Obituary of General Frederick Schneider (d. 1899)

Post date: Feb 14, 2012 4:28:55 PM

Extract from the parish magazine of February 1899.

''THE death is announced of GENERAL FREDERICK SCHNEIDER, late Bombay Staff Corps, at the age of 73. General Schneider entered the service in December, 1841, and was placed on the unemployed supernumerary list January, 1884, having thus served 42 years. He served with the 10th Bombay Native Infantry in the campaign in the Southern Mahratta country in 1844-45, and was present at the taking of the forts at Munshur and Munsuntosh.'' The Times, Jan. 5th, 1899.

Thus the well-known figure of one who made his home at Wateringbury for 15 years and was much beloved has passed away from us. The notice in The Times might be supplemented by a record of administrative qualities loyally and unselfishly used in times of great stress in India, and of deeds of bravery like those which, when they come under notice, win the Victoria Cross. But we in Wateringbury shall remember General Schneider, not for what we have heard of him, but rather for what we personally know of him. His kindly disposition was evinced in many ways. He was always ready to do anything which seemed to him to be wanted or to be of use in the village. In answer to an appeal from the pulpit for District Visitors, he next day quietly put the question to the Vicar "What do you expect of a District Visitor?" and eventually he offered his services. In the words of a correspondent, "he entered into everything that went on in the Parish, whether festive or otherwise. He attended every Meeting and School Committee, and took a personal interest in the children— penny dinners to wit—and visited many a poor home in a warm-hearted generous way."

General Schneider passed quietly away after a brief period of confinement to his house. The funeral took place in Kensal Green Cemetery, on Saturday, the 8th of January, the officiating clergy being the Rev. J. E. Revington Jones and the Vicar of Wateringbury.

The 1881 census shows him living with his wife, Ruth 5 years his junior, on the Tonbridge Road. Both were notable as having been born out of the country although they are carefully noted as being British citizens: he had been born in Italy and his wife in Nova Scotia. The date of 1881 implies an inaccuracy in the parish magazine's reference to 15 years in Wateringbury.

The obituary was written by the vicar, Rev. Greville Livett, who seems, unlike his predecessor, not to want to mention The Working Men's Club of which General Schneider was an early vice-president. Schneider's work in respect of school matters is illustrated in the following snippets: Schooling in Wateringbury and School extension. He is recorded as visiting Wateringbury school in 1898, just a year before his death.

He is not recorded in Wateringbury but in Hove (probably on holiday) in the 1891 census but is on the 1891 list of voters in Wateringbury.

The London Gazette of July 29th, 1887 contradicts the Times report at the top of this snippet as to date of his being retired as it records under that date Major General Frederick Schneider, Bombay being a made a Lieutenant General on the unemployed supernumerary list.

It is believed he had a daughter Constance who married in 1885 Stephen Hammer and died in 1937.