Rectory Lane Cemetery, Berkhamsted

The Potter family are deeply rooted in Berkhamsted, and can be traced back to the earliest available records. Sidney’s great grandfather, Wilkinson Potter, married Elizabeth Stevens on 5th November 1777 at St Peters. Sidney was born on 6th April 1871, the third (of six) children of Joseph Potter, and Emma Humphrey (married 1865). Sadly, Emma appears to have died in childbirth in 1877. In 1881 Sidney and his older brother William are living with his widowed father, but his four siblings are lodging with their aunt and uncle, Charlotte and Charles Tarsey. By 1891 Sidney and William are lodging with their older sister Mary Ann, and her husband Harry Winter, in Victoria Road. Sidney is working as a butcher’s assistant. He is still there, doing the same job, in 1901, with the Winter’s now much expanded family! On the 1st April 1907 Sidney married Sarah Beatrice Simmonds, at St Peter’s, Berkhamsted, and they set up home at 17 Holliday Street. Sidney continues to work as butcher’s assistant, but by 1939, he has changed trade to builder, and they have moved next door, to number 19. They had no children. Sidney died in late 1967.