The Owen Branch

This part of the family emanates from Wales.

Great-Grandad Joseph Charles OWEN was born in Wrexham, Wales in 1868, the eldest child of Thomas and Jane OWEN, my Great Great Grandparents.  Great-Grandfather had 3 brothers; Thomas, John and William and it appears they remained in Wales choosing not to join their father and mother in their relocation to the Northeast.

In the mid-1880s Great Grandfather’s family moved from Denbighshire, Wales to Whitburn Village.   It was the time of the Great Depression so the pull of work, to escape poverty, at the end of the 19^th century must have been huge to make people up sticks and move to the Industrial North.

Note:  It was rumoured that Great Grandfather Joseph had originally moved from Wales to have trials for Sunderland AFC, but I can find no evidence of this ever-taking place, but I have it on good authority that he was a very good footballer.

On Xmas Day 1889 in Whitburn Parish Church, Joseph married my Great-Grandmother Margaret Jane TURNBULL, he was 21 and she was just 19.  They lived in Moor Lane, in the house next door to my Great Great Grandparents George and Jane Turnbull, Margaret’s parents.

In 1898 Great Great Grandfather Thomas Owen passes away and three years later Great Great Grandmother Jane is also taken.

At the turn of the century (1901), my Great Grandparents (Joseph and Margaret) now live in Elder’s Buildings and by then they had 2 Children: Georgina (my Great Aunt), and Evelyn (me Nanna).  Joseph Charles Owen (Big Uncle Joe) would be born a year later in 1902.

Soon after Big Uncle Joe’s birth it appears Joseph and Margaret’s marriage was in trouble. They had then moved to Rupert Street, with Great Grandfather Joseph putting a notice in the Sunderland Echo stating that he wouldn’t be held responsible for any debts incurred in his name after 12^th April 1902 at this address. Today we would think this is an astounding thing to do, but apparently it was normal in those days.

Great Gran Margaret was suddenly left with three young children, but it’s appears she wasn’t alone for long, striking up a new relationship with Robert Gibson (nee White). 

The onset of WWI threw the family into turmoil, as it did with so many families. By 1914 Great Aunt Georgina was married with her own family and living in Sunderland. By 1916, Evelyn (me Nanna) is working in the munition’s factory in Newcastle and in 1918 Robert Gibson is declared missing in action, presumed dead at the Battle of the Somme. He’s remembered on the village War Memorial.

Great Aunt Georgina had married Robert Orwin in 1912 and they had two sons Wheatley and George.  They lived in Monkwearmouth, if I remember rightly, not far from where the Stadium of Light is now.

Big Uncle Joe married Aunt Isabella (nee Smith) and they had five children Joseph, Robert, Doreen, Thomas, and Terrence. In 1939 Uncle Joe and Aunt Isabella lived at 28 Myrtle Ave.

Uncle Joe & Aunt Isabella’s second son, Robert Gibson Owen, was a famous footballer; he played for Hartlepool, Huddersfield, Lincoln and Derby, he coached South Shields to cup victory, and he scouted for Graham Taylor at Watford Football Club. He is remembered in the Lincoln City FC Hall of Fame with over 300 appearances for the Imps. Robert was hugely respected within the football fraternity and was well known in the village. Incidentally, Robert was the first to be christened with a middle name of ‘Gibson’ to remember Great Grans second husband Robert Gibson. My father was also christened Robert ‘Gibson’ Ventress.

Evelyne Owen (Me Nanna) became Evelyne Ventress when she married me Grandad Harry.  She was locally known by many names; Nan, Nanna, Ev, or Aunty Ev, or Mrs V by the plethora of people who knew her, and it felt everyone in the village knew her and she knew them too, scandal and all.  The stories she would tell…

While her and Big Aunty Viva (Elvina), her stepsister, would often fall out, she adored her brothers Joseph (big uncle Joe) and Robert (big uncle Bob). After all, she was their big sister and remained a constant in their lives…well you know how big sisters can be.

Evelyn was very small in stature, 5’ 2” in her stocking feet, she had long black hair, always tied in a bun on the back of her head. To me she always looked frail, probably reflecting her life which was hard, extremely hard.  Notwithstanding her outward appearance, don’t get me wrong, she may have looked frail, but she was a woman to be reckoned with.  She’d been a suffragette, a scullery-maid in Whitburn Hall (Downton Abbey style), she had three children out of wedlock, she worked in the Newcastle munitions factory during WWI, became an air warden during WWII and she was a member of the Temperance Society. She bragged she didn’t have an alcoholic drink until she 48, and that was a small bottle of Mackason.  We have to remember she was also born into a time of great change…. a period of devastating World Wars, the Woman’s Freedom Movement, with the end of Victorian ‘values’, and I think she loved every minute of it! A woman of her time.

By the Roaring Twenties Evelyn was a single parent living hand-to-mouth, struggling to make ends-meet, living in Elliots Yard, with her mother and her young family, Peggy, and twins Elsie and Joseph.

Joseph OWEN, Evelyn’s 1^st son, and twin to Elsie, was adopted as a baby. The story was, Evelyn was very ill following the birth of the twins, she went blind at one point, and had to be nursed by her mother, my great grandmother at Elliots Yard. It became obvious to my Nanna and Great Gran that they wouldn’t be able to cope with twins and so Great Gran arranged for friends of the family who were unable to have children to adopt Joe. It’s worth understanding that this wasn’t a formal state approved adoption, but an arrangement between the families. Soon after leaving his biological mother, Joe with his new parents moved to Peterborough, and it would be another 62 years before he found out who his real mother was and was able to meet his twin sister Elsie.

On 18 March 1924, Evelyn married Harry Ventress (my Grandad) at South Shields Register Office. 

They moved into Rackley Way and by the end of that year their daughter Irene was born.  Between them they had 7 children: Margaret (Peggy) OWEN, Elsie & Joseph (twins) OWEN, Irene, Robert (my father), Mavis and Patricia. I say between them because not all these children were Harry’s. Harry and Evelyn were married for 40 years until Harry’s death in 1965.

Margaret (Peggy) OWEN married Bill TROTMAN; they had a son Brian. Margaret divorced Brian TROTMAN and married Andrea SMILES, and they had 3 children, Alan, Margaret and Carole.

Elsie OWEN married John Anderson and they had 2 children, John-Edward and Vanessa.

Great Grandad Joseph Charles Owen died in 1951 at the age of 82, apparently still playing football with the kids up to the time of his death.

In 1965 Evelyn lost both her husband Harry and her brother Joe. I was only 7 years old, but I remember it being a very sad time in 20 Rackley Way, with what felt like lots of visitors offering their condolences every day of that very cold winter of 1965. A sad time, but with fond memories of village members supporting each other.

Great Aunt Georgina passed away in 1973, and four years later we lost me Nanna, Evelyn.

The passing of Evelyn ended the first generation of Owen’ born and bred in Whitburn. However, I know there are many descendants who still live in the village and/or have connections to the village. So, if you think you can add to this story why not contact us and help bring our story to life?