Rectory Lane Cemetery, Berkhamsted

Joseph Batchelor

08/02/1891 –11/09/1951

Decorated WW1 motorcycle despatch rider, 2nd Signal Company Engineers, then Clerk of Works

Relatives

Chris (Christabel) Batchelor (1892-1974) — wife

• Christopher Dolton

Joseph, the only son of John and Fanny Batchelor, was born on 8th February1891 in Berkhamsted. Although he was the only son, he had five older and two younger sisters. Joseph is included in the 1891 census, age “0” when the family was living in Charles Street.

Joseph was 10 at the time of the 1901 census which records that the family had moved to Prince Edward Street, together with three lodgers. Joseph’s mother, Fanny, was not at the property in Prince Edward Street on the night of the 1901census. She was visiting The Fryth, where Joseph’s two oldest sisters, Martha and Jane, worked as housemaid and cook respectively.

By the time of the 1911 census, Joseph, then age 20 years, had left Berkhamsted. He moved to South Ealing where he was living with Herbert and Martha Mellor. Martha was Joseph’s oldest sister and she had married Herbert Mellor. Joseph’s trade, like that of his father before him (and indeed that of his two uncles and his grandfather), was that of carpenter. Herbert Mellor was also a carpenter.

Following the outbreak of the First World War, on 4th January 1915, Joseph enlisted in the Royal Engineers  (service number 72715) to serve for the duration of the war. He had previously served as a Territorial soldier in the 1st battalion, Hertfordshire Regiment.  The Hertfordshire Regiment had been formed from the amalgamation of earlier Volunteer Battalions and formed part of the Territorial Force. “F” company was based in Hemel Hempstead with detachments in Berkhamsted, Tring and Ivinghoe.

Joseph’s attestation papers give his address as 13 Douglas Avenue, Wembley. His mother Fanny is listed as his next of kin. He had apparently given up his trade as a carpenter by then, his occupation being recorded as “motor cyclist”. After training in Biggleswade, Joseph embarked for France on 6th May 1915, where he joined the 2nd Signal Company, Royal Engineers.

The Signal Companies of the Royal Engineers were the precursors of what was to become in 1920 the Royal Corps of Signals.  At the outbreak of the war there were only 12 companies. By the end there were 589. A company was attached to each army division and was responsible for communications, primarily by visual means, telegraphy or despatch. Despatches were carried by horse, runner or motorcycle. Joseph, with his given occupation of “motor cyclist,” would have been an obvious candidate for despatch rider.

By 1917 Joseph had been promoted to sergeant. He came home on leave on 20th December 1917. Two days later, on the 22nd December, he married Christabel Horne in the Parish Church at Harefield.  Marriage banns are recorded as having been read in Hemel Hempstead (where his parents lived) on 18th  November 1917 for “Christian [sic] and Joseph Batchelor.” The newly-weds did not have much time together; Joseph’s leave ended on 4th January 1918 and he returned to France. Nine months later, on 27th September 1918 Christabel gave birth to their son, Joseph Raymond Batchelor. Joseph was not present for the birth; he did not get leave again until October 1918.

On 19th July 1918 he was awarded the Military Medal. This medal was awarded to personnel of the British Army below commissioned rank for bravery in battle on land. Unfortunately whilst Joseph’s service record records the bald facts of the award and date, it does not tell us how he won the award and citations for the Military Medal were rare.

He was discharged from the Army on 22nd March 1919 with the rank of sergeant and a good conduct record. In addition to the Military Medal he was also awarded the 1914-15 Star, The British War Medal and the Victory Medal.   His address on discharge was given as the Bee Hive, Hemel Hempstead, the public house run by his parents. (The Bee Hive Public House stood on what is now Allandale at the junction with Chapel Street.  The pub has now been turned into a residential propery, Beehive House, and is immediately adjacent to 103 Chapel Street, Hemel Hempstead.  In Joseph’s time 105 must have been just across the road, but that number is now a modern flat halfway down Chapel Street).  Joseph was fortunate. Unlike millions of others, he came through the war physically unscathed, although there is no way of knowing the psychological trauma he may have suffered.

In the absence of a photograph, Joseph’s service record gives us an idea of his appearance. He was 26 when he left the army. He was 5 feet 11 inches in height and weighed 170lbs. His chest was 40 inches and he had blue eyes and a “fresh” complexion. His only deformity was a deformed nail to his left index finger. (Perhaps he had hit it with a hammer in his days as a carpenter!)

Joseph and Christabel had a second child, a daughter, Annie Joan, born on 25th April 1925.

The 1939 Register tells us that Joseph, Christabel and Annie were living at 105 Chapel Street, Hemel Hempstead. Joseph was employed as a “clerk of works”. There is no reference in the Register to their son Joseph, who was by then 21 and had presumably moved away from the family home. In 1939 Annie was age 18 years old. Her occupation was Post Office telephonist and her name is somewhat oddly recorded as “Annie Shingler (Batchelor).”  Annie married a Colin Shingler, but not until 1945.

By May 1940 German forces were overrunning France and regular British Army troops were forced back in disarray to Dunkirk from where they were evacuated in late May. A German invasion of Britain looked to be imminent. On the 14th May, the Secretary of State for War, Anthony Eden, broadcast an appeal for volunteers who for one reason or another were not then engaged in military service. “We want large numbers of such men in Great Britain, who are now British subjects, between the ages of seventeen and sixty-five years to come forward now and offer their services…” This part time, unpaid volunteer force was first called the “Local Defence Volunteers” – LDV (colloquially said to stand for “Look, duck and vanish”), but in 1942 officially became the “Home Guard.”  1,500,000 men volunteered, although in 1942 legislation was passed to compel men to join the Home Guard in areas in which units were under strength.

