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Victoria Street, Englefield Green, dated 3.3.1908

Just Williams Part 7 – some of the Victorian tradesmen who shaped Englefield Green

19th & 20th Century | Collection | Englefield Green | Museum Blog | Tourism, Trinkets and Trade
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This short series of articles, by Margaret Stewart, has been looking at some of the businesses which began trading in Egham during the Victorian era and continued for over 50 years. There were similar businesses away from the centre of Egham itself and in the surrounding areas. What they have in common is that they were all begun by men called William…

7.            William Beauchamp, builder 25 Victoria Street

William Beauchamp, born in Egham in 1851, was one of a large local family of Beauchamps including beer house keepers and publicans. His father John was landlord of the Star and Garter in Englefield Green.

Instead of following his father’s footsteps William chose to become a labourer/carpenter.  In 1871 he married a local girl Charlotte Sarah Butler, who had been lodging with his family. He established himself in Victoria Street and gradually built up his business until by 1901 he was operating in his own right at 25 Victoria Street as a builder, with a number of employees.

He was extremely successful and apparently responsible for some of the most impressive buildings in Englefield Green:

  • Englefield Green Vicarage in Barley Mow Road
P3228

This unusual building was designed by architect Arthur Campbell Martin (1875-1963) who lived at 3 Willow Walk. He was the  son of Rev. Charles Martin, (1840-1910), Warden of Radley College, 1870-79, and Rector of Dartington, 1890-1910, and  brother of Rev William Keble Martin famous as the author of  Concise British Flora in Colour. Arthur Campbell Martin made his name designing small country houses and church buildings. The Vicarage featured a symmetrical curved front elevation flanked by large chimney stacks and, hipped tiled roof.  It is now privately owned.

  • St Agnes Villas 52-54 Egham Hill
Estate agent photo
  • Houses in South road Englefield Green:
Estate agent photo
  • A building at Royal Holloway, completed in 1926 to house the Physics and Botany departments including purpose-built laboratories.

In 1987 the building was named after Professor George Horton who had been Head of Physics from 1914-46.

The Horton Building now houses the Economics Department.

Image from RHUL website 

William’s company also undertook less glamorous work  such as a Contract of work done for RBC in 1937 which involved redraining the  water closets at 4/9 Alexandra Road, Englefield Green. The original contract is held in Chertsey Museum as CHYMS.2008.015.15. Further evidence  of him taking on this sort of work comes in the form of a  manhole cover (now in Egham Museum), bearing his name, which was discovered to the rear of the White House Egham during demolition work.

MC718

William and Charlotte went on to have 13 children:

  1. Samuel William (1870-1950) who also started out as a carpenter before becoming a builder like his father, with whom he may have worked. From at least 1928 until his death in 1950 he too had become a builder, based at 51 Victoria Street. His son William Frank (1900-1984) worked as a bricklayer. After a few years in service in London his daughter Rose Annie lived for a while at No 25 with her grandfather William until she married Frederick James Childs, a dairy worker, at St Jude’s in 1930. They stayed in Englefield Green with their son Brian.
  2. Annie Charlotte  (1872-1965) who married her father’s next door neighbour Walter Horace Taylor: they continued to live at 26 Victoria Street where their son Horace was born. Contemporary photos show him accompanying his grandfather around.
  3. Alfred Henry (March-May 1874) The name Charlotte Sarah also appears on his baptismal record, crossed out: this is probably that the mother’s name was inserted in the wrong place rather than indicating an otherwise unknown twin.
  4. Florence Mary (1875-1955) Florence and her younger sister Edith ran shops (together?) at 17 and 18 Victoria Street from 1907-11. Florence married William Grey in 1900 and she ran FW Grey fishmonger and poulterer at 19 Victoria Street 1912-13. She died in Ontario* in 1955.P2388
  5. Frank (1877-1882) who was just four when he died.
  6. Edith Olive (1880-1960). At the age of 21 she was working as a school teacher before running shops with her sister Florence. Edith married Walter Tolles in 1900 and they opened Beauchamp & Tolles haberdashery at 20 Victoria Street 1912-1913. Walter died in Ontario* in 1946 and Edith returned to Englefield Green for the rest of her life. P3299
  7. Albert Edward  (1881-1945) married Georgina Maude Taylor in 1904 and they lived on Middle Hill. A carpenter, he died in Ontario*  
  8. Ada Kate (1883-1974) married Arthur Enock Dew in 1903, and they continued to live in Egham.
  9. Arthur Henry (1886-1964). He married Alice Smith in 1903 and they lived at 20 Victoria Street, where he worked as a bricklayer, possibly for his father. He died in Ontario.*
  10. Rose Emily (1887-1952). Rose married Fred Butler in 1910. They ran a shop in Deptford before returning to Englefield Green, where he was a builder.
  11. Herbert  (1888-1962) married Emily Pile 1911, when he was an engineers’ fitter. By 1939 he was running a chauffeur service.
  12. Sidney (1890-1981). By 1911 Sidney was a jeweller’s apprentice: a year later he married Henrietta Butler and they lived at 25 Queen’s Road. He joined the Air Force in 1916 but survived to return to his family in 1918. By 1939 he was working as an instrument maker and living in Englefield Green with his son Victor (who served in the RAF during World War II) and daughter Francis (sic). He died in Dorset in 1981.
  13. Percy (1893-1917). He started working life as a pastry cook. He joined the Buffs (East Kent) Regiment as a Private and died in Belgium in October 1917, only a few months after marrying Elsie Caister Prangley in St John’s Church, Egham. He was buried at Brookwood Military Cemetery. His name is included on the War Memorial Cross in the grounds of St John’s Church, Egham.

* Shortly before World War I several of William’s children – Florence, Edith, Albert & Arthur and their partners – emigrated to Ontario in Canada. Family stories suggest that it enraged William that they did not then make themselves available in the service of their country after war broke out.

William died in 1938, an extremely rich man. His estate was worth some £9036.2s 2d or £778,164.59 today. He left properties in South Road Englefield Green, Queens Road Egham and Egham Hill respectively to his daughters Annie, Ada and Rose. He also owned the Old Star and Garter in Harvest Road and properties in Railway Terrace Egham Hythe, Blays Lane Englefield Green, Hope Terrace Englefield Green, Queens Road,  which were to be sold on behalf of all his surviving children,

The business continued under S&R Beauchamp until 1945 (the probate award suggests that this was most likely Samuel and Rose Beauchamp) and then as G.E. Turner Beauchamp & Sons until 1955.

The history of the Beauchamp family is documented in detail in Beauchamp, Bruce (2004) Beer house keepers, builders and other Beauchamp’s, a family history on the Beauchamp’s of Egham, Surrey, Queensland, Australia.   

General sources: Egham Museum photograph and document collections (including ratebooks), https://www.ancestry.co.uk , https://www.findmypast.co.uk

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