Charles Henry MARGRETT
Ancestral line as currently established: Charles Henry 1862, Charles 1827, Henry 1808, George 1783, ?..............Family Tree number 15
Born: 10AUG1862 in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
Sole child of -
Father: Charles Margrett
Mother: Alice Walburn
Charles Married: 14 FEB1887 in Bishops Cleeve, Winchcombe, Gloucestershire, England
Spouse: Anne Amelia Page
3 Children: Herbert Henry, 1895
Doris, 1899
Kathleen, 1902.
Died: 22NOV1941 aged 79, in Dandford House, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
Whilst Charles Henry Margrett never has any brothers or sisters to play with, he has 18 or more uncles and aunts, all related to his father because his grandfather married twice and produced and supported two successive families. In fact his youngest aunt, a half-sister of his father, is only 7 when he is born.
The registers show that Charles Henry Margrett enters the world at 3 Thirlstaine Place, Cheltenham into a well established family. His father is 35 at his birth and is carrying on the business of baker and confectioner that his own father had handed down to him.
Charles Henry, at the age of 8, is at school and continues to study for at least a time, predictably helping in the family business and picking up marketing, stocking, employee management, retail pricing, as well as the physical skill of baking and managing the ovens as he gets older. By the age of 18 he is actually working for his father as a baker, who by then is aged 53 and must have in mind for Charles Henry to take over when he retires in the years ahead.
But he is physically active as might be expected of someone who has spent his teen-ages working in a bakers. At the young age of 21 he is selected to play for the Gloucestershire Colts against the Gloucestershire County Eleven at the Bedfordshire cricket ground on Monday 14th April 1884. This is recorded in the Liverpool Mercury daily newspaper. Perhaps a keen sportsman, but not the star of the team as shown by his score in 1886 when he plays in a benefit match for a retiring player against Sussex. He is bowled out for 14 in his first innings and out for a "duck" in his second.
Ten years later, there is a further report in 1894 in the Bristol Mercury & Daily Post recording him playing for Cheltenham aged 31 against East Gloucestershire and scoring 19 runs, the highest for his team in that innings. In 1901, aged 38, he continues fully managing the family business, and now with a son aged 6 and a baby daughter. Perhaps because he is a significant figure in society as a baker and confectioner for Cheltenham, he is moved in 1904 to “put something back” and in a civic election, he is voted to serve on the Town Council. Two years later, his father dies aged 78 and the Will is proved after six months showing that the paperwork was more substantial because of the business. He must now be the leading family figure.
His urge to undertake civic duties continues in 1908 as he is elected as chairman of the Water Committee; this may stem from business and the need of a clean supply for his bakery, or just civic responsibility. Next year he becomes the chief Magistrate. Charles Henry Margrett is becoming Mr Big in Cheltenham.
Only eight years after being elected to the Town Council, he becomes the Mayor of Cheltenham described as "coming of an old municipal stock. During the past 60 years his father, grandfather and uncle have all served the town on its governing bodies. His grandfather founded the old-established bakery and confectionery business now known as Margrett and Son, upwards of a century ago, which was carried on by the late Mr Charles Margrett for many years, and is continued by Mr Charles Henry Margrett at 61 High Street, Cheltenham, where it has been located for nearly 70 years." He also served as Mayor from 1926 to 1930.
The National Census of 1921 records Charles aged 58 as a company director of the Farmers Club Room, the Constitutional Club Company, the Blue Bird Cafe Limited, the Queens Hotel and the Cheltenham Theatre Company Limited. He also is recorded as being a founder member of the Conservative Club in Cheltenham, a Justice of the Peace, an Overseer of the poor, and a freemason, and in 1923 was awarded a CBE which must be for civic service. He continues a second term as Mayor in 1926.
He appears on two Passenger lists, firstly in 1924 arriving at Liverpool from Las Palmas aged 61, and secondly in 1927 arriving in London after boarding in Gibraltar. These are whilst he is still active in the service of Cheltenham town.
As the second world war looms, he is recorded in the emergency National Register just as "a company director".
His wif, Ann Amelia pre-deceases him in 1940 and he and his son, Herbert Henry Margrett (a local government clerk) are her Executors. Charles Henry and his wife also had two daughters. He dies soon after in 1942 with his estate proved and Probate issued at Gloucester in the sum of £14,359 by Herbert Henry Margrett (his son) and Walter Fowles, an estate agent.
His full life history is in the page from "Who's Who in Cheltenham" entitled "Cheltenham's Chief Magistrate 1909 -1911". He was also recorded in "Who Was Who" issue dated 1941-1950 and some of his life has been in Margrett Magazines; No: 6 in 1991, and No: 21 in 2008, published and deposited with the British Library in those years under I.S.S.N 0269-0284.