Page 61 - Just another English family (Sep 2019)

William and Margaret’s second son, Alfred (1863-1926), married Hannah Emma Gray (1866-1940). Hannah Emma was born in Keighley, Yorkshire, but Alfred and Hannah married in Darlington in 1889. Alfred became a minister of the United Methodist Church and headmaster of Ashville College. On the Teacher’s Registration Council Register (1914-1948) Alfred is shown as having his first position in 1905 and obtaining his registration in 1917, but I am not clear as to the chronology in terms of starting Ashville College. Indeed, I have read little about Ashville College except in relation to the film director, Tony Richardson, first husband of Vanessa Redgrave.5 Alfred and Hannah had two children – Marjorie Gray (1892-1969) and, six years later, Ronald Gray (1898-1980).
William and Margaret’s third son, Walter, married Laura Beckett (1864-1935) in 1898 in Ormskirk. It is not clear why the marriage ceremony took place in Ormskirk. Laura was probably born in Putney, London, although the 1911 census suggests ‘Holt, Norfolk’. Anyway, Walter and Laura had two children – Herbert William (b. 1900) and Bernard Walter (b.1902) – who were both born in Putney, Surrey.
Finally, William and Margaret’s last child, Herbert Ashworth, married Annie Barrett (1878-1954) in 1910 in Croydon. Herbert and Annie had two children – Geoffrey Edward (1910-2003) and Joan H. (1914-?).
Again to summarise, William and Margaret had eight grandchildren named Soothill from their four boys who survived childhood – a remarkably symmetrical
5. “Tony despised Ashville College, which he castigated for the rest of his life” (Adler, T. The House of Redgrave: The Secret Lives of a Theatrical Dynasty, Aurum Press, 2012). Richardson had been sent there as a boarder. Ashville College in Harrogate was about twenty miles northeast of Shipley where the Richardsons lived. The school’s religion was Methodism and the Spartan dormitory without carpets and curtains is described. All this is some time after Alfred Soothill was involved, but the tradition was clear.
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