George Alfred Melton was
born on 1st September 1854 in Castleacre, Norfolk. Although christened George,
the census records suggest he was probably known as Alfred or Alf. Shortly
after his birth, the family moved to Norwich. His younger brother, Frederick,
was born in Heigham, Norwich on 10th December 1855.
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| Birth certificate |
Alf’s father, Fred, was a
journeyman gardener and it seems likely that the family moved regularly. Indeed,
according to the 1861 census the family had moved to the village of Ditchingham
located close to the Norfolk Broads and the Suffolk border. Both Alf and his
younger brother Fred were attending the local school at this time.
The transient nature of
his father’s employment is bound to have had an impact on Alf. At some point in
the 1860s he would have been forced to say goodbye to his school friends once
his father had decided to take the family away from Norfolk. This must have
been difficult for him. By 1871, Alf was living at 5 Moselle Street, Tottenham
with his parents and younger brother. According to the census both Alf and Fred
were working as ‘errand boys’.
At the age of nineteen, Alf married Sarah Ann Collison
at the parish church of St James the Great in Bethnal Green on 23rd
March 1874. Sarah, aged just seventeen, was the daughter of a blacksmith and had grown up in the East
End. St James the Great or the “Red Church” as it was known, was regarded at
the time as a place where you could get married quickly with no questions
asked. The vicar would apparently sell marriage licenses on the premises for a penny
before conducting the service and the permission of the parents of the young couple probably wasn't sought.
At the time of the
wedding, Alf was working as a cook and was living in Bethnal Green. The events
that led up to this important milestone in Alf’s life are not clear. However,
the railways must have played a part as Tottenham and Bethnal Green were, and
still are, on the same line.
In the years that
followed their wedding, it is apparent that Alf and Sarah lived at a number of
addresses in the East End. Their first child Sarah Frances, was born in Mile
End Old Town on 27th December 1874.
Sarah was baptised at St Thomas’s, Stepney on 2nd July 1876 and at
the time the family were living at 8 William Street in Mile End Old Town. Later
that year, on 19th December, Alf and Sarah’s first son, George
Frederick Melton was born and their second
son, John Robert Melton was born around eighteen months later on 16th
June 1879. At the time of John's birth, Alf was still working as a cook in a
restaurant but they had moved to 11 Ann Street,
Ratcliff. The street ran alongside the main
London to Southend railway line and was situated between Commercial Road and
Cable Street. Today this street is called Barnardo Street, named after the
famous Dr Thomas Barnardo who opened his first home for boys nearby.
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| 8-14 Ann Street, Ratcliff |
The census taken on the
night of 3rd April 1881 showed that Alf and his family were still living at 11 Ann Street, Ratcliff. Alf was employed
as a ‘workhouse porter’. By the late nineteenth century Great Britain had
evolved into the world’s premier superpower thanks to the industrial
revolution. Great Britain’s standing abroad concealed the shameful truth that
thousands of people in the cities were living in poverty and squalor. The East
End of London contained many of these unfortunate people: the marginalised, the
poverty-stricken, the drink-sodden, the orphans, the immigrants, the criminal types,
the unemployed and the revolutionaries. Alf’s time as a workhouse porter would
have exposed him to the plight of many of these poor people and the experience
is bound to have had a profound effect on him.
By the following year,
Alf and Sarah had moved to 25J Juniper Street. Their new home was in a four-storey
block of “model dwellings” that had been built in 1880 for the “respectable
working class”. A staircase leading from the dark street lead to eight flats
and although by today’s standards these places appear grim, they provided
accommodation that was considered to be better than that found in the majority
of houses in the district. Many of the poorer families living in the East End
could not afford the rent which was around 5s a week and paid in advance but
Alf’s wages had clearly enabled him to climb one rung up the ladder.
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| Juniper Street, Shadwell |
Alf and Sarah had a new
baby girl, Esther Emily Melton, early in 1882. Baby Esther was baptised at St
Paul’s church, Shadwell on 26th November but by then it is likely
that the baby was already ill. Tragically, Esther died just over a week later
on 4th December. The cause of death is cited as “dentition, cerebral
irritation” which suggests that teething problems were responsible for her
untimely death.
With the death of baby
Esther still fresh in their minds, Alf and Sarah decided it was time to get
their two boys baptised. They were both baptised at St Paul’s church, Shadwell
on 19th January 1883. By this time, Alf was working as a “packer”
possibly in a warehouse by the nearby docks.
Alf and Sarah had another
daughter named Lily on 18th September 1883 and she was baptised at
St Paul’s, Shadwell on 5th October. Their fourth daughter, Edith
Emily was born on 22nd February 1886. Throughout this period, Alf
and his growing family remained at 25J Juniper Street.
On the night of 30th
August 1888, a huge fire took hold in Shadwell Dry Dock. Many local people went
down to the scene of the fire and as they lived nearby it is reasonable to
speculate that Alf and Sarah were amongst them. As the firemen were damping
down the following morning, news emerged of an “unfortunate” who had been
murdered in Bucks Row, Whitechapel. The discovery of the body of Mary Ann
Nicholls was the beginning of a series of murders which gripped the public
imagination and baffled the police. Alf and Sarah would have undoubtedly read
the newspapers and heard rumours on the streets but they were probably too busy
bringing up their young family and providing a roof over their heads to concern
themselves too much. Their daughter Edith was baptised at St Paul’s, Shadwell
on 9th November 1888 coincidentally this was the same day that Mary
Kelly’s horribly mutilated body was discovered in Spitalfields.
