The Holpins

The Children of William & Celia

The photo above shows:

Back row - Frank, Hilda, Arthur, George, Grace & Bill (junior)
Front row - Percy, William (senior), Celia & Jack

William Holpin and his wife Celia Alice (nee Smith) were both born in Tytherington.  They were married in 1899.  William was away at the time of the 1901 census - he was in South Africa fighting in the Boer War.  Celia Alice was at home in Tytherington with sons, Arthur and William.  They were to have eight children:

Arthur Henry - nicknamed 'Farmer' born 22 October 1898.  Married Rosie.

William Edwin Robert - born 15 May 1900. Click here to read more

George Henry - baptised 23 April 1903 Sgt Major in Glosters.  He married Maisie and they lived in Gravesend.

Hilda - married twice, first husband was Robert Shute, her second was Danny Raggatt.

Percy - born 21/12/1909.  Married Lottie Wilcox and settled in Haresfield, Stroud.

Jack born 17 October 1910.  He became a Petty Officer in the Royal Navy and settled in South Africa. He married Olive Marslan.  Jack died in Capetown in 1963.  Olive died there on 18th July 2002.

Frank Worthy - born 27th February 1912.  Frank was known locally as 'Wormy'.  He married Florence Attwood of Oaxhill in Somerset. He died 27th January 1971.  Florence died 8th May 1997.  We will be writing up more information on Wormy when we do the history of 1 Sawmill Lane.  Click here to read about Frank and his family

Grace - Grace was born on 20 October 1913.  Click here to read more about her and her husband, Henry Thompson, the baker

The family moved from Tytherington to Grovesend.  Four newspaper articles in 1917 and 1918 highlight the problems Celia Alice was having in bringing up such a large family.  The first article shows that she was in trouble because her son Arthur had been absent from school on 51 occasions during an 11 week period.  She explained that Arthur had been kept home to do the gardening in the absence of his father (who was serving in the Army) and to work in the hayfield.  A fine of 5 shillings was issued.  Another article dated January 1918 shows Alice was having a similar problem with her son, John, aged 9.  The school inspector said he had seen John pushing a truck of coal and claimed he had persistent irregularity and there had a lot of trouble with other members of the family.  He acknowledged that the father was in the Army and the mother had ten children at home, two over school age.  Alice was fined 1s 6d with a caution that the fine would be heavier next time.  The third article records that her sons, William and George, were fined £2 each by the Children's Court for playing 'pitch and toss'.  The article suggests that some leniency may have been shown by the Court, but we cannot read this section of the article to see what form this leniency may have taken.  The fourth article shows that Celia and her sister were living in a 2 bedroom house in Grovesend with eight children aged 3 - 16 years.  A court order was issued allowing Celia to live with just 7 children or 6 if her husband was living there as well.  We don't know what happened as a result of this order, but the family did eventually move again to Crossways, the Exchange Rooms and then to 15 Market Site.  William died on 8 November 1945 and Celia Alice on 9th April 1951.

This page was last updated: 04/06/2011