Author Archives: Steve @ Atcherley.org.uk

Charities, golf tees and Catherine Emma Grace Atcherley

Although born in Canada (at Brockville, Ontario, on 21 July 1869), Catherine Emma Grace Atcherley [] – usually known as Grace – grew up in Rhyl on the north coast of Wales. After losing her mother when she was just one year old, and her father at the age of five, it seems likely that Grace was brought up by her… Read more »

Ethel Mary Atcherley’s World War One

“The KING has been graciously pleased to give orders for the following promotions in, and appointments to, the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for services in connection with the War, to be dated 1st January, 1920:— […] To be Members of the Civil Division of the said Most Excellent Order:— […] Miss Ethel Mary Atcherley. Queen’s Hospital, Birmingham.” … Read more »

Mother, grandmother and guardian: Elizabeth Atcherley, née Gittins

Elizabeth Atcherley, née Gittins [], became a mother at the age of 36, and a widow (with children aged 7 and 18) at 54. Later, the deaths of her daughter and son-in-law meant that Elizabeth became guardian to seven grandchildren – at the age of 85! Elizabeth was most likely the Elizabeth Gittins who was baptised at Alberbury St Michael and… Read more »

Richard Atcherley’s World War Two – Shot down in a Spitfire

Updated 2 January 2017.  I remember one occasion when Batchy sat with us over a flying supper in the early hours of the morning, and said, pointedly, ‘Flying is a young man’s game. You chaps are about right, I am too old for it.’ Soon after that, he left us to command Kenley …  — Jim Bailey (2005), The Sky… Read more »

A policeman’s lot: Constable Thomas Cureton Atcherley (Part 1)

As a ‘bobby’ in Bloxwich (and later in Walsall town) at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, Police Constable Thomas Cureton Atcherley [] found himself up against drunks, gamblers, thieves, army deserters and other assorted miscreants, not to mention a house fire. Fortunately, his job had its lighter moments too. When the 1881 census was… Read more »