John Wolfe

John Wolfe was born in Cork in 1823. By 1861, he is living in Kensington, London working as a railway clerk and depot accountant according to that year’s census. He married Charlotte Sophia Thomas in Norfolk in 1860. London-born Charlotte was the daughter of John Thomas, a commercial agent, and Sophia Cremer from Gimingham on the Norfolk coast.

They had four daughters – Sophia (born 1862), Edith Charlotte (born 1864), Kathleen (born 1866) and Gertrude May (born 1872). Charlotte and John also had two sons- Reginald (born 1868, who died in early childhood) and Louis James (born 1873). Based on the birthplaces of the children, the family moved frequently around the London area. At the time of the 1871 census, they were living in Ealing where John was working as a clerk. On

Louis James Wolfe’s baptismal certificate, John is listed as an accountant. In 1881 they are in Paddington and John works as a merchant’s clerk. Events now take a turn for the worse! The census of 1891 has John Wolfe confined in Brighton Workhouse and described as an imbecile pauper and unable to work. The rest of the family is living nearby in the town of Brighton. The following year Louis James, their only surviving son emigrates to Manitoba Canada where he tries his hand at farming.

John Wolfe died sometime before 1901 as in that year Charlotte is described as widowed. Her unmarried daughters are living at home working as dressmakers or milliners.

Sophia Wolfe married Frederick Charles Monk in 1895. They had a daughter Gertrude Edith who married Raymond Jeater in 1921. Their descendants live in England.

By 1915, Louis James, still unmarried, and working as a dairyman in Edmonton Alberta joins the Canadian Overseas Expeditionary Force at the age of almost 42. His mother may have died by then as his recruitment papers give his sister Gertrude – with an address at Brighton – as next-of-kin. His attestation papers on recruitment are stamped with „63rd Battalion’ - the Edmonton Battalion– the C.E.F mainly being organized into 260 numbered battalions later organized into four Divisions in France. These papers show he was a 6 week long member of the 101st Edmonton Fusiliers – known as the militia; this was Canada’s then peacetime army structure. His service records will be ordered from the Canadian Archives and may shed some light on his movements during the period of his enlistment (the C.E.F having seen action across the Western Front from Second Ypres, Passchendaele (Third Ypres), Vimy Ridge and Amiens).. He is presumed to have survived the war as his name does not appear in any Canadian casualty listings.

(courtesy Gary Acheson)