Scarborough. This intrigued me, and I often thought I should try to
capture Mait and make him tell me more about those relatives. Three
years later, he was 98 years old and on his death bed, at St. Joseph’s
Hospital where I visited him. He wanted to tell me all the facts about all
the yarns and stories, though he still told the funny versions and chuckled
like always. I went to leave after I felt I may be wearing him out, but he
grabbed my coat and told me to stay, so I asked
the nurse for a paper and pen and I wrote everything down that he had to
say…even the jokes! So, about this time period, WW1 1917-18 in the
U.K., as I had said, the city of Scarborough had been shelled frequently,
previous to Mait’s visit. I also had mentioned about Alice Ann Sawdon, a
distant Barker cousin of ours, who was keeping a boarding house there. Mait
said Alice had three daughters: Hilda, Elcy and Olive. Olive (Sawdon)
Wilkinson’s husband was on the Scarborough police force. He also mentioned
that one or all of the daughters, had worked in a millinery shop where they
would make 10 shillings per week. But of course, Mait had to include: “the
woman who ran the shop made more than that on just one hat!” Elcy, I believe was the youngest as she was still
at home during the Second World War when other relatives billeted there. Elcy
had been “shell-shocked” by the bombing of the area perhaps near her
workplace, and it affected her, the rest of her life. She was quiet, hardly
ever said anything, but only went about what she had to do and did what
anyone told her to. She spent much of her later life in a hospital and passed
away there in 1981. It must have been such an exciting time, being visited by
these uniform-clad “far-flung-relatives” from Canada! At the end of their stay, at Alice’s, the boys
wanted to give Alice a nice gift to remember them, so they asked the
daughters “what would Alice appreciate the most?” The daughters thought a
while, and then one of them said “I suppose a bottle of something nice!” |
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LINKS To Check Out |
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Barker Genealogy |
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Disher Genealogy |
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Binnington Yorkshire |
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Hackness Yorkshire |
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Scarborough Yorkshire |
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Staxton Yorkshire |
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