Elsa May Sinclair

Elsa May was my grandmother - and a singer. She was in the very first performance of J M Barrie's Peter Pan. She recorded many Gilbert and Sullivan shows that she performed in and I have her on 78 and CD. It was an amazing treat to discover the CD - exactly 100 years after she sang.

Elsa May married Philip Neville Freme Sheppard, my grandfather. Now I had heard that she was a 'disgrace' - in other words she had been married before (divorced? widowed?) and for a gentleman to marry a theatrical performer! I don't think the aunts (Minnie and Bobo - who must have been Philip's sisters) approved at all.

Now I knew nothing about the first marriage, and indeed I am sure the Sheppard family were not interested either, but then, out of the blue, I got an email. From the descendants of Elsa's first husband. So, I have a distant cousin in Australia to whom Elsa May Sinclair is great grandmother, as well as being my grandmother.

My 'new cousin' told me all about it:

"Elsie May Sinclair married Achilles Sapountzakis on 11/5/1908

They had a child Peter Gilbert Dwight Sapountzakis born 27/3/1909 (My Grandfather)(Don't ask me how to pronounce name Greek I think)

By 1911 Elsie was living with her widowed mother Emily,her son Peter and her brother John Morris Sinclair at Whittingstall Rd Fulham,Elsie stating she was a professional singer.

Elsie must of separated with her husband Achilles by 1911

Elsie married Philip Neville Fream Sheppard on 19/6/1917, on their marriage certificate it says Elsie was a widow living at Curzon School House and Philip was a gentleman living at 27 London Rd,Neath, South Wales.Also on marriage certificate her name is Elsie May Sapountzakis.(A widow I wonder or did Achilles take off and went back to Greece,no records of him in England only marriage certificate to Elsie.Achilles was 21 and Elsie 29 when they married.

I am also wondering why Elsie would name her child Peter Gilbert Dwight, a Sheppard family name, when she was married to Achilles Sapountzakis, only she knows, and something I would like to know.

Peter Gilbert Dwight Sapountzakis took the name of Sheppard at some time,as he left the Port of London in 1925 and came to Australia under the name of Sheppard. He was only 16."

My mother knows about 'Uncle Peter' - Peter was in fact my father's half-brother, not his uncle, but there would have been quite an age difference. Somewhere my mother has a photo of Anthony (my dad) and Peter (his half brother) on a beach playing cricket. She is going to try and find it.

Now the interesting thing is I have Elsa's nose (not her exact one of course, but mine looks like hers). I wonder if my Aussie cousin has too?

Oh - and did I mention I'm a singer too? My dad was as well; he played trumpet too.

But back to Elsa/Elsie. She had two children by Philip, my father and his sister, Angela. And she had one son - we assume from Achilles. Sally said the Aunts didn't like that Peter took the Sheppard name - but I sort of feel that although they sent Peter to Australia at the age of 16 (he went to work on a passion fruit farm that failed) I think it looks like Philip took him on when he took on Elsa, which is admirable in those very uptight Edwardian times.

Sally says my dad talked about not knowing what happened to Uncle Peter - being sad that he lost touch. I wonder if they looked alike at all? My brother looks like my dad, for sure.

I have, somewhere, letters from J M Barrie to Elsa. She was looking for more work, and he had nothing for her, but it was nicely written I seem to remember. I'll see if I can find them and scan them in for here.

The photos I have of her show her as a pretty lady, but the thing I never realised until I got the CD and there was a picture of her and the cast of HMS Pinafore on the cover, is that she was not very tall.

I don't know where she is buried, but I guess I could find out. I would imagine in Bath, where the family lived. My father is buried in Bath, in the cemetary in Horseshoe Lane. I was only 13 when he died so I didn't go to the graveside. When in 1981 my husband and I visited Bath as part of our honeymoon, we visited the cemetary. I'd never ever been there. We looked over the huge cemetary - no maps, no guide, no idea where my father was. My husband said 'follow me'. He walked down, turned left, then up a small path. 'Here he is'. He said. He led me straight to him. No - neither of us have the slightest idea how he managed it!

More family history

I don't know a lot about the family, mostly because all the people who could tell the stories have passed on. But I can tell what I know - and I'm doing this because folks have started to contact me who want more information on the family.

That's great! I am going to try and get the family trees scanned - if I could make them available as an on line resource I am sure it would be very helpful to researchers.

Meanwhile - here's where I sit in the world:

My father, Philipa Anthony Sheppard, married (don't know who first time round) and then married my mother (picture above - 3 friends, then 'Bones' Long, Sally's father, then Sally, then Anthony, then Peeps, then Peeps' Mother - Granny Arthur). He had one sister, Angela, who had one son, Nick.

So my family was Mum, Dad, Auntie Angela, Cousin Nick and my brother, Phil. When I was very small there were Lance and Emmie - I will have to track them down in the family history book, can't quite work out where they came from. Cousins? Second cousins? Not sure.

My father's parents were Elsa May Sinclair and Philip Neville Freme Sheppard. I know there was some controversy over Philip marrying a singer/actress (can you imagine? An Edwardian gentleman marrying a stage performer?!) but also some mention of her being divorced as well. I don't know who she was married to first time round either.

And I don't know if the first marriages - my father's or my grandmother's - had any offspring.

If you think that's starting to get complicated - my mother's side of the family is even more complex with two sets of step parents: Charles Keller, from a German family and an amazing history, but all I have left is a 1st world war Military Dress Sword; and Primrose (Mary) Long - known as 'Peeps'. She was one of the founding members of the Church of Scientology but she got fed up with Ron L Hubbard and left. I have her scientology bracelet - weird what hierlooms get handed down, eh? A sword and a bracelet. Sounds like a bad fantasy book plot coming up, eh?

Enough! There is a reason for this post which, I hope, I will be able to elicudate on further in the near future. Meanwhile if you want to contact me about the Sheppard family history, you can email me at

cjcauston at yahoo dot co dot uk

Sally April Long

Costumier, milliner, designer, Dr Who monster maker - wife to Philip Anthony Dwight Sheppard and daughter of Alexander F Long and Margaret Goddard (daughter of the famous pianist, Arabella Goddard).

That's my mum! She's 77 next week. She deserves a much longer post, but for now I will tell you she went to school in South Africa during the war (in Durban - the film 'Cry the Beloved Country' was filmed in the farmhouse she lived in with her uncle and auntie).

She went to art college in Oxford (now known as Oxford Brookes) and worked with many famous people in the theatre and film including Vivien Leigh, Sir John Gielgud, Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, and many, many more. She worked on Dr Who in the 70s with designers Jim Acheson and John Bloomfield (I noticed John's name at the end of Spiderman 3!).

My parents met at my father's divorce party. His sister, my aunt Angela, invited her (Angela was a costumier too). I have no idea who my father's first wife was, Sally said he married her because it was 'the gentlemanly thing to do'. In other words, they had - ahem! - relations, and therefore he thought he should marry her.

Sally married Anthony in 1955 and my brother Philip was born in 1956. Sally had many miscarriages between my brother and myself, and at least one after I was born.

Sally will have more posts, because her life is an interesting one too (as you may guess from the above 'taster'). I have not pursued her family history - the Longs or the Goddards. I will ask Sally what she remembers. Her cousins are still alive