A PUB IN EAST LONDON 1939

 

Modern flats in Queensbridge Road.  The area has a mixture of historic and post war housing.

No, not that one.  No, not the Marquis of Lansdowne.  The pub that is the focus of this short blog is The Victory in Queensbridge Road Hackney, about 10 minutes walk from the Lansdowne. 

My Father, Fredick Alfred TRENDALL (1914-1983), moved into the Marquis of Lansdowne in 1939 and shortly afterwards married his first wife Lillian BARKER (nee WILSON) (1909-1954).  Lillian was a widow and was running the pub that has previously been run by her first husband. George Stanley BARKER.

At the same time The Victory was being run by Annie Agnes RICE (nee MEHEW) (1881-1965) the widow of Albert Charles RICE (1878-1921).  Albert was the son of Charles Osborne RICE and Mary Ann Nelson TRENDALL (1846-1914) and, with his siblings, had been brought up in a Lunatic Asylum in Kent where his parents worked.

Mary Ann Nelson TRENDALL had an interesting and tragic life.  She is the subject of a linked blog.  She was the daughter of William TRENDALL (1820-?).  He was the twin brother of Thomas TRENDALL (1820-1878) who is my direct ancestor.

Also living at The Victory in 1939 was Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL (1853-1944).  She is the oldest person to appear on my family tree.  She was also the daughter of William TRENDALL and was born in the family house and business (he was a Pawnbroker) in Cromer Street St Pancras. She was therefore the Aunt of Albert Charles RICE, and Edward Osborne RICE  (1868-1953), who was also living at The Victory in 1939.

Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL never married and spent her working life in domestic service, mostly as a cook.  Her life spanned an era of great change.  She was born at a time of oil lamps in a city that relied entirely on horses and a few trains for transport.  She saw the coming of the London Underground, gas, electricity, radio and the motor car.  Her relatives and friends fought in wars from the Crimea to the struggle against Hitler.  She was in London during the air raids of the First World War and the Blitz of the Second.

My sisters were nearly 2 years old when she died half a mile from where they lived, but they never met.  The overlap between Maureen and Christine TRENDALL (1942 -  ) and Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL covers a span of 170 years and counting. 

Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL often visited relatives.  For example on the night of the 1911 census  she was with her 1^st cousin; Eliza HOOKER (nee TRENDALL) (1841-1911) in Beccles, Suffolk.  Eliza was the daughter of Robert TRENDALL (1809-?) the elder brother of William and Thomas TRENDALL (B1820). Eliza died a couple of weeks after the 1911 census was taken.  At the time of the 1871 census  Anne Elizabeth was staying with her Grandfather William JOHNSON (abt 1794-1874) in Northaw near Cuffley, Herts.  For a while Anne Elizabeth and the RICEs lived in North Kensington, a short walk from the birthplace of my Grandfather Frederick TRENDALL (1890-1940).

When Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL died she was buried in Kensal Green cemetery.  Not far from the (unmarked) grave of Thomas TRENDALL (1820-1878), my Great Great Grandfather and her Uncle. (1)

The Victory, which was about the same age as the Lansdowne, closed in the 1950s and was demolished to make way for the blocks of flats that now occupy the eastern end of Queensbridge Road.  I have not been able to find a photograph, although there are many pubs with similar names in the area.  The Victoria, for example, is a pub that survives at the other end of Queensbridge Road.

Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL represents an important link to the past.  She reminds us that there is a lot that we don’t know about our fairly recent history.  Why did my Father and his Father have little contact with their extended family?  Was there a falling out?  Or was it just a case of different branches of the family drifting apart while living in a busy city?  Ann clearly kept in touch with various parts of the family, but not with my direct line.

The pubs of the East End operated as a virtual network.  For example local branches of the Licensed Victuallers Association ran events and outings and the Morning Advertiser was full of news about who was running which pub, especially in the capital.  Were the two parts of the family aware of each other?  We are unlikely ever to know.

