edward george mallendane + florence bennett
Edward George was born 4 October 1924 in Bethnal Green, the son of Alfred Mallendane and Ellen Saunders. He was a skilled football player but any chance of a professional career ended with the outbreak of the war. He joined the Royal Navy in 1941, aged only 17 years, and was assigned to the MS Marve training centre for naval officers outside Bombay, India.
his monkey
Teddy served as a petty officer and piloted landing craft in Burma and Singapore for the duration of the war but he continued to play football while in the Navy and won two silver Cups in 1945 and 1946 with his regimental team. He adopted a monkey that was allowed on the ship but Teddy was not allowed to bring it back to England at the end of the war.
When he returned home, Teddy drove a truck around Dagenham selling and delivering fruit and vegetables. He likely worked with his older brother Jimmy or perhaps helped with the family business after Jimmy’s untimely death in 1949. In the 1950s, Teddy went to work as a Porter at the Smithfield Meat Market and worked there for twenty five years.
Smithfield Market was designed to supply inner city butchers, shops and restaurants with meat for the coming day. It is one of the oldest markets in London and meat and poultry have been traded at Smithfield for over 800 years. In 1856, the market was moved from its original site just outside the city walls to its present site on Charterhouse Road in Clerkenwell to reduce congestion in the city. The need for a new location was explained in Cruchley's London in 1865 : A Handbook for Strangers:
The confined area of Smithfield produced so many nuisances, and so many accidents were caused by infuriated cattle being driven through the crowded streets of the City, that public opinion, after some years of contention, compelled the removal of the metropolitan cattle market to its present commodious habitat.
Teddy married Eleanor Florence Bennett in Bethnal Green at Christmas in 1950. Eleanor, known to friends and family as Nell, was the younger sister of his brother Charlie’s wife, Dolly. For a second successive generation, two sisters married two Mallendane brothers.
Teddy was very active in the community and was instrumental in developing local football in the Bethnal Green area. In the late 1960s, Teddy formed a boys football club in Bethnal Green called Tiger FC and while he played and coached, Nell helped organise and fundraise. As a result of their hard work and commitment, the club grew to include 10 teams of various ages and they played in competitions in Belgium, Holland, Germany and France. The team was very successful and some players went on to play professionally.
Sadly, Teddy died of a heart attack while playing in a father—son charity match on 1 March 1976. Teddy was respected and admired by many in Bethnal Green and over 100 friends and neighbours attended his funeral. The funeral procession passed by the local school and all the boys who played for him lined up outside the school in their football kits to pay their respects.
Nell remained in Bethnal Green until her death on 22 February 2005.