This story starts with a wedding dress. Namely the one worn by Miss Cynthia Joan Bush at her wedding on the 17^th January 1942 at St Peter and St Paul’s Parish Church Wantage, to Mr Geoffrey Gould Remington Hickes, which has now been donated to the Vale and Downland Museum.  A photo (also donated) shows the happy couple at their reception held at her parents home Greystacks in Denchworth Road Wantage. From left to right (in the photograph) is the best man Geoffrey’s brother Arthur Hickes, Dorothy Hickes (Groom’s mother), Geoffrey Hickes, Cynthia Bush, Joseph Henry Chivers Bush (bride’s father), Joyce Pettingale (bridesmaid and Cynthia’s maternal cousin), and Elsie May Bush (Bride’s mother).

Please see family trees which it is recommended one consults for the remainder of this article.

The Bush Family

Cynthia’s grandfather was William Chivers Bush (1846-1920) who married Mary Jane Collins in East Challow on 5^th June 1879. The surname Chivers probably goes back to his grandfather Thomas Bush who married Jane Chivers in Childrey on the 13^th December 1827. More research is needed here however to confirm. William and his wife Mary as can be seen from the family tree had six children the two youngest being Joseph and his brother Victor. The Bush family lived in Oxford Lane Grove and William was a platelayer for the Great Western Railway based at Wantage Road Station. The responsibilities of a platelayer included inspecting and maintaining the track, including all its component parts such as rails, sleepers, fishplates, bolts, etc. Their duties include greasing points, and generally watching for wear and tear.

In 1891, whilst oiling the points at Wantage Road Station William was knocked down by a goods train which was being shunted. Bush had the presence of mind to lie down in the hollow between the metals, the engine and trucks passing over him. He miraculously escaped with a few bruises and a cut on the head.

A photo taken of Mary Jane Bush (nee Collins), has been donated to the museum by her great-grandson.

Joseph Henry Chivers Bush

Joseph Bush was born on the 4^th December 1892 in Grove and by 1911, was living as a garden boy for Mr and Mrs George Tyser at Oakfield Mortimer near Reading.  On the outbreak of the First World War, Joseph joined the Royal Army Medical Corps and went to France on the 27^th July 1915 with his unit the 56^th Field Ambulance RAMC.

Field Ambulances were mobile front line medical units responsible for the care and evacuation of casualties from the battle area. Casualties were evacuated down a chain medical facilities from Regimental Aid Posts at the front line and relayed back through Advanced Dressing Stations and then to Casualty Clearing Stations, Main Dressing Stations and eventually back to the base hospitals. Each Field Ambulance would be made up of doctors, ‘first aiders’ /medics but mainly comprised stretcher bearers – their main task was to get the casualties back to where they could have the most appropriate treatment.

Joseph Bush served on the Western Front for some time until he contracted trench fever and was transferred back to the UK to serve with the RAMC ambulance trains taking wounded and sick servicemen from the port of Dover to their designated hospital in the UK.

By a strange co-incidence in August 1917 one of the casualties he met in Dover was his brother Victor who had been wounded for the second time (in the leg) and was being conveyed to the 2^nd Birmingham War Hospital at Hollymoor.

Victor Edward Bush

Victor Bush was Joseph’s younger brother and was born in Grove on the 16^th August 1897 and can be found in the 1911 census as a schoolboy still living with his parents in Grove. He served with the 2^nd Battalion Royal Berkshire Regiment during the Great War being wounded twice. On the second occasion Victor was repatriated back to the UK which was when he met his brother Joseph. On recovery from this wound Victor was transferred to the Military Mounted Police for the remainder of his military service in WW1. On release from the army, Victor returned to Grove and for some time lived with his widowed mother working as an agricultural labourer at Manor Farm.

Subsequently he took a job as a motor transport driver. Victor Bush married in 1930 to Lilian Alice Stallard and the couple had a daughter Jean born in 1931. Victor Bush died on the 31^st October 1954 in Wantage.

Elsie May Hughes

Elsie May Hughes was born in West Bergholt in Essex on 3^rd August 1893 the daughter of Walter Hughes and his wife Emma (nee’ Watts). There were two other daughters in the family Ethel born in 1899 and Gertrude in 1906. Walter was a horseman working on farms in the Little London area of Essex. His daughter Elsie can be found working as a kitchen maid for Thomas Usborne JP (a former Member of Parliament from 1892-1902 for Mid Essex) and his family near Chelmsford in 1911.

From circa 1918-1919 Elsie volunteered to work for the British Red Cross. As to where and her exact role is unknown as no record of her service with them has been found. Also, there is a family story that she also worked for a time for Winston Churchill as a secretary either at this time or later. This cannot be substantiated as the Churchill Archives Centre in Cambridge have no record of her.

On May 14^th 1919, Elsie Hughes married Joseph Henry Chivers Bush at St Paul’s Parish Church at Harringay. He was 26 and she 25. Joseph gave his profession as a Sergeant in the RAMC and Elsie gave her home address as 35 Endyman Road Harringay. Her sister Ethel was one of the witnesses.

The Bush Family In Wantage

In the 1921 census one can find Joseph and Elsie Bush living at 12 Springfield Road Wantage (otherwise known as Rosemount).  Joseph is listed as working as a General Clerk at the RAF Depot at Milton. This was one of the main maintenance and storage depots for the RAF until 1958. Also listed on the schedule is their daughter Cynthia Joan (who had been born on the 12^th September 1920 in Wantage and christened on the 12^th December 1920). There are three lodgers living with the family Vere Harvey-Brown, Allan Charles Clark and Wyndham A Davies. Note Elsie gives her birthplace as Nayland Suffolk which is actually near to West Bergholt, Essex.