At first it was ill organised with make-do uniforms and weapons and is perhaps best known today from the television comedy show “Dads’ Army”, but it evolved into a well-equipped and well-trained force. The Home Guard was not only readied to assist regular troops in repelling an invasion, but also performed other roles, such as manning anti-aircraft guns, manning road blocks and looking out for enemy parachutists.

Many veterans from the First World War who were too old to fight but who had valuable military experience volunteered, including Joseph. “A” company of the 7th  Hertfordshire Battalion Home Guard was based  in Hemel Hempstead. The nominal roll of members of A company serving on 3rd December 1944, does not include Joseph’s name, but the name “Batchelor, Joseph” does appear in a supplementary list of those who had served with “A” Company, but who had been discharged on the grounds of ill- health, age limit, change of occupation or joining the regular forces.

Joseph died in West Herts Hospital in Hemel Hempstead on11th September 1951. He was 60 years of age. Christabel and Anne were granted probate to his estate which was worth £3,580/4 s /4d.

Joseph was buried in Rectory Lane Cemetery in the plot next to his parents, John and Fanny.

Chris (Christabel) Batchelor (1892-1974)

1892 –1974

Domestic servant, married army despatch rider, Isle of Wight as a widow for 20 years

Relatives

Joseph Batchelor — husband

• Christopher Dolton

Christabel, or Chris as she is named on the grave where she is buried with her husband Joseph, was born in Farnborough, Warwickshire on 12th July 1892. She was the third child born to George Thomas Horne and his wife Sarah (nee Powell). Christabel had two older siblings, Emma born in 1880 and Willie born in 1885.

Christabel’s origins were humble; the occupation of her father George was recorded in the 1901 census as a coal dealer and general hauler and her mother was a dress maker and carrier. Her brother Willie was a ploughboy.  Parish records tell us she was baptised in the Anglican church in Farnborough on 21st August 1892.

By the time of the 1911 census Christabel was eighteen years of age and was no longer living with her family. She had moved to Netherfield, Stantead Abbotts near Ware in Hertfordshire where she had entered service as a maid. Netherfield was the home of Henry Prior, a barrister, and his wife Florence. As well as Christabel, the Priors employed four other domestic staff.

Netherfield was  a substantial house built in the 1860s. It still stands today, albeit divided into separate apartments. In 1946 it was sold to the Salvation Army as a residential home for elderly men. Marlene Harris’ parents were officers in the Salvation Army who ran the home for a time. Marlene describes the property as it then was: “The rooms of Netherfield were enormous. On the ground floor were two huge sitting rooms with French windows overlooking the side garden, then the entrance hall which was big enough to house a full size snooker table. This led into the dining room with windows overlooking the back of the house and a huge garden. Also on the ground floor was the kitchen…leading off the entrance hall was a beautiful sweeping staircase with a wooden rail, it was my job to polish the rail, do you know that the easiest way to do that is to sit on a polish laden duster and slide down!! Upstairs were several more bedrooms, some quite grand, some a little smaller and I would think, had at one time been the servants quarters.”

How did Christabel, at 18 years of age, come to be working as a domestic servant so far from her family home in Warwickshire? The 1911 census may hold the answer. Amongst the other domestic servants working at Netherfield at that time was the 34 year old Bessie Powell. Powell was the maiden name of Christabel’s mother, Sarah, so Bessie may have been Christabel’s aunt and she may been instrumental in securing the position at Netherfield for the young Christabel.

The next documentary reference to Christabel appears in the Hemel Hempstead parish records concerning the reading of the banns of marriage on 18th November 1917 in respect of her forthcoming marriage to her fiancé Joseph Batchelor.  We do not know where, how or when the two first met, but Joseph’s Army service record tells us that when he enlisted in January 1915 he was living in Wembley. The same record details his marriage to Christabel on 22nd December 1917, giving the address of Warren Farm, Harefield, which is presumably where Christabel was then living.  It is only 5 miles or so from Wembey to Harefield . Had Christabel left her position at Netherfield to enter service at Warren farm?  If so, perhaps Joseph and Christabel met in that area before he enlisted in the Army. Joseph’s army attestation papers record his occupation as “motor cyclist”.  Perhaps the dashing young motor cyclist swept Christabel away on the pillion of his motor bike?

The newly-weds were not to have long together before Joseph returned to the front. His leave commenced on 20th December  1917. He and Christabel married in the parish church in Harefield on 22nd December 2017 and Joseph returned to France on 4th January 1918. His next leave was not until October 1918. Christabel had given birth to their son Joseph Raymond Batchelor on 27th September 1918.
Joseph was discharged from the Army in March 1919 and his address was then given as the Bee Hive, Hemel Hempstead, the pub run by his parents. Christabel and Joseph, together with their son, set up home at 105 Chapel Street, Hemel Hempstead.

The 1939 register discloses that Christabel had had another child, a daughter, Annie Joan born in 1921. In 1939 Annie, aged 18 years, a post office telephonist, was living with her parents, still at 105 Chapel Street. Curiously the 1939 register gives Annie’s name as “Annie J Shingler (Batchelor)”. Annie was to marry a Colin Shingler, but not until 1945. Christabel is described in the register as a housewife.

Christabel and Joseph were still at 105 Chapel Street when Joseph died in 1951. At some date thereafter Christabel moved to the Isle of Wight as her address at the time of her death on 6th November 1974 was Endoroad, Wotton Bridge, Isle of Wight. She was 82 years old and died intestate without leaving a will, her estate being worth £5,000. She was buried with her husband Joseph in Rectory Lane cemetery, her mother in law and father in law lying in the adjacent grave.