The album was very dusty, slightly damp and falling apart and so the contents were removed in the hope that one day they might be returned to the family as a reminder of the way things were. The pictures tell the story of one family and their friends from the close of the 19th century to the 1930s, particularly the years between the First and the Second World Wars, and research has already begun to fill in pen portraits of those involved.

Ernest Smallman was born at Stafford in 1884, the son of newsagent Alfred Smallman, and spent his working life in the same occupation, beginning in the trade when he left school at the age of 11 and subsequently leaving home to become a relief clerk for W H Smith and Son which was then running a chain of bookstalls on railway stations throughout Britain. He was sent to various locations in the country, including the railway stations at Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire, and Port Talbot in South Wales, and to Peterborough North Station, a fortunate posting because Ernest’s family had close relatives or friends in the district and he often went there to stay.

It was here that he met his girl friend, Gertrude Lizzie Plimmer, and they were married at St Augustine’s Church at Woodston, Peterborough, in December 1905. He was 21 and she was 18. On 25th July 1914, almost ten years after their marriage, she and Ernest re-visited the church and sent a postcard picture of it to her mother-in-law, Mrs Mary Ann Smallman, at her home in 22 Talbot Road, Stafford, where she kept a small corner shop, continuing in business on her own after her husband had died. She wrote:

All at Peterborough send their love and good wishes to you. We are looking forward to seeing you all on Monday night by the last train. I am sending my bag on in advance and it will be delivered to you.

W H Smith encouraged its employees to be highly competitive, inspiring maximum effort through awards for retail sales and anyone who increased trade would receive suitable recognition and be in line for promotion. A shield was presented annually for the manager who produced the best results and this reflected well on their staff. Ernest therefore must have been good at his job and highly regarded because by 1916 he had been appointed manager of the bookstall on the railway station at Bourne, part of the company’s No 8 Midland District.

He and Gertie moved to the town and rented a house at No 6 Elm Terrace with their two young children, Ernest and Joy, always referred to by their pet names of Sonnie and Girlie. Many of the photographs date from this period, having been taken by Florence Redshaw, daughter of local Bourne photographer William Redshaw and who worked in the business for a few years before moving to Birmingham.

The Great War had begun in 1914 and many young men enlisted but because Ernest had a family, he would have been reluctant to volunteer. Conscription was introduced in 1916-17 and as he was not in what was termed “a reserved occupation”, it seems probable that he was compulsorily called up as a result and he left home in the late summer of 1917. There is no indication as to which unit he joined but it was most likely to have been the Lincolnshire Regiment to which most of the army recruits from Bourne were sent and the album contains two photographs of Ernest with his army colleagues while in training, one of them on cookhouse fatigues peeling potatoes and the other under canvas, probably on manoeuvres before leaving England.

He had various postings but kept in touch with his family through a series of postcards, never forgetting his wife’s birthday and one, which is undated, reveals that Gertie never enjoyed the best of health because he wrote on the back of a particularly sentimental card addressed to her at Elm Terrace:

To my darling wife: With my fondest love and all kind thoughts, I send you my heart’s greetings for your birthday. May you live dear one to enjoy many more and with better health. Hoping I shall be with you soon to a home of love and happiness.

Another card, again undated and sent this time after his unit had moved to Dublin, also expressed concern for his wife’s well being. He wrote:

MDW [My Darling Wife]: Just a line, hoping it will find you in much better health. Unfortunately, I cannot obtain a view of the place I have arrived at (KH). I am looking forward to seeing you again soon. Fondest love and kisses from your affectionate husband, Ernest.

One card, showing a coloured picture of two St Bernard dogs, was sent in September 1917 addressed to “My Dear Little Sonnie” and the message revealed Ernest’s emotional and loving nature. It said:

I am sending you these two dogs so that no harm can befall your dear Mamma and yourself. I want you to kiss Mamma for me and wish her many happy returns of the day, hoping soon we shall be all together any day soon and spending such a happy time together. With my fondest love and kisses. From Ernest.

Ernest was posted to France some weeks later and continued to send postcards home to Elm Terrace telling of his progress. In December 1917, he wrote to Mr and Mrs Foster at Cawthorpe House near Bourne, sending his good wishes for Christmas and the New Year. This couple were most probably servants, perhaps gardener-chauffer and housekeeper, because Cawthorpe House was then a grand country mansion, the home of Charles Campbell MacLeod, a wealthy brewery owner.

