Ashwell, John

John was born in Ashwell on 1 November 1891, third son of John and Mary Ann (nee Brindy) Ashwell.  He was a pupil at the Merchant Taylors School, Ashwell.

John enlisted on 11 July 1917. He served with the Household Battalion, Regimental Number 3317, on the Western Front, France and Flanders.  In the general conversion of cavalry men to infantry in 1918 John joined the Grenadier Guards, Regimental Number 30532. He survived the War.

He is commemorated on the St Mary’s Church Ashwell Roll of Honour.

The 1911 census shows him living in Stevenage with his brother, where he was working in his brother’s butcher shop in High Street.

John married Hilda Evelyn Browning in 1917 at Ashwell, Hertfordshire in the second quarter 1917.  They had two children, Evelyne Mary born 1920 and John Douglas born 1922, both born at Ashwell. They lived in Ashwell until about 1928 where John was a butcher. In about 1928 the family moved to Eastcheap, Letchworth, Hertfordshire, where they had a butcher’s shop.  Hilda died on 18 July 1935 at Letchworth.

In 2^nd quarter 1937 John married Verdun Margaret Goodwin at Ashwell, Hertfordshire.  The 1939 census shows them living in St Albans, Hertfordshire, where John was a butcher’s shop manager. They must have divorced as Verdun married a Mr Saunders in 1952.

There was a butcher shop in High Street, Ashwell in the 1940s owned by a John Ashwell, and it is assumed that when he divorced he moved back to Ashwell.

John died on 4 July 1962.