During the so called
“autumn of terror” Sarah had been pregnant again and in the early months of
1889 she gave birth to another baby girl who they named Emily Harriet. Just prior
to Emily’s birth, in the previous November, the
family moved to Cable Street where Alf established himself as a coffee tavern
keeper. The local trade directory for
1890 shows that Alf’s coffee rooms were situated at 263 Cable Street. The term
coffee tavern described two types of premises. One
type became popular in the mid/late Victorian period and were promoted by the
temperance movement as an alternative to public houses. However, in the East
End of London a coffee tavern could be likened to a modern “greasy spoon caff”.
These were places were ordinary workers could sit and enjoy simple food.
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| Article from the Lloyds Weekly London Newspaper 31st Aug. 1890 |
At around 4pm on
Wednesday 27th August 1890, Alf witnessed a horrific accident on
Cable Street. A four-wheeled van pulled by a pair of horses and loaded with 3
tons of cargo pulled out to overtake traffic. At that moment, a small girl,
unseen by the driver, was lying in the road. She tried to get up but was run
over. The driver immediately pulled up, but the girl was severely injured and
taken to the children’s hospital, which was situated nearby in Glamis Road. She had to have both legs amputated
and later died. George was called as a witness at the inquest which took place
on the following Saturday at the Shadwell Vestry Hall. The coroner returned a
verdict of accidental death and it was Alf’s evidence that helped to deflect
blame away from the poor driver.
The 1891 census confirms
that Alf was a ‘coffee tavern keeper’ at 265 Cable Street. He was living there
with his wife and their six children. However, the Post Office street directory
of 1894 shows that Alf’s coffee rooms had moved the short distance to 267 Cable
Street which was located at the junction with Watney Street and was situated right
next door to Shadwell station on the East London Railway. Alf and Sarah’s large
family increased later that year with the birth of Alice Maud on 13th July 1894. Alice was baptised at
St George in the East church on 5th August.
On 11th
September 1896 Alf and Sarah’s third son, Albert Thomas, was born and by the time
he was baptised on 11th October, Alf had given up the coffee rooms and
had begun working as an “engineer”. Their new address was 31 Tillman Street
which was a three-storey terraced house situated on the eastern side of the
street just south of the board school. Charles Booth, the famous social
researcher, visited the street between 1st and 3rd
February 1898. Here is an extract from his notebook: South down Tillman
Street, late Ann Street. 3 storey houses at south-east end put up by Chapman
Estate get a respectable class, purple rather than light blue on the map. On
the south west side, poor 2 storey houses- light blue. The purple on the map
seems to have moved across the road into the newer houses.
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| Excerpt from Charles Booth Poverty Map 1898 |
Booth’s survey
descriptions for the area show a wide gulf in the living conditions from street
to street, from pinks along Cannon Street Road representing more respectable
classes to the darker colours of Cornwall Street representing the most wretched
homes. The whole area would have been shrouded in smog induced by coal smoke
from homes, railways and industry. The streets would have been littered with
filth including manure from the ubiquitous horse-drawn transport.
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| Lady Winterton in Tillman Street c1929 31 Tillman Street is in the 3-storey block in the background |
On 8th April
1897, Alf and Sarah’s eldest son got married to Ann Morris, a local girl who
was the same age as their son. The following year on 30th November
1898, Alf and Sarah’s youngest child, Ada Elizabeth was born. A few days later
on 4th December, their eldest daughter, Sarah Frances, got married
to a man named Albert Lawrence. Finally,
on Christmas Day 1898 Ada Elizabeth was baptised at St George in the East
church. It had been a busy end to 1898.
The 1901 census shows
that Alf and his family were living at 31 Tillman Street. Alf was working as a
laundry engineer; his daughter Lily was working in a cigarette factory and
daughter Edith Emily was a book folder. Living at the address with them were
John and Rebecca Robinson and Rebecca’s mother, Helena Aspinall. It seems
likely that Alf rented out the rooms at the top of the house to earn a bit of
extra cash. In 1905 the electoral register shows that the two bedrooms on the
top floor were being let (unfurnished) to a man by the name of James Standing
and the records for subsequent years show that his daughter Lily and son in
law, Charles Hannington, were living there. Incidentally Lily and Charles were
married on 9th April 1905 and it seems likely they moved in straight
after the wedding.
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| Family tree |
The 1911 census shows Alf
still living at 31 Tillman Street with his wife and their children Emily,
Albert and Ada. Alf was now working as a ‘stationary engine driver/fitter’ which
suggests his job involved attending to a large stationary steam driven engine.
Though this is apparently different from his job in 1901, it is possible that a
large steam engine may have been used at a large laundry. According to the census, his daughter, Edith had
followed her elder sister and was working as a ‘cigarette packer’. Albert was
an ‘office lad’ and Ada was at school.
By 1914, Alf had changed jobs again and was employed as a watchman, probably in one of the many riverside wharves. When he failed to return home from work on Tuesday 23rd June, his family must have been concerned. Their worries only grew as the days passed and he remained missing. Their worst fears were confirmed when, on Saturday 27th June, a body was pulled from the Thames at South Wharf, Rotherhithe. An inquest held at the Coroners Court on Monday 29th June held that death was due to accidental drowning.
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| Extract from the Southwark and Bermondsey Recorder 3rd July, 1914 |
His sudden death must have come as an awful shock to his wife and children. It was a
tragic ending to a man who evidently worked extremely hard to provide for his
family. His work-ethic, which was no doubt instilled in him by his own father,
enabled him to earn a living as a cook when he was a young man, scrape a living
as a workhouse porter witnessing the harsh poverty of the East End, running his
own coffee rooms, then when his business failed, learning to be an engineer
before becoming a watchman in his final years. He wasn’t Jack of all trades, he
was Alf of all trades and a remarkable man.
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| Annotated Goad Insurance Map |
Updated January 2024 after finding a newspaper article referring to his inquest
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