Skellingtons

Charles John Creed was born in 1886 in Holborn, the only son of his father, who later remarried.  Charles appears to be living in Paddington age 25, a seaman, unmarried, with an incorrect and implausible birthplace listed.  Two years later someone of his named married there to Annie Skellin, an Irish girl who already had a son, from perhaps her time in service in St John's Wood.  This unlikely couple appear not to have hit it off, as there is no trace of them emigrating, having children, or living together.

However, Charles's father bought a property in Pimlico Road, having done well as a furniture dealer, in fact it may have been the shop.  It was to this address that Charles John is registered in 1934, with a lady, not Annie.  Through following him onwards in the electoral roll we find his son, and learn the identity of his second wife, Edith.  It appears they never married, Edith having arrived in London aged 18 from Canada where she had spent 4 years in servitude as part of an English charity's then policy to rehome 'waifs and strays'.  Edith's father was unable to cope with three children, and it was the girl who was sent from her charming Shropshire home town, to the horrors of the home in Hull.  But perhaps they were kind to her, poor girl she had no other option.

One hopes that she fell in love with Charles Creed, and was content with separation from the Skellin lady.  If Annie Skellin was Catholic, divorce would have been an impossibility, and Charles John would have been trapped.  We would find it very hard to piece together this story and learn of Charles's story, and of Edith's childhood, without the London electoral roll's now on Ancestry.