William Turner

His military service record has not been found.

An anonymous soldier

William Turner is one of the names on the Bottesford ‘church list’ of WW1 Servicemen, but his military service records have not been located.

Family background

William Turner junior was born on the 18th August, 1882, and baptised on the 1st October, in Bottesford. He was the last of the four sons of William and Martha Turner. William Turner senior was a gardener who came from Ashurst in Kent, where he was born in 1853. Martha (neé Patch) was from Norton, Somerset, born in 1849. They married at Christ Church, Battersea, on the 19th August, 1875. After Martha’s death (after 1911), William remarried, leaving Bottesford to live at Hayes, near Tunbridge Wells in Kent.

By the date of the 1881 census the family had moved to Bottesford and lived on Easthorpe Road. The 1891 census also records them as still resident on Easthorpe Road. There were now four sons, all at school: Frederick W. (aged 12), Louis Henry (aged 11), Ernest (aged 10) and William (aged 8). There was also a boarder named William Sopp, a 21 year old groom from Kirdford. Sussex. William Turner senior gave his occupation as that of a gardener.

Kelly’s Directory for 1908 records that Mr William Turner was the private gardener to the Rector of Bottesford,Canon William Vincent-Jackson. He also worked for the Duke of Rutland and earned the rare distinction of having a variety of chrysanthemum named after him. A W.Turner listed as a bell ringer in the belltower of St Mary’s, Bottesford, was probably this same William Turner, father of William junior.

In 1901, William Turner junior was at work as a draper’s assistant, boarding at 51 High Street, Grantham. However, by the time of the 1911 census, when he was 24 years old, he had moved to London and was boarding at 14 Alfred Road, Acton, working as an assistant in gentlemen’s clothing.

Military service

No military records as yet although his name is on the Bottesford service list.

Life after the war

William Turner (Jun) had moved to London where he married and had one daughter, named Stella. She remembered that he died when she was about seven years old.


Acknowledgements:

We are grateful for the information that we have had from Mrs Barbara Whitton (Ernest Turner’s granddaughter). Thank you also to Jonathan D’Hooghe for his efforts in tracing William’s military service.


 

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