JRR Tolkien Part 2

Welcome back!  Now this one involves a little bit of scandal at the end...what would a family tree be without a little bit of scandal.

We finished our story with John Burnyeat living in Okanagan. 

We resume the story with his daughter Dorothy Burnyeat.

Dorothy Burnyeat was born in 1890 and died in 1967 in the city of Vernon in the Okanagan region of British Colombia   I didn't really tell you about Okanagan did I.  The Okanagan Valley lies within the shadows of the Cascade Mountain range and has a humid climate.   The city of Vernon was named after Forbes George Vernon (21 August 1843 – 20 January 1911), Lieutenant (ret.) British Army, was a Member of the Legislative Assembly of the Canadian province of British Columbia from 1875 to 1882, and from 1886 to 1894, representing the riding of Yale.  Dorothy would live her whole life in British Columbia, Canada.  In 1912 she married James Gray Sims (1886 - 1964) and it is James's family which takes us on the next part of our journey to Edith Bratt who would eventually marry JRR Tolkien.

James Sims father was Dr William Cawley Simms and was born in 1859 and died in 1939 after living his whole life in St John's Newfoundland.  William would temporarily move to Edinburgh in Scotland around 1854 to attend the Royal College, Edinburgh where he was awarded the second prize in surgery.  It is here that he met Christina st Clair McLean; she was born in Edinburgh in 1831 and would die in 1867 in Newfoundland Canada; they married in 1858 in St Johns, Newfoundland, Canada.

Christina's brother Lachlan Alexander McLean was born in 1849 in Kirkcudbright and died in 1895 in Victoria Australia.  Wikitree states that Lachlan moved to England and in 1871 he was boarding with Mary Ann Fitter and her son Joseph in Edgbaston, Warwickshire. He was employed as a Bankers Clerk adn would later qualify as an Accountant.In 1876.  Lachlan was married by special licence by the Rev. Phillip Browne of St James in the parish of Kings Norton to Lucy Warrillow, daughter of Frederick Warrillow.  After the marriage, he sailed on the ship 'Somersetshire' to Australia leaving London, 1 March 1877. Lucy didn't make the voyage with Lachlan and must have sailed at a later date.Lachlan and Lucy settled in Fitzroy, Victoria on Regent Street. He was employed as an Accountant in the colony of Fitzroy. No children were born to Lachlan and Lucy and Lachlan MacLean died in St. Vincents hospital, Victoria in 1895 age 46. He was buried the day of his death at St Kilda Cemetery, Melbourne.  After his death, Lucy sailed back to England in 1896, via the Cape, on the ship Dunottar Castle arriving London May 21. 

Lucy Warillow's father lived and died in Birmingham; her mother was Ellen Taylor who was born in 1823 in Liverpool.  The various census state that Frederick was the manufacturer of printed books and stationery and owned his own company F Warillow Limited.  Handwritten notes and letters reached peak popularity during the second half of the 19th century.

His brother Alfred John Warrilow was also born in 1818 in Birmingham and married in 1838 in Parish Chapel St Pancras, London to Elizabeth Scott who had been born in London in 1813.  Their son was Alfred Frederick Warlow who was born in 1842 in Clerkenwell in London and died in 1891 in Solihull Birmingham.  In the 1881 census Alfred is stated as being a paper dealer based in West Bromwich.

This is where the bit of scandal first appears.  Alfred was a man of means and able to employ a governess and this governance was Francis Janny Bratt.

Francis was born in 1859 in Wolverhampton and would die in 1903 in West Bromwich.  During her time as governess for Alfred she became pregnant and it is rumoured that the father was Alfred Frederick Warrillow.  After the birth of her daughter Edith in 1889, Francis would leave the services of Alfred Warrilow and set up her own business as a stationer in Solihull according to the 1891 census.  In the 1901 census it appears that Francis had moved to Handsworth with her business continuing as a stationer.

Her daughter Edith was born in 1889 in Gloucester and would die in 1971 in Bournemouth.  Wikipedia states that Edith was brought up in Handsworth, a suburb of Birmingham, by her mother and also her cousin, Jenny Grove (related to Sir George Grove).The circumstances of Edith's birth were a regular subject of neighbourhood gossip.

Frances Bratt died when her daughter was 14 and Edith was sent to the Dresden House boarding school in Evesham. The school was run by the Watts sisters, who had studied music in Dresden. Although the school had a very "strict regime", Edith was always to remember it fondly. It was at the Dresden House School where Edith "first developed her great love, and talent, for playing the piano."

Following school, Edith was expected to become a concert pianist or at the very least a piano teacher. While he considered how to proceed, Edith's guardian, solicitor Stephen Gateley, found her rooms at Mrs. Faulkner's boarding house at 37 Duchess Road, Birmingham.  Edith first met Tolkien early in 1908, when he and his younger brother Hilary were moved into 37 Duchess Road by their guardian, Fr. Francis Xavier Morgan of the Birmingham Oratory. At the time Tolkien, known within his family as Ronald, was 16 years old and Edith was 19.  The Tolkien's were married in the Catholic Church of St Mary Immaculate on West Street in Warwick on 22 March 1916.

I told you this family of mine was amazing...and it gets better.  The next post will show how I am related to JRR Tolkien by a different family line which involves Elizabeth Tiplady and Robert Hunt....