CFHS code : MG220
Parish : St Mary the Great
Inscription : In Loving Memory of JANE beloved wife of GEORGE W SILK d 27 Dec 1925 aged 74 also GEORGE WALLIS SILK d 22 Mar 1933 aged 89
Monument : Headstone/Kerb stones
Above information from Cambridge Family History Society Survey
Lat Lon : 52.202129, 0.13759463 – click here for location
Monument
Inscription
Jane Silk (née Pettit) (November 1850 – 27 December 1925)
Jane was born in Bottisham and baptised in Westley Waterless (just outside Newmarket) on 26 January 1851. Her parents were Robert and Mary Ann Pettit, and her father ran the Bull Inn at Borough Green during her childhood. Aged 20 she was living at 14 Trumpington Street and was a housemaid to widow Mary Ann Gwilt. She married George Silk on 28 October 1872 and the couple had eight children: Alice Agnes (1874-1965), Emma Eliza (1876-1892), Ernest George (1877-1915), Annie Elizabeth (1881-), Charles Frederick (1884-1917), Ethel Florence (1889-1954), William (1890-1978) and Reginald (1894-1947).
Two of their sons died in the 1st World War. Ernest George Silk was called up at the start of the war, and went to the front in September 1914. He was shot by a bullet in November and was treated in England, before returning home to Cambridge for two months on sick furlough. He returned to the front in April 1915, and was killed on 8 May 1915. He left a wife and four children. Charles Frederick Silk died on 3 May 1917 and is buried in Arras, Northern France. He also left a widow.
George worked as a postman and the family lived at 22 Eden Street (1881), Mill Road (1891), 7 Summerfield (1901) and 4 St. Marys Passage (1911) and then 64 Victoria Road (at least 1915 onwards). Jane died at Victoria Road aged 75 years.
George Wallis Silk ( 1843 – 21 March 1933)
George was the illegitimate son of Eliza Silk (1821-1900). He was born in Dry Drayton and baptised there on 8 October 1843. His mother had been in service in 1841 to baker George Wallis who lived on Castle Street, which is perhaps where his name came from. He grew up with his grandmother and uncle in Dry Drayton (1851) and later was an apprentice bootmaker to Henry Chapman at 3 Bulcher Row (1861). His mother married George Cursley (1823-1892) in 1865, and George went to live with them (1871) and was working as a postman by that time. He died at 64 Victoria Park aged 89 years old.
Sources:
Ancestry
Newspaper archives
by Claire Martinsen
[If you have any information about this person, please contact us at Friendsofmillroadcemetery@gmail.com]