Early in 1918, he sent a postcard from Montérolier-Buchy in Normandy showing the Hotel Nord in the Route de Saint-Saëns with troops standing outside and a large tented encampment in a nearby field. The message on the back said:

This is the depot where I am. It was evidently taken in the summer and it is entirely different now as they are replacing the tents with huts. Fondest love and kisses, Ernest.

Soon afterwards, he was captured by the Germans and was confined to a prisoner of war camp in Holland until the end of the war. But even before the Armistice was signed on November 11th, the troops had started coming home and Ernest sent a postcard from Enschede in Holland on Monday 9th November 1918 saying:

My Darling Wife: I am leaving here today and it may be for Rotterdam and then afterwards for the boat to cross the briny, for home and happiness and to join my loved ones once again. As far as I can say, I shall arrive no doubt about Thursday but I will drop you a wire as soon as the voyage is accomplished. I do so trust this will find Sonnie and self well in health as it leaves me. Fondest love and kisses to Sonnie and Girlie. Ernest.

He returned home and presumably resumed his job at the station bookstall and the family witnessed the peace celebrations that were held in Bourne on 19th July 1919 because the civic gathering in the market place and the victory parade were photographed by local cameraman Ashby Swift and copies of his pictures are included in the album. He also arranged for photographs to be taken of his station bookstall and proudly placed himself in a prominent position in one of them.

But the sequence of postcards indicate that he subsequently left soon afterwards to work away from home for a spell, perhaps on further relief work for W H Smith at another railway station or even looking for an alternative employment opening because on 9th September 1919 he sent a postcard to his wife from Ripon in North Yorkshire, still expressing concern about her health but anxious to let her know that there were good times ahead:

The album contains many portraits from this period, of mothers and fathers, aunts and uncles, grandparents, cousins and friends, all dressed in their best clothes that reflect the fashions of the time, of prize winning in sports, particularly bowls, of motor cars that were just becoming a familiar sight on the roads, although there is no indication of the owners.
The postcards in the collection also include those from friends they made during their time in Wales, thank you cards from guests who had been to stay and greetings cards from holidays at the seaside which were then enjoying widespread popularity through train travel. There were also cards from the Isle of Man, Great Yarmouth and Blackpool.

But after many years of worry, it was not Gertrude who succumbed to ill health but Ernest and in 1930, after 22 years with W H Smith, he was forced to retire but had sufficient savings to set up on his own and so he left Bourne and bought the tobacconist and newsagent’s shop at Wolverhampton. Here, he kept busy and became a well known figure in the town as a member of the Newsagents’ Federation and of the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes, a philanthropic and charitable organisation, and also kept in touch with his family and a postcard addressed to him at 44 Horseley Fields mentions the Silver Jubilee express train speeding along the main east coast line between London and Scotland in 1935. It was sent by his grandparents who were living in a house a short distance from the railway track at Hatfield in Hertfordshire. They wrote:

The train passes through twice a day. We can hear it long before it passes. It goes straight through Hatfield. It is a massive thing and lovely.
 

Ernest died at Wolverhampton in May 1951 aged 66, and the funeral was held at St James’s Church, Horseley Fields. Gertie survived him by six years, dying on 14th December 1957, aged 70, and her funeral service was held four days later at St Matthew’s Church on the corner of Horseley Fields and Walsall Street, a building that was demolished in 1964 after being damaged beyond repair by industrial pollution which was then endemic in the Black Country.

After her husband’s death, Gertie may have carried on the newsagent’s shop for a while assisted by their daughter, Joy, now married. She probably lived above the shop with her three children and eventually took over when her mother died although the business continued to be known as Smallman’s. She is listed as the owner in Kelly’s Directory for 1961 although her brother Ernest had taken no part in the business, preferring to follow his own career, having married a lady named Lillie and they had one child, a boy called John.

The contents of the album are a fascinating slice of social history giving a few personal anecdotes but we know so little about the people involved. However, the Internet has brought a renewed interest in genealogy and there are thousands of people out there with computers busy compiling their family trees.

Among them must be many named Smallman or related to someone who is. Perhaps if they read this, they may be able to help fill in some of the gaps and anyone who does identify with the family, then please email because Jill Loach is anxious to see this delightful and fascinating archive returned home.

© REX NEEDLE 2005
Album photographs courtesy Jill Loach

This article was also published by the Black Country Bugle on Thursday 7th July 2005