John BAILEY

                   In October of the year following the death of his mother Jane, his father  John Bailey was injured in the course of a call to "Gooch and Cousin's Warehouse".  This injury resulted in his death, leaving his three young sons bereft of mother and father.

For awhile, the boys were cared for by their mother's eldest sister, Mrs. Lucy Alcock.  The family was kept together for a while, after which, no doubt, the burden became more than Lucy Alcock could carry.

She, for some reason, decided to leave London and go to Nottingham, taking Alfred Benjamin with her.

John James, the eldest son, wrote that when his Aunt Lucy left to go to Nottingham, he remained in London in a position of some kind in Regent Street.  Being left by himself, he got into bad company, lost his job, drifted around London and tried to enlist with a group that was going to Malta.  He was unsuccessful in doing this--or in getting any kind of work--and was destitute in Soho when his Aunt Lucy heart of his predicament.  She then set herself to the task of helping John J. emigrate to Canada.  He settled down, married, and reared a large family in Ontario.  He kept closely in touch with his brother, Alfred Benjamin through the remainder of both their lives.

John James made a habit of saving the comic sections and mailing them to Hucknall so that Alfred and his family could enjoy them.  The comics were carefully stored away in Alfreds attic, and constituted a wonderful legacy to his grandchildren.

Reared family in Canada and died in Hamilton, Ontario.

He wrote a letter to his brother, Joseph, in 1902, telling him about his birth parents, since Joseph was adopted into a Houston family in Texas when he was a small child.  Letter will be listed in "Individual Sources."
                  

                   Was a professional  "knitter" with machine knitting.

Alfred Benjamin's father, John Bailey  was a Member of the Metropolitan police force in London.  He married Jane Miles, whose family was from Aldershot, Hants.  His son, Alfred, had in his home a framed certificate that was presented to his father, John Bailey, which commerated John's bravery and intrepidity in saving lives in a fire.

Family correspondence indicated that the home life of the John and Jane Bailey family was a happy one.  Johy James, the eldest son, was born in 1851.  Alfred Benjamin was born in 1853, and a third son, Joseph William, was born in 1863.

In March of 1866, Jane Miles Bailey died giving birth to a fourth child which was either stillborn or died shortly after birth.

In October of the year following the death of his wife, Jane, John Bailey was injured in the course of a call to "Gooch and Cousin's Warehouse".  This injury resulted in his death, leaving his three young sons bereft of mother and father.

For awhile, the boys were cared for by their mother's eldest sister, Mrs. Lucy Alcock.  The family was kept together for a while, after which, no doubt, the burden became more than Lucy Alcock could carry.

She, for some reason, decided to leave London and go to Nottingham, taking Alfred Benjamin with her.

John James, the eldest son, wrote that when his Aunt Lucy left to go to Nottingham, he remained in London in a position of some kind in Regent Street.  Being left by himself, he got into bad company, lost his job, drifted around London and tried to enlist with a group that was going to Malta.  He was unsuccessful in doing this--or in getting any kind of work--and was destitute in Soho when his Aunt Lucy heart of his predicament.  She then set herself to the task of helping John J. emigrate to Canada.  He settled down, married, and reared a large family in Ontario.  He kept closely in touch with his brother, Alfred Benjamin through the remainder of both their lives.

John J. made a habit of saving the comic sections and mailing them to Hucknall so that Alfred and his family could enjoy them.  The comics were carefully stored away in Alfreds attic, and constituted a wonderful legacy to his grandchildren.

When Alfred arrived in Nottingham he was apprenticed to a stockinger, (a manufacturer of stockings and other knit goods.  He didn't take well to the boredom that was inherent in this line of work and the wages would be exceedingly low.  In due course, he made his way to Hucknall where he ended up working as a miner in the surrounding mines.  He may also have continued to work on a part-time basis as a framework knitter.  It chanced that he married a young woman, Ann Buck, whose family operated a Shetland Shawl knitting works.

Grandfather Alfred Benjamin Bailey seems to have been descended from a long line of Church of England worshippers.  Grandfather was orphanded at a very early age, and although I remember him as being a devoutly religious man, it seems to me that his religion was something inherent within himself rather than any clearly defined external super-imposed set of beliefs.  After he married my grandmother (Ann Buck), who was a prominent Baptist family, grandfather just naturally went along with her to attend the Baptist church.  Although he was formally, as I suppose, a member of the Church of England (having been baptized into that church as an infant), there is no indication that he ever was baptized into the Baptist Church, though we always thought of him as a member of that church.

In fact, the ONLY church my grandfather Bailey objected to was the Mormon Church, into which my mother eventually married.  Grandfather objected to the Mormons, I suppose, because they were an "oddball group" whom he did not consider to be particularly respectable.  Though he was normall a very tolerant and broad-minded man, he seems to have been unreasonably prejudiced against the Mormons.

He had two children, Alphonso Miles Bailey and Effie Hannah Bailey.

Alphonso was a very gifted young man and was deeply loved and admired by his parents.  He was conscripted and served in the British Navy with the rank of Able Seaman.  He was eventually assigned to the HMS Raglan, which was one of the ships lost in the Battle of Jutland.

In the days of WWI there was no radio, so news of the battles and casualities had to come via the newspapers.  It chanced that Alfred was a frequent visitor to the reading room of the Public Library where he read the newspapers thoroughly.  He read in the newspaper the account of the Battle of Jutland, that his son's ship was involved, and that it had been sunk.  Alfred was a man who felt things very deeply but didn't talk much.  Also, he realized what a terrible blow this news would be to his wife, so he decided there was no use in troubling her mind until the official notification came through, so he said nothing to anyone about what he had read.

In the meantime, the letters from Alf, written prior to the battle, kept arriving in the mail.  It took several months for the actual notification of Alf's loss to be received in the mail.
                  

                   Letter from son of  Joseph William Bailey Muir (Andrew Forest Bailey Muir), gives the names of wife and birth the dates of the children in this family.  Letter is in possession of decendant of his brother (Alfed Benjamin Baily), Prydwen Margaret Thomas Metzger.

BELOW are exerpts of above letter written January 22, 1934   Other info in the letter is written in the notes section of the that particular person.  The letter is addressed to his neice, Effie Hannah Bailey Bettridge.

"Your mother's family came from Aldershot where your grandfather, Old Joe Miles was a Town Crier. . . Your father only had one sister and she had one son.  Her, her husband, and her son are all dead.  Your mother has two sisters and a brother living yet, to my knowledge." [1934]

"[He] was a member of Gray Lodge No. 329 Ancient Wree and Accepted Masonry, Ruthven Commandery No 2, Knights Templar, Washington Chapter No. w Royal Arch Masons and houston Council Royal & Select Masters, and a life member of Ransford Chapter Order of Eastern Star."