emma malindine + nathaniel miller
Emma Elizabeth was born at 2 Mount Street in Bethnal Green on 17 February 1872 to Charles Frederick Malindine and his wife Emma Elizabeth Tweed. She was baptised at St James the Great in Bethnal Green on 10 March. In 1891, she was living with her family at 111 Mount Street and working as a Fancy Box Maker. Three years later, at the age of 22, she married Nathaniel Miller at St James the Less on 4 February 1894 with her brother James and sister Annie as witnesses. When they married, Emma was still living her family but at 63 Virginia Road while Nathaniel lived with his family at number 76.
Nathaniel was born on 29 June 1872 to Nathaniel Miller, a Cabinet Maker, and his wife Gertrude Flower Saunders. He was baptised at St Leonard Shoreditch on 21 July and grew up on Virginia Row living at number 3 in 1881 and at number 76 in 1891. He worked as an assistant cabinet maker with his father and carried on with the trade in adulthood.
Just over a year after their wedding, their first son, Nathaniel, was born at 194 Barnet Grove in Bethnal Green on 21 March 1895 and baptised at St Philip on 4 April. By 1897, they had moved to 96 Ravenscroft Street where daughter Emma Elizabeth, known as Cissie, was born on 20 March. She was baptised at St Leonard, Shoreditch on 11 April.
The family hasn’t been located in the 1901 Census but contemporary Post Office Directories place them at 72 Virginia Road from 1900 to 1902 and they note that Nathanial ran a Chandler’s Shop, a general goods store that sold both household items, primarily soap and candles, as well as groceries. It seems clear that the family returned to Virginia Road between 1897 and 1900; they were still there when the census was taken on 31 March 1901 but the returns for the even numbered houses between 66 – 82 do not appear in the either the returns or the enumerator books.
On 3 March 1902, their son Thomas was born in a house further down the street at 76 Virginia Road and baptised at St Leonard three weeks later. Violet was born on 17 January 1908, also at number 76, and she was baptised at St Leonard on 9 February. Nathaniel appears in the Post Office Directories until 1910 but the following year, Nathaniel, Emma and their four children were living in North London at 4 Sheringham Avenue in Tottenham. They occupied five rooms and Nathaniel was back working as a Cabinet Maker while his eldest son, Nathaniel, worked in a Cigar Factory.
They returned to Virginia Road several years later and Nathaniel appears again in the 1915 directory at 82 Virginia Road, as a dairyman, and as a chandler at 1A Queen’s Buildings on nearby Gosset Street. It seems that Emma, the daughter of a general dealer, was helping run the chandler’s shop and she later appears in the Post Office Directory as a Greengrocer on Virgina Road along with her sister, Annie, who continued to run the Malindine family business. Their shop was next door to the Beasley’s Coffee Rooms at 65 Virginia Road.
On 3 March 1918, their son, Nathaniel Junior, married Grace Miriam Beasley at St Philip in Bethnal Green. Grace was born on 22 January 1901 in Walthamstow, Essex to Richard William Beasley, a Coffee House Keeper, and Emily Eleanor Harknett. Although Grace grew up in Walthamstow, her half-brother, Richard, operated the coffee house on Virginia Road and she probably met Nathaniel through this association.
Nathaniel Senior died in West Ham on 31 July 1922 but it is not known if they were living in Essex or if Nathaniel was working or visiting there at the time. There are no records of Emma until the mid-1930s when she appears in a number of Electoral Registers at 36 Wellington Row in Bethnal Green along with a number of other single occupants. In 1939, she was living at 23 Durant Street with her daughter Violet and her husband. Emma died in Bethnal Green the following year aged 67 years.
Nathaniel Junior and Grace remained in Bethnal Green after their marriage and went on to have three children: Nathaniel Frank, known as Frank, on 13 December 1918, Charles on 21 November 1919, and Eric Edward on 13 May 1926. They left the East End for Essex and settled in Romford where Nathaniel died on 11 May 1935, aged only 40 years. In 1939, Grace was living at 83 Jewel Road in Walthamstow with her youngest son and supporting him by working as a Washer and Cleaner. Also in the house, but listed as a separate household, was Ammunition Worker William Frederick Trebes, his wife and one of his three children. William was the son of Gertrude Miller, Nathaniel’s aunt, and her husband William Trebes. Fourteen years later, William’s wife died and several months later he married Grace in Hackney. William died on in Walthamstow in 1959 and Grace on 14 Jun 1968.
Nathaniel and Emma’s daughter Cissie married William Lelliot in Worthing, Sussex in the spring of 1922, just months before her father died. William was born in Broadwater, Worthing, the son of William Lelliott and Catherine Penfold, and he was fifteen years older than Cissie. The settled in Worthing and had four children – William George on 24 April 1923, Alfred Charles on 14 March 1925, Cecilia Joan on 13 February 1930, and John Stephen on 23 December 1935. In 1939, they were living at 28 Angola Road in Worthing; William was working as a General Corporation Labourer (worked for the local council), eldest son William was working as a Pullman Car Attendant, 14 year old Alfred was an Errand Boy and the two youngest were still in school. Two years later, William died aged only 58 years and Cissie was left to raise their four children aged 6 to 18 years. She remained in Worthing, although she never remarried, and died in Worthing in 1978.
Thomas married Matilda Tippett at St Paul Bethnal Green on 3 April 1924 and they had one son in 1931. In 1939, Matilda was living alone at 71 Hereford Street in Bethnal Green and it is possible that Thomas was serving in the army and their son may have been evacuated from London. There are no further records of the family until the 1960s when they were living in Highbury, North London. Thomas died in Camden in 1984 and Matilda in Islington in 1995.
Violet was the last to marry, to Arthur James Brown in Bethnal Green in 1931 but it doesn’t appear they had any children. In 1939 they were living at 23 Durant Street in Bethnal Green with Arthur’s sister Rosina. Arthur was working as a Cigarette Machine Operator and his sister also worked in the tobacco industry as a leaf stripper. They moved to Loughton, Essex in the 1960s but their common names make it difficult to track them and no other records have been confirmed.