I have recently been doing some digging about my paternal grandfather
Allan John ‘Jack’ Downes as he was missing from the 1901 census. I have
discovered that he sailed to Wellington, New Zealand on the Kaikoura on 22 July 1896 arriving there on 10th
September. He returned to the UK on the Weimar sailing this time
from Sydney and arriving in Southampton on 3 June 1901. On the passenger
lists on the way out he is described as a ‘Farm pupil’ on the return as a
‘Labourer.’ My mother always described him as a ‘man of independent means’ and I have never got to the bottom of that!
A son of Colonel Leonard Downes, he was born in 1875, so he made this four-year trip in his early 20s..
I would love to know more about this unexpected discovery. If anyone can help me to discover more please add a comment to this blog or write to me at lsanders@cardiffmet.ac.uk.
In the 1911 census he was a ‘ Works Manager’ in
an ‘Electric Lamp’ Manufacturer’. He lived in an eleven roomed house in Croydon with his wife and
children and his father Leonard who was a retired lieutenant colonel in the
Royal artillery. Family legend tells me that they moved to
Lee on the Solent buying Canford out right in 1917.
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