john malindine + caroline grint
John, known as Jack, was baptised at St James the Great in Bethnal Green on 20 September 1874 and the baptismal register lists his date of birth as 29 August 1874 but on a subsequent record (the 1939 Register) his birthdate is given as 8 September. He was the son of Charles Frederick Malindine, a Hawker, and his wife Emma Elizabeth Tweed. He grew up on Mount Street in Bethnal Green and by 1891, he had moved out of the family home and into a house around the corner at 63 Virginia Road with his brothers Charlie and Jim.
On 14 February 1897, he married Caroline Grint at St Peter in Bethnal Green with his brother Jim and sister Eliza as witnesses. Jack and Caroline knew each other at least two years before their marriage as they both appear as witnesses at her sister Ellen’s marriage to David Power on Christmas Day 1895.
Caroline was born in Bethnal Green in 1873 to William Grint, a Photographic Assistant, and his wife Jane Bridges. When they married, Jack was living at 45 Quilter Street, just down the street from his brother Jim and sister-in-law Eliza, and working as a Printer’s Compositor, responsible for inserting the individual letter blocks into the printing frame. Caroline was living on Gossett Street and although no occupation was listed on the marriage certificate, she previously worked as a Corset Maker.
It appears that Jack and Caroline returned to Virginia Row after their marriage and the first of the their eleven children, son John, was born there on 2 May 1898 and baptised at St Peter, Bethnal Green on 29 May. Caroline was born on 17 December 1899 and baptised at St Peter on 14 January 1900. The family was still at 63 Virginia Row in 1901 and occupied just one room in the house while Jack’s parents and four siblings occupied the other four rooms. Charles Frederick was born on 26 December 1901 and baptised on 19 January 1902 but he died three months later.
They had left Virginia Row for Coopers Gardens by the time son William Thomas was born on 8 April 1903; he was baptised at St Peter on 3 May. Maud was born on 7 August 1905 at 67 Hassard Street and baptised at St Paul, Bethnal Green on 23 August. Ernest Edward was born on 16 November 1907 and baptised on 8 December at St Paul but he died the following year.
Frederick James was born on 15 August 1909 and baptised on 1 September at St Paul. Two years later, they were living in 4 rooms at 69 Hassard Street off the Hackney Road and Jack was still working as a Compositor. Daughter Elsie Catherine was born shortly after, on 8 July, but her baptismal record has not been found. Beatrice, known as Beattie, was born on 17 December 1913 and baptised on 14 January 1914 followed by Hilda Winifred in the fall of 1915. She died two years later and was buried at Manor Park Cemetery in Newham, Essex on 7 May 1917.
One year after their daughter’s death, their eleventh child, Flossie, was born but their happiness was short lived as their nine year old son Frederick died several months later and like his sister Hilda, he was buried at Manor Park on 14 August 1918.
The losses continued when Jack’s wife Caroline died on 18 March 1920 of Influenza and chronic bronchitis when she was only 46 years old. She was buried at Manor Park eight days later but it is not known if she was buried in the same plot as her children. Sadly, two year old Flossie died shortly after her mother and although the cause of death is not known, it is possible that she too died of influenza.
When she died, Caroline had six surviving children ranging in age from 7 to 22 years and it appears that the family was able to stay together after Caroline’s death. However, Jack was to lose one more child when daughter Maud died in Bethnal Green in the summer of 1927, aged 22 years.
By 1918, the family had moved to 2 Gascoigne Place in Bethnal Green and Jack appears in the Electoral Registers along with a number of his children at this address until 1939. Their daughter Elsie appears from 1935 and she remained in the family home even after she married Edward Henry Merrifield in Shoreditch in the summer of 1935. In 1939, Jack, Elsie and her husband were still living together at Gascoigne Place and while Jack was retired, Elsie worked as an Umbrella Tipper and her husband as an Air Craft Inspector. Jack later left Bethnal Green for Essex where he died in 1948 while Elsie and Edward moved to Ealing where Edward died in 1962. Elsie appears alone in the Electoral Registers at 43 Graham Avenue in Ealing throughout the 1960s but in 1979, at the age of 68, she married a second time to widower Norman Alfred Percy Coy. Elsie died in Ealing in 1990 and Norman in Lincoln five years later.
