Rectory Lane Cemetery, Berkhamsted

Sidney Temple Cargill

17/08/1879 –03/12/1950

Lt.Col.Sidney Temple Cargill, Royal Engr.

Relatives

Ethel Evaline Cargill — wife

• Janet Cartwright
• Melanie Hilton

Plot 1146 Sidney Temple Cargill (1879-1950) 

Sidney was born 17 August 1879 at St Charles Square, Notting Hill, London. He was the son of Captain Sidney Cargill of the 55^th Regiment of Foot, himself the son of a judge in Jamaica, and his second wife Delicia Jane Mackeson, daughter of a Queen’s Counsel.

He was baptised 14 November at St Jude’s, South Kensington

In the 1881 census the family lived at Boundary Villa, Kendal, Westmorland and father was described as “Captain 55^th Regt. Of Foot. Active service.” His younger brothers Ronald and Godfrey were both born in Kendal, his sister in Carlisle. By the time Sidney was 11 in 1891 the family had moved to Laurel Bank, Lancaster. His father had retired from the Army with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and the youngest member of the family, another brother for Sidney, had just been born. The family employed a nursemaid, a German governess, a cook, a housemaid and an under-housemaid.

Sidney joined the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and The London Gazette of 27 December 1898 records his promotion: “Gentleman Cadet Sidney Temple Cargill, from the Royal Military Academy to be Second Lieutenant [Royal Engineers]18 December.”

On 19 April 1900 he was sent by the War Office to the Derby railway locomotive workshops on a training course. He left there 23 June 1900, “Ordered to China”. In August a multi-national force relieved the siege of the Legation Quarter of Peking (Beijing) where foreign citizens and diplomats and thousands of Christian Chinese had been besieged by Boxer rebels and the Imperial Chinese army since June.

In 1901 he was promoted to Lieutenant but was on half-pay and not on active service in June 1903. He married Ethel Evaline Brander in October that year, in Battle, Sussex. Ethel had been born in the Punjab.

Their first son, Donald, was born in Lydd, Kent, in 1905.

By 1910 Sidney, Ethel and Donald were in Bloemfontein, Orange Free State, where their second son, Kenneth, was born that year.

The April 1911 census recorded Sidney in Tempe, Orange Free State, serving as a captain in the Royal Engineers and Ethel and the boys in married quarters there. The Orange Free State had been a Boer enclave in Southern Africa which had come under British control after the Boer Wars and is now part of South Africa. Tempe is now virtually joined to Bloemfontein.

They had returned to England by 1920 when the Directory for Bromley has Major Sidney Temple Cargill, Royal Engineers, listed at 16, Elmfield Road.

Sidney, Edith and Kenneth do not appear in the 1921 Census, but Donald, aged 16, was a boarder at the North Eastern County School (now Barnard Castle School) in County Durham. “The object of the school was to provide a liberal education, with fees a fraction of those charged by public schools.” (Wikipedia)

The electoral register for Stanmore in 1934 shows Sidney at 10, Hilltop Way, Stanmore. This is large detached house, but Ethel is not named with him. In 1938 she was listed at 17, Snaresbrook Drive, Stanmore, a house with another married couple in residence. They were, however, both living together at 14, Boxwell Road, Berkhamsted at the time of the 1939 Register where Sidney, aged 60, is listed as “Lieutenant Colonel, retired”.

Edith died 21 December 1949 and is buried in plot 1087. Sidney survived her by less than a year, dying 3 December 1950 aged 71.

Janet Cargill writes:

“Lt.Col. Sidney Temple Cargill, Royal Engr.

Sidney Cargill was the uncle of Patrick Cargill the theatre, film and TV actor (well known for his TV role in ‘Father, dear Father’ and his stage work which included Toad of Toad Hall).

Sidney was also Great Uncle to Robin Jackman, member of the English National Cricket Team. Sadly he died in S. Africa on Christmas Day 2020 of COVID.

He was also great uncle to Brigadier (ret) Bruce Jackman OBE MC, a Gurka officer as well as great, great uncle to my son in law Major (ret) Toby C.M Jackman MBE third generation Gurkha soldier.”