We’ve been a bit amused over the enquiry re the Maple family. I realise how very little we know about them. There always seemed to be such a lot of things to be brushed under the carpet. My father’s father died when he (my father) was 2 & we rather think his mother died before we were born. Anyway his mother married again - a man named Carter. They had a pub in the West Ham district: he was a drunkard, led the mother an awful life and my father being the youngest had a pretty bad time. His youthful experience made him a ?rabid teetotaller. Carter lived and died in West Ham Lane. He lived there with Aunt Amelia. I should think the West Ham registers should have some information. My father was a West Ham Church choirboy, although he changed to Methodism when he met my mother. Of the family, Uncle Jim lived in Underhill Rd Dulwich – he was a Civil Servant – 3 sons: one went to Australia for being a bad lad, Sid died a down & out in North M. Hosp when my father lived at Tottenham; then there was Fraser – I don’t know what happened to him. Uncle Tom – Windsor Road – jeweller in Davies St. W - Eva, Maurice & Norah. Eva & M have no children – Norah 2 girls. Then there was Uncles Charles & Fred who lived at Leytonstone. I hardly knew them. Then there was A. Emma, another tippler, who the family were always trying not to know, but who managed to get round my father at the end & was buried in our grave, much to your mother’s disgust. All told, not a very edifying chronicle!! The family originated in Warwickshire. Arthur Watson would know about that, he once took my father around the place. It’s strange but I realise now that I never heard my grandmother mentioned, what her name was or what sort of woman she was. It seems rather strange to think about it now. She had a family of eight & yet it’s just as though she’d never been.

Bernice’s father was Albert Joseph Maple (1863-1937) and her mother was Agnes Ellen Maple née Layzell (c1863-1918).

Albert’s father was James Maple (1818-1865) and having been widowed, James’ wife, Amelia, married William James Carter (c1841-1913) in 1866 and had 2 further children by him.

At the time of his death in 1865, James was a publican at the ‘Chestnut Tree’ (now the ‘Waltham Oak’) in Lea Bridge Road, Walthamstow.

From the censuses it is evident that Carter did not move to West Ham Lane until some time between 1881 & 1891. Censuses up to 1901 show him as a gas fitter or engineer as does the 1912 West Ham Commercial Directory. Neither he or his wife show up as publicans in West Ham on http://deadpubs.co.uk.

James Richard Maple (c1850-1924) actually had 4 sons:
    Sydney George Maple (1872-1930)
    Horace William Maple (1874-1908)
    Herbert Grant Maple (1879-1947)
    James Fraser Maple (1886 - ? )

Sydney did indeed die at the North Middlesex Hospital in 1930 but it seems unlikely that he was a down and out as at the time of death as his effects were valued at £440 11s 3d which in those days was a respectable sum.

Both Horace and Herbert went to Australia but I don't know which was the bad lad. Horace died in 1908 so Bernice may not have known of his existence.

Fraser married in 1912 had a family. I haven't found anything later than the 1927 electoral register for him although his wife and daughter were at the same address in the 1931 electoral register.

Thomas Holloway Maple (c1855-1915) was almost certainly named after Thomas Holloway who was a witness at his parents’ wedding – possibly the best man.

Norah may well have had 2 daughters but I can find a birth registration for only one (Doreen). However, the 1939 England & Wales Register shows a Shirley Eva Vasey born 6th January 1933 - I wonder whether she was adopted.

The family may well have come from Warwickshire but I have yet to make the link. The first documentation I have of the earliest Maple in this family tree, John Maple (c1784-1836), was his first marriage in 1810 at Marylebone in London. His second wife (from whom all the other Maples mentioned in this note are descended) was born in Worcestershire. A John Maple was baptised in 1785 at Tanworth-in-Arden which is in Warwickshire.

Arthur Watson was a grandson of Jane Smith née Rackham (1848 - ?) whose sister Mary Ann Layzell née Rackham was the mother of both Agnes Ellen Layzell (c1863-1918) who married Albert Joseph Maple (1863-1937) i.e. Bernice’s parents and of Florence Layzell (1877-1954) who married Harry Archibald Maple (1876-1917) whose mother was Esther Eliza Maple (1852-1940).

Bernice refers to a family of eight but it is evident she was unaware of John Lakin Maple (c1849-1894) no doubt because both he and his wife died before Bernice was born.