Rectory Lane Cemetery, Berkhamsted

Kate Elizabeth Tofield (964)

10/01/1877 –25/05/1941

Wife of labourer Herbert Tofield; widowed at the age of 27

Relatives

Herbert Tofield (964) — husband

• Jane Beaty

Kate Elizabeth TOFIELD

Kate TOFIELD was born Kate Elizabeth BILBEY in Aldbury on 10^th January 1877. Her parents were Joshua, a railway labourer and Sarah BILBEY. Sarah worked as a straw plaiter as well as caring for her son and three daughters. They lived at what was described as “the upper end of the village” of Aldbury.

By 1891, when Kate was 14, her father had risen to the ranks of a platelayer on the railway, Sarah was no longer straw plaiting, perhaps because there were now seven children in the family. Kate had left school and was working as a “nurse girl”.

When Kate was 20, she married Herbert TOFIELD in Berkhamsted in 1897. Herbert had been in the army for some years previously but was now working as a labourer in a chemical works. Their new home was at 7, Prospect Place, Berkhamsted.

The couples’  daughter Doris Kate was born on 4^th April 1899 and their son Clarence Herbert on 10^th September 1900. Their third child was a daughter called Gladys Rose, born on 24^th June 1902. But tragedy struck this young family only a year later when Herbert died at the age of only 29. Kate was left a widow with three young children under five years old.

Kate was obliged to find work and took up sewing jobs at home. In the 1911 census her occupation was described as “plain needlework”. The three children, aged 12,10 and 8 were all at school so she must have been working very hard to support her family.

Kate’s first daughter Doris stayed with her mother until she married Harold KENT in 1920, lived in Water End Road, Potten End and soon had at least four children. She lived to be 83.

Clarence worked as a lithographic printer at John Dickinsons in Apsley and lived with his mother until he married Annie SPRATT when he was 21. The couple lived at 1, Cutis Way and had three children. He died there at the age of 70.

Kate’s younger daughter also lived with her mother and also worked for John Dickinsons, like her brother. She worked an envelope making machine in the Apsley Mill. So at least for a while Kate’s adult children would have supplied an income to the family. Gladys married a gardener called Archie SUMMERFIELD in 1926, when she was 23 and the couple had four children. Their home was near to her sister’s family in Potten End and she lived to be nearly 80.

From her marriage onwards Kate remained in the same house at 7 Prospect Place. She is last recorded in 1939, living there alone.  She lived as a widow for nearly 40 years and died, aged 64, on 25^th May 1941. Her probate was granted to her son, Clarence and the value of her effects was £295.

Although Kate’s life was in many ways a sad one, let’s hope she took comfort from the fact that she had managed to bring up the three children to have fulfilling, long lives and to produce at least eleven grandchildren. She is buried alongside her husband, Herbert in
Plot 964

Herbert Tofield (964)

1874 –25/06/1903

Served in the Bedfordshire Regiment before becoming a labourer at Coopers.

Relatives

Kate Elizabeth Tofield (964) — wife

• Jane Beaty

Plot 964

Kate Elizabeth TOFIELD died 25th May 1941 aged 64.

Also of Herbert TOFIELD died 25th June 1903 aged 29.

Herbert TOFIELD

Herbert Tofield was born in July 1874. His parents were Albert and Emma TOFIELD, living in
8, West Passage, Tring. Albert was an agricultural labourer, and Herbert was the second of their nine children. The family seems to have been quite peripatetic, moving around as their children were born. By the time Herbert was 16, he had followed in his father’s footsteps and was also an agricultural labourer, working for Mr Swanson in Tring and now living in Halton, Bucks, still with his parents and siblings.

In May 1892, when Herbert was nearly 18 years old, he decided on a change and enrolled with the 4^th Battalion of the Bedfordshire Regiment. His term of service was to be 6 years. By the time he married a local girl, Kate Elizabeth BILBEY in 1897 in Berkhamsted, he must have been a very different young man.

By the 1901 census the couple were living in Berkhamsted at 7, Prospect Place and Herbert had now found a job working as a labourer in a chemical works, almost certainly Coopers chemical works Herbert was 26 years old and was the father of two small children.

One wonders what caused Herbert’s death at the young age of 29. Possibly an accident at work? But he left behind his young wife, aged only 27 at the time, with three children aged under five. He died on the 25^th June 1903 and is buried in Plot 964.