MITCHENALL FAMILY HISTORY
William Joshua
1865 to 1943
William Joshua was born in Westerham in Kent in 1865 according to some records but the 1939 census states two years before, on the 2nd November 1863.. He wasn't baptised until 20th May 1866, apparently on the day his sister Emily was born. Emily seems to have been a twin of Arthur, and may have been baptised early; in any event, she didn't survive to her second birthday.
William lived with his parents until his mid-teens, but by 1881 at the age of 17 he was a grocers assistant in Staplehurst.. His mother died, probably in Westerham, when he was 25, and the following year he married Annie Pope in Frittenden.- both his later addresses in Mid Kent some way from Westerham.. Herbert William, his eldest son, was born near to these addresses in Biddenden. William then moved in to South East London, first to Chislehurst, where Sidney was born, and then to Welling, where Percy Victor was born. By 1896 he was in Lee, where both Ernest Cecil and Annie Beatrice were born, and he stayed in this area for the arrivals of Arthur Reginald and his youngest Leonard. Details of their homes can be seen on the map
and are further described with details of his son Arthur Reginald.
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This picture, taken of his grandchildren with William and his wife, must date from the early 1930's. The two grandchildren survive at the time of writing (2019).
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William and Annie remained in Lee until the 1939 census, when he was at 23 Lenham Road. Shortly after this, bomb damage affected the family. Son Arthur lived at 30 Lenham Road, which is today opposite number 23 - the original house was presumably also opposite in 1940. Today, this end of Lenham Road is replaced with modern homes. You can read about a later 1944 V1 attack on wordpress- the Lenham Road V1 attack.. The street was also hit by earlier bombing; relatives advise me it was the 20th May 1940 attack which left them homeless and using the Bombsight census data, high exposive bombs are identified between October 1940 and June 1941 (.Bombsight census) So perhaps memories aren't entirely accurate, but clearly the family was affected early in the war. William didn't see the end of the war, departing in 1943. Annie survived until 1949.
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Ernest's Son Stanley ErnestReginald (1923 - 2008)
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