(Frank) Alban (Allan) Thomas Croucher (1855-1891)

Dates

Birth: 12 January 1855 St Martins in the Fields, Westminster, Middlesex, UK
Father: Frank William Croucher c1820-1885
Mother: Selina Bethney c1824-1860

Christening: Unknown

Marriage: 8 October 1882 St Mary Le Strand, Westminster, Middlesex, UK
Wife: Emily Jane Cawdery (Caudery, Cordery) [Hale (Hales)] 1863-1945

Death: 7 March 1891 Ballyglass, Belmullet, Mayo, Ireland

Children

Caroline Emily Selina Croucher [Brown] 1883-1976
Alban Thomas Joseph Croucher 1885-1917
Leonard Charles Croucher 1887-1927
Frank William Croucher 1890-1974
Sydney Herbert Croucher 1891-1969

Notes

I cannot find any information on his birth or christening and even his name is uncertain - Alban or Allan. There is however an entry in FreeBMD for the birth of Frank Alban Croucher in January-March 1856 in St Martin (1A 310) and I believe this was him although he never used the name Frank.

His mother died in 1860 at St Martin in the Fields.

In the 1861 census as Alban (sic - on the original) S (sic - in the index, could be a T on the original) Croucher aged 6, born in Westminster St Martin in The Fields, and living with his widowed father (Frederic), a housekeeper (Eliza Croucher not married - I assume this was Eliza Challenor who his father married in 1865), three brothers (Ferdinand F, Horace and Malcolm J), and three sisters (Emma Jane, Julia A and Trevinia M) at 1 Kings Head Yard, Long Acre, Westminster St Martin in the Fields, Middlesex. Another family lived at the same address

In the 1871 census as Allan (sic - on the orginal) Croucher aged 15, born in St Giles, Middlesex, and living with his father (Frank Wm), four brothers (Alfred, Arthur, Ferdin and and Horace), and sister (Anne) and three (half)sisters (Emma, Julia and Louisa) at 23 Little Newport Street, St Anne Soho, Westminster. Another five families lived at the same address.

Marriage of Allan (sic - on the typed original) Thomas Croucher and Emily Jane Cawdery and to Emily Jane Caudery (both on typed original, the second with the note "I believe Caudery Emily Jane is the same person as Cawdery Emily Jane, as written/signed on my Grandfathers (Leonard Charles Croucher) birth certificate") in FreeBMD in October-December 1882 in Strand (1B 1047).

Entry in Ancestry Westminster, London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1935 for Allan Thomas Croucher aged 25, father Frank William Croucher, and Emily Jane Cawdery on 8 October 1882 at St Mary Le Strand. "Page 35 [...] 1882. Marriage solemnized at the Parish Church in the Parish of St Mary le Strand in the County of Middlesex. [No.] 70 Oct 8 1882 Allan [second l could be a b] [aged 25 [a] Bachelor [and] Carpenter [of] 14 Fountain Ct Strand [father] Frank William Croucher [a] Carpenter, [and] Emily Jane Cawdery [aged] 19 [a] Spinster [of] 5 Dukes? Court [father] Joseph Cawdery [a] Carpenter. Married in the Parish Church according to the Rites and Ceremonies of the Established Church after Banns [...] in the Presence of us, Joseph Cawdery [and] Harriett Palmer".

His daughter was born on 4 August 1883 and baptised on 29 August 1883 at Holy Trinity, Sheerness, Kent his name spelt Alvin Thomas, his son was born on 21 February 1885 and baptised on 26 April 1885 at St Peter Battersea when he was a carpenter living at 65 Maysoule Road, second son born in Chatham on 17 September 1887, and third son in Belmullet, Mayo, Ireland on 15 February 1890. His last son was born after his death.

Entry in Ancestry All Ireland, Civil Registration Deaths Index, 1864-1958 for Alban Croucher aged 36 in January-March 1891 in Belmullet (4 50).

The death was reported in The Morning Post 13 March 1891 Page 3.