Jack and Caroline’s eldest son John was the first to leave home when he married Elizabeth Amy Rose Cooper in Hackney in 1924. Elizabeth was born on 18 May 1902 at 59 Nicholas Street in Shoreditch to Ernest Sidney Cooper and Elizabeth Ann Bull. Their only child, John Ernest, was born in Hackney on 3 July 1924, less than nine months after his parents’ marriage. John and Elizabeth lived with her parents after their marriage but by the early 1930s, they moved to their own home at 28 Mortimer Road in Hackney where they lived for the next ten years. John died in Hendon in 1941, aged only 43 years, and was buried at the Harrow Weald Cemetery. Four years later, Elizabeth married a second time to Henry Monk in Hackney and they lived at 41 Beynon Street with her son John throughout the 1950s but by 1963, the three of them had moved to 74 Penshurst Road in Croydon. Further records relating to Elizabeth and Henry have not been found but John, who never married, remained in the house in Croydon until his death on 12 August 1978.
Caroline, known as Cissie, also remained at home until she married in Bethnal Green in 1930 to Arthur Hunter. They had one daughter born in Islington in 1931. They left the East End for North London and in 1939, they were living at 27 Haileybury Avenue in Enfield where Arthur worked as a Police Constable. Caroline died at 3 Ennerfield Gardens in Wembley on 22 September 1985 and Arthur died is Surrey in 1996.
William Thomas married Maud Maria Smith in Bethnal Green in the fall of 1934. Maud was born on 12 October 1899 to Charles and Annie Elizabeth Smith and she grew up on Corfield Street near Weaver’s Fields. William worked as a Porter for the Railways from the age of 19 and later worked as a Labourer. After their wedding, they moved to 12 Nichols Square, off Hackney Road, in Haggerston and home to St Chad’s Church. An article on Spitalfields Life describes the square and its unfortunate demolition:
Unquestionably, the centrepiece of Haggerston’s nineteenth century development was Nichols Sq, situated east of the Geffrye Museum beyond the railway viaduct. Built in 1841 and featuring two outward facing rows of picturesque Tudor gothic villas at its centre, Nichols Sq was further enhanced in 1867-9 by a splendid church and vicarage – St Chad’s – by the architect James Brooks. Surviving in good condition until blighted by a Compulsory Purchase Order, the square was swept away in 1963 for the Fellows Court Estate. Geoffrey Fletcher, author of ‘The London Nobody Knows,’ lamented the impending loss in 1962 by illustrating the houses in the Daily Telegraph, and describing “the delightful Gothic villas … in excellent condition [which] if they were in Chelsea would fetch anything from £10,000 to £15,000.” Savouring the architectural detail, he comments “Typical of the finesse of the period is that, while the terrace railings have a Classic flavour, the similar ones of the cottages have a Tudor outline. But after next year none of this will matter any more.”
By 1939, William and Maud had moved to what appears to be the first of a number of council estates and were found at 25 Longbow House in Shoreditch. They lived in Poplar in 1949 before moving across London to Hammersmith where they lived at 7 Ellenborough House from 1950—58. It was back across London to Camden and the Maitland Park Villas for five years then north east to High Hill Ferry in Upper Clapton and in 1965, they were back on the west side of London at 2 Crokesley House on Burnt Oak Broadway in Edgware. At some point, they moved to Wandsworth where William died in 1986. Maud died at Springfield Hospital at 61 Glenburnie Road in Wandsworth on 5 March 1989.
Jack and Caroline’s youngest surviving daughter, Beattie, married Richard Candy in West Ham in 1932 and they had two daughters although sadly one died in 1942 aged 2 years. Few records have been found regarding this family but at some point, they left Essex and settled in Hitchin, Hertfordshire where Beatrice died in 1997.