Looking at the 1925 Electoral Roll for Wantage, lodging with the Bush family at this time is Benjamin Pettingale and James Ormiston and his wife Elizabeth. James Ormiston was a solicitor in the practice of Jotcham and Son, Coroner for the Wantage District and clerk to the commissioner of taxes in Wantage. Benjamin who also worked at the RAF Depot at Milton, was born in Hull in 1897 and served as a supply clerk in the RASC during WW1. He married Elsie’s sister Ethel on the 22^nd July 1919 in Walthamstow Essex. Their daughter Joyce Eileen was born in London. The family moved to Wantage in the 1920s and in the 1930s can be found living at 33, Belmont (then known as Kelvedon) Wantage. After acting as bridesmaid to her cousin Cynthia in 1942, Joyce married herself later the same year to Lawrence George who was serving as an Air Gunner in the RAF. Post war the couple ran a confectionary shop at 36, Mill Street, Wantage until 1955 when they emigrated to New Zealand later moving to California where the family still live.

Blenheims (32 Belmont Wantage) and Greystacks (18 Denchworth Road  Wantage)

In October 1930, Elsie Bush bought 32 Belmont (also known as Blenheims) in Wantage from its owner Margaret Neave. This came with a strip of land stretching up the hill to present day Denchworth Road. Subsequently the Bush(s) bought a triangular strip of land adjoining 29 Belmont from Mr H Barlow. The house itself dates back to the early 20^th Century and was built in an orchard owned by the Liddiard family.

The Bush(s) were proud of their new acquisition as evidenced by a series of 10 photographs taken in the garden and on the path up to the house.  The Bush family decided to build a new house on the land nearest to Denchworth Road in the late 1930s which was called Greystacks and there is a photo of Greystacks taken shortly after it was built from the garden with a parrot in a cage by the steps leading up to a large bay window.

To help finance the building of the new house (which according to Peter Hickes (Elsie’s grandson) was designed by his grandmother), Blenheims was used as a private nursing home. Blenheims is listed as a nursing home in the 1939 Kellys Directory. There are several elderly ladies living at Blenheims and at Greystacks in the 1939 Register. They include the Hon. Lavina Talbot (1849-1939) who was a noted British promoter of women’s education in the UK and the mother of Gilbert Talbot (1891-1915) after whom the Toc H Organisation is named. Lavinia Talbot died in Wantage in 1939. See her Wikipedia entry here

Cynthia Bush at this time was training as a nursery nurse with the Princess Alice Nursery Training School part of the National Children Adoption Association at Castlebar Sydenham Hill London. A copy of her preliminary certificate is held by the Vale and Downland Museum in Wantage.

The Hickes Family

The Hickes family were a relatively wealthy family who originated from Cornwall. By the 1930s, they were living in Hastings in Sussex. The head of the family was Arthur Gould Remington Hickes who was a member of Hastings Town Council, a lawyer he was a Deputy Coroner in London for a number of years. Arthur Hickes married Dorothy Bray in 1915 and the couple had four sons, Geoffrey, Arthur, Roland and Peter.

Geoffrey, the eldest (who shared his father’s middle names) was born on the 12^th December 1916 in Croyden Surrey and was articled as a legal clerk to Hastings Council, later qualifying as a solicitor in 1939. Geoffrey joined the Honourable Artillery Company as a Gunner on the 22^nd January 1940 and served as a Private until he was posted to No 125 Officer Cadet Training Unit at Ilkley Yorkshire in 1941. Subsequently he received a commission in the Royal Artillery as a 2^nd Lieutenant  on the 2^nd August 1941. Posted to the 13th (HAC) Regiment RHA, which had been raised in December 1940 with G, H and I Batteries, it landed in Normandy on 15 June 1944.  Geoffrey was photographed with his gun crew near Caen Normandy in June 1944. Subsequently the unit fought through to Belgium and on into Germany by which time Geoffrey Hickes was a Captain and the Adjutant of the 13^th (HAC) Regiment RHA. He was awarded the 1939-45 Star and the France and Germany Star the ribbons of which are in the museum collection.

Whilst her husband was serving abroad in World War 2, Cynthia lived with her parents at Greystacks and in 1944, the couple’s only son Peter was born in Wantage Hospital.

In the meantime, her father Joseph was a member of the Auxiliary Fire Brigade in Wantage responsible for one of two fire pumps that had been allocated to the Wantage and Grove Brigades.

Post-war, Geoffrey and Cynthia moved to Eastbourne, where Geoffrey went into practice as a solicitor, becoming a senior partner in the firm Langhams. Also, he was very active with the Conservative Party for many years. Geoffrey died in 1988. His wife Cynthia died in 2009 in Bristol.

The End of the Bush Family in Wantage

Meanwhile back in Wantage, Joseph and Elsie Bush had separated. In January 1945, Blenheims was sold by Elsie to Frederick Bickford and Greystacks passed into the hands of the McKibbin family and later to the Chandlers. Elsie Bush moved to Pevensey in East Sussex where she lived within a few houses apart from her sisters Ethel and Gertie. She died in 1976.

Her husband Joseph Henry Chivers Bush remained in Wantage for a time where he can be found in the Electoral Roll in the 1950s living with his widowed sister-in-law Lilian in Barwell. He later moved to Woking Surrey and died in 1978.

Acknowledgement

My thanks must go to Mrs Gaye Withnall for allowing me to see the deeds for Blenheims in Belmont.

References

• Bush/Hickes family archive with the Vale and Downland Museum Wantage
• Census, Electoral Rolls and other genealogical information on Ancestry/FindMyPast
• Newspaper extracts from the North Berks Herald and on the British Newspaper Archive.

Trevor Hancock

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