Double driveway access gully (gutter) plate marked ‘A J BESSANT – PLUMBER – EASTBOURNE.’
I have taken just a selection of
directory entries for A. J. Bessant from 1890 to 1920 to give an idea of the
different trades Alfred was involved in spanning that period. Also, a later 1965 entry.
1890 Pike’s
Blue Book page 374 Builders, page 390 Engineers, South Street & Mark Lane.
1900 Gowland’s
page 417 Plumbers, 32 Grove Road.
1903 Gowland’s
page 311 Gas Fitters & Hot Water Fitters, Grove Road.
1905 Gowland’s
page 341 Plumbers & Sanitary Engineers, 32 Grove Road and Mark Lane.
1907 Gowland’s page 318 Electrical Engineers, page 347
Plumbers & Sanitary Engineers, 32 Grove Road and Mark Lane.
1909-10 Pike’s
Blue Book page 411 Electricians, 32 Grove Road and Mark Lane.
1914 Gowland’s
page 324 Builders, St. Leonard’s Road; page 341 Electrical Engineers, page 345
Gas Fitters & Hot Water Fitters, page 350 House Decorators, Painters, and
Paperhangers, page 372 Plumbers & Sanitary Engineers, 32 Grove Road.
1920 as per
1914.
Entry for 1965
Kelly’s page 518 (Builders) Bessant A. J. Ltd (& heating & electrical
engineers), 36 Grove Road (Tel. 454) & (yard) St. Leonard’s Road.
Census
information for Alfred John Bessant, born Chelsea, Middlesex (London),
1855.
1871 census:
Age 16 living at 10 Warwick Square Mews, St. George Hanover Square, London
& Middlesex with his parents and seven siblings. Warwick Square Mews was used to house the
coachmen (and coaches) and their families and were attached to the large
mansions lining Warwick Square itself.
1881 census:
Alfred (listed as ‘Gas Fitter’) and his 19-year-old wife Sarah Elizabeth (nee
Reese) were listed as ‘visitors’ to a family in Wales, presumably relatives.
1891 census:
(incorrectly shown on Find My past as ‘Alfred T Bessant’): Alfred is now listed
as ‘Plumber’ and is living in South Street with his wife Sarah and his parents.
1901 census:
Alfred (Electrical Engineer/Employer) and Sarah are now living at 32 Grove Road
with a 15-year-old boarder, Ralph Robson (Electrical Apprentice), and Ellen
Newman, a 30-year-old widow (Servant Domestic).
Sarah Elizabeth
passed away on February 21st 1909 aged 47 years (see gravestone
picture).
1911 census:
Alfred (Builder), aged 56, and his second wife (married 30th April
1910) Nellie May (nee Robson), aged 31, are now living at 3 Southfields Road
with their one-month-old son Jack Gordon Bessant, plus a nurse Alice Russ, and
Domestic Servant Edith Head. The 1911
baptism record states Alfred’s profession as ‘Electrical Engineer’, and the
child’s name as Gordon rather than Jack Gordon.
Presumably Alfred had met Nellie previously when he employed her brother
as his apprentice in 1901.
1921 census:
Still living at 3 Southfields Road, with 3 children, and 2 visitors.
Alfred passed
away January 1939 and is buried in Ocklynge Cemetery (grave
located by Danielle Wilson).
Nellie May
passed away in 1947.
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