Entry in Find My past Western Gazette, Yeovil, Somerst 20 March 1891 "A Coastguard's Boat Capsized. Loss of Four Lives. A catastrophe is reported from Belmullet, county Mayo. As two coastguardsmen, Isaac Thomas and Albert Croucher, from Ballyglass station, were returning in their small boat from Belmullet, accompanied by the son, aged 14-, and daughter". It was also published in The Star, Saint Peter Port, Guernsey 14 March 1891, Bristol Times and Mirror, Bristol 14 March 1891, and Eastern Daily Express, Norwich, Norfolk, East Anglian Daily Times, Ipswich, Suffolk. I assume the two children were those of Isaac Thomas.

There are thirty eight entries in Ancestry Family Trees for Alban Thomas Croucher.

The following is from the National Archives sent by Tony Croucher (also in Ancestry UK, Royal Navy Registers of Seamen's Services, 1848-1939:

Alban Croucher born 12 January 1855 at St Martins London
Engaged on 3 Sep 1874 for 10 years height 5 ft 3.5 inches, black hair, grey eyes, dark complexion and a carpenter
Re-engaged on 28 April 1885 for 10 years as above except for dark hair and tattooed on right forearm
Pembroke 3 Sep 74 to 22 Sept 74
Newcastle 23 Sep 74 to 1 Jun 77
Pembroke 2 Jun 77 to 16 Jul 77
Shannon 17 Jul 77 to 19 Jul 81
Pembroke 20 Jul 81 to 5 Oct 81
Duncan 6 Oct 81 to 27 Oct 84
Pembroke 28 Apr 85 to 19 Aug 85
Alecto 20 Aug 85 to 4 Aug 86
Pembroke 5 Aug 86 to 10 Feb 87
Tyne 11 Feb 87 to 7 Mar 88
Pembroke 8 Mar 88 to 25 May 88
Asia 26 May 88 to 31 May 88
Pembroke 1 Jun 88 to 23 Oct 88
Calypso 24 Oct 88 to 24 Nov 88
Shannon 25 Oct 88 to 1 Dec 89
Ballyglass 2 Dec 89 to 7 Mar 91
Drowned

The following email came from Heather:

Dad’s grandfather we now believe was a coastguard – and he died trying to rescue some people off a wrecked ship off the coast at Black Sod Bay in Ireland. His wife (don’t know her name) was at the time pregnant with my great uncle – Sidney and gave birth to him in Portsmouth in 1892. Frank W Croucher was born in Ireland in 1890. Frank and Sidney were then brought up by their aunt and uncle – Mark and Caroline Robinson which could be why your trial goes cold in 1901. They lived in Weymouth They had a lodger in 1891 called Edward Dainty and Sidney Croucher we know went on to marry a Lilly Dainty, possibly a daughter of Edward? Frank Croucher married Francis Ivy Silver Allen in 1915 in Portsmouth. They had children – Ivy, Margaret, Ken, David (my Dad).

Blacksod Bay is to the north of Achill Island. Belmullet at its northern end is some 55 miles NW of Ballyglass. There is a description of Blacksod Bay in the Windsor Magazine Vol X 1899 p347 extracted from a letter from a coastguard.

In front is a stretch of Blacksod Bay, bounded in the distance by a range of barren mountains, not unpicturesque in summer time, but most dreary in winter. In the rear stretches for miles the surging bog, the montony only broken by the stacks of turf which are piled here and there, and a few huts in the distance, with small patches of cultivated ground around them. Our post office is four miles away, and approached by a mere track across the bog, for it cannot be called a road. The telegraph office was thirty miles from us during the five years of my stay there, when it was brought within ten miles. Our nearest shop is ten miles away by the road, but something nearer by water, and even there we can only obtain the bare necessaries of life: anything beyond has to be obtained from our nearest town, a distance of forty miles, and is conveyed by small smacks, Our church is five miles away, also approached by a track across the bog impassible during the winter: another and better road has now made the distance nine miles. We are fortunate in having a butcher who (to use his own words) kills a "beef" once a year, at Christmas, which is the only time that we get any beef: for six months, July to January, we generally manage to get some mutton: the remainder of the year the sheep are too poor to kill, so we have to live on bacon, with an occasional fresh pork when someone in the station kills a pig".

Relationship

Alban Thomas Croucher was the grandfather of David Reginald Croucher, husband of Patricia Ann Ashford, my half third cousin once removed.

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