< More Waters Upton Memorial Inscriptions / MIs in the churchyard
Waters Upton churchyard MIs: Meakin
Added October 2023:
In Loving Memory of WILLIAM ASTBURY MEAKIN, Rector of this parish 1920 – 1925
Born Oct. 4th. 1856 – Died Jan. 14th. 1932.
Also of his wife MARY EMILY MEAKIN, Born Jan. 3rd. 1860, Died Dec. 31st. 1936.
William was a son of Thomas Walmsley Meakin, a grocer, and of Esther, née Astbury. He was born at Longton in Stoke on Trent, Staffordshire, and baptised there on 2 November 1856. He was enumerated with his family, at Longton, in 1861, and with his younger siblings and widowed father, at Normacott in the parish of Stone, ten years later. In 1881 however, William Astbury Meakin was one of 22 students in theology at The College, situated at The Close in Lichfield.
The Clergy List of 1897 shows that William was made deacon in 1882, and priest in 1884. He served as curate at Burntwood, 1882-83; of Penn Fields, also in Staffordshire, 1884-5; of Brixton Deverill, Wiltshire, 1886-7; of Hordley, Shropshire, 1887-91, and of Stone, Staffordshire, 1891-5, before being made perpetual curate of Withington in Shropshire in 1895.
The vicar of that parish was a former curate of Waters Upton, John Thomas Halke; the Wellington Journal of 8 June 1895 reported that William Astbury Meakin was instituted as vicar of Withington on 30 May that year. He came to Waters Upton in 1920, taking over from Samuel Hobson (see Memorial Inscriptions: Hobson), and appearing on the 1921 census with his wife and daughter at the Rectory. He was succeeded as rector of the parish by his son George Astbury Meakin in 1927 and retired to the White House, his abode at the time of his death. He left effects valued at £1,912 1s 4d.
William Astbury Meakin married Mary Emily Hawkins at Bath St James on 22 November 1888. This was Mary’s native city: she was born there to grocer George Hawkins and his wife Martha, née Southee, on 3 January 1860. With William, Mary had two children: the aforementioned son, and daughter Margaret Esther. Mary continued to reside at the White House in Waters Upton after her husband’s passing, until her own death on New Year’s Eve 1936.
IN
LOVING MEMORY OF
GEORGE ASTBURY
MEAKIN,
1890 – 1977.
RECTOR OF WATERS UPTON
1926 – 1929.
ALSO HIS WIFE
VIOLA,
1905 – 1984.
“MAY GOD’S LOVE ENFOLD YOU.”
V. M.
George Astbury Meakin was born at Hordley on 16 March 1890, and baptised there on Easter Day the following month (6 April), not by his father, the curate, but by the rector, J W Moore. The 1901 census records him as a pupil at West Cliff School, Ramsgate, Kent, a private school where the head master was Arthur P Southee – almost certainly a relative (I need to carry out some research to confirm this).
Crockford’s Clerical Directory of 1930 shows that George continued his education at Oxford, where he was awarded his BA in 1911 and his MA in 1915; he was made deacon in 1913 and priest the following year. He served as curate at St Barnabas Homerton in Hackney, London, 1913-17; as vicar of Wombridge in Shropshire 1917-26 (during which time he briefly served with the Royal Army Medical Corps); as curate of Waters Upton, 1926-29, and as curate of Gaywood, Norfolk, from 1929.
George next served as vicar of Heacham in Norfolk (he was described as vicar-designate of that place in the Lynn News and County Press of 17 November 1931). It was at Heacham that he married, on 23 July 1935, Viola le Strange, daughter of clergyman Austin le Strange.
Viola was 15 years younger than George, having been born on 30 September 1905, at Ringstead in Norfolk. She gave Ringstead Rectory as her last UK address when she sailed to Gibraltar on the Sibajak, a Dutch mail ship, in 1934. When she tied the knot with George Astbury Meakin in 1935 however she was of The Home Mead in Heacham. The couple had two children.
After more than two decades in Norfolk the Meakins moved to Staffordshire in 1954, where George was vicar of Whittington until 1960. The Lynn Advertiser of 6 Apr 1973 noted that George was then living in retirement at Old Hunstanton in Norfolk; the National Probate Calendar entry for George gave his address as Sedgeford in that county. Viola was also of Norfolk (Hunstanton) when she died, but her death was registered at Shrewsbury.
Waters Upton One-Place Study 