 

Philip Trendall

May 2026

 

Corrections and comments always welcome

 

 

(1)     She would have known Thomas TRENDALL.  When she was little Thomas lived at the same and adjacent addresses.  Her Father, William, and Thomas were twin brothers.  She was in her late 20s were he died – she may even have attended his funeral.

SPOTLIGHT ON MARY ANN NELSON TRENDALL OR: " FROM THE ASYLUM TO THE PUB"

 

Mary Ann Nelson TRENDALL (1846-1914 ) had an interesting life and an interesting name.  It is not clear where the name Nelson came from.  I cannot see any earlier uses of the name, although it was inherited by at least one of her descendants (1).  Perhaps her father, William TRENDALL (1820-?) was a fan of the long dead Admiral.  Nelson’s Column had just been completed when Mary was born.

Mary was brought up in Cromer Street, St Pancras where her father (and her grandmother, Mary BARTLETT c1795-1859) ran a pawnbrokers.  She was one of at least three children.  Her sister never married and in her final years lived with Mary’s children (see connected blog).  Her brother ended up as a fisherman in Aberdeen (see blog dated August 2020).  Her father was the twin brother of Thomas TRENDALL (1820-1878) and the families lived in close proximity.   She was baptised at St Pancras 4^th October 1846 having been born 14^th September in the same year.

When she was 12 her mother, Elizabeth TRENDALL (JOHNSON) (c1823-1858) died at home.  The following year her Grandmother, who it seems lived with the family rather than with her husband, also died at Cromer Street.  Five years later in 1863 she had a child out of wedlock.  She was 17.

Her son was born in Stroud Green, near Finsbury Park London.  The name of the father is not recorded and the entry in the baptism register makes it very clear that the child was illegitimate.  The birth was registered by Thomas TRENDALL, probably her uncle, my great great grandfather, (1820-1878).  She named the boy Thomas Johnson TRENDALL, the middle name being the maiden name of her mother.  We do not know who the father was, but there is a chance that it was a neighbour who was, a couple of years later, to become her husband.  An alternative explanation for the choice of middle name would be that she named him after his father – there were several JOHNSON families living within a five minute walk of the TRENDALL household

In the 1871 census Thomas Johnson TRENDALL was living with, or visiting, his grandfather, William JOHNSON (c1794-1874) in Northaw, Herts.  William JOHNSON had remarried shortly after the death of his first wife Mary BARTLETT.  His new wife was a widow 26 years younger than he was.

Mary Ann Nelson TRENDALL married Charles Osborne RICE (1844-1911) in March 1866.  He was an ‘Engine Smith’ and an engineer.  He lived in Brighton Street St Pancras which no longer exists.  Brighton Street was adjacent to Cromer Street making the couple very close neighbours. It appears that Charles adopted Thomas Johnson TRENDALL (2) shortly after the marriage, as the latter is described on his death certificate as Thomas Johnson RICE, aged 11, in 1875.  The cause of death was given as “Acute Rheumatism (10 days) and Bronchitis (3 days)”.   Shortly after getting married the couple had moved to the new City of London Lunatic Asylum at Stone in Kent.  Charles worked on the heating and other mechanical systems.  Mary may have also have worked there in addition to her childcare duties.   It was a good place to work, quite well paid and with accommodation. 

The City of London Lunatic Asylum at Stone nr Dartford around the time that Charles and Mary lived and worked there.  The hospital closed in 2005.  (picture from Wikipedia)

The loss of her son was a tragedy.  One that was familiar to many parents in the nineteenth century.  Familiarity did not lighten the loss.

In around 1871 Mary’s father, William TRENDALL, emigrated to Canada to join his older brother, Robert TRENDALL (1809-  ).

 Charles and Mary had several more children.

Emily Elizabeth RICE (1866-1870) was born seven months after her parent’s marriage and just before the move to the Asylum.  She died, aged 3, of congestion of the lungs and throat (3 days) in 1870.

Mary’s third child, Edward Osborne RICE (1868-1953) had a long life, dying, aged 85, in the Mile End Hospital.  He never married and appears in the connected blog: ‘A Pub in East London’.  His death certificate describes him as a ‘retired Licensed Victualler’ of 33 Queensbridge Road.  This was the address of the Victory public house.

Mary’s second daughter, Edith Helen RICE (1871- ) lived into adulthood and was married in 1891 in Marylebone to a widower, Alfred HOBLEY (c1863 - ) who was a clerk at the Asylum and who was the son of the Clerk of Works at that institution. One of the witnesses to the marriage was a TRENDALL but it is not clear which one.  It may well have been Mary’s sister, Ann Eliizabeth TRENDALL (see connected blog).  The City of London Asylum was a large place with many staff.  It is not surprising that it functioned as a village like community.

Two years later another child arrived.  William RICE (1873-1873) was named after his grandfather, William TRENDALL.  The baby only lived for a few hours.  The cause of death being recorded as ‘premature birth’.  Mary herself registered both the birth and the death two days later.

In February 1877 Florence Lillian RICE was born.  She lived until April in the same year.  She died of intussusception (5 days).  This a serious problem with the bowel that effects infants.  Before the development of modern diagnostic and treatment techniques (including antibiotics) it was normally fatal.

Mary and Charles had one further child.  Albert Osborne Stanley RICE was born at the Asylum in 1878.  Albert lived until 1921 having married in 1902.  He had four children.  He joined the army at the age of 36.  During his service he contracted TB and was discharged as ‘70% disabled’.  His youngest daughter was born a few weeks after his death.  For a large part of his life he worked as a barman and a publican.  He is buried in the same grave at Kensal Green Cemetery as his aunt; Ann Elizabeth TRENDALL (1853-1944).

Mary and Charles spent around 20 years working at the Asylum.  In the 1891 census Charles is shown as Clerk of Works.  A very good job, but for reasons that are not known (staff records are very limited in this period) the family left Stone in 1892  and returned to London.  In 1893 Charles was running the Gladstone beer house in South Norwood.  It was a lowly establishment and he applied (unsuccessfully) to the Magistrates to upgrade the licence to allow the sale of all types of alcohol rather than just beer.  The police confirmed that the place had been better since Charles had been running it but clearly there were challenges.

                            The Gladstone in 2007 shortly before being converted into flats

In 1901 the family were living at 96 York Road Battersea and Charles is described as a Beer House ?? (for fear of throwing stones in glass houses I will not make comment on the hand writing on this census!).  Earlier, in 1896, Charles appears on the electoral roll at 96 Usk Road.  This is probably the same address.  It was the site of the Somers Arms until 2000 when it was demolished. 

The family stayed at the Somers Arms until 1905.

Although the records mainly record Charles’s name we must remember that Mary was the landlady of these establishments.  Her name was not on the licence or on the electoral register because she was a woman, not because she was not involved in the business.

By 1911 Mary had Charles had retired and were lodging at an address in Wandsworth.  Also at the same address was their son, Albert, and his wife and child.  Charles died at the same address in December 1911 of a cerebral haemorrhage.

Mary lived on until she was 67, dying on 20 February 1914.  This was a couple of days before her 1^st cousin, once removed, celebrated the birth of a son, my Father.  Mary died of breast cancer.

We do not know how the extended Trendall family interacted.  We have no letters, documents or personal memories to tell us about the everyday life of our ancestors.  All we have is bare facts and interesting co-incidences.  We do know that Mary Ann Nelson TRENDALL lost four of her seven children when they were young and it is hard to imagine the pain that this must have caused her.  But even here there is a mystery.  On the 1911 census quoted above it is recorded that Mary and Charles had 8 children, six of whom had died.  I cannot trace these additional children and we know that Thomas Johnson TRENDALL was not born within the marriage.  Perhaps this is a recording error but possibly I have missed something and the tragedy that surrounded the life of Mary and Charles was even greater than I have described it.

 

Philip Trendall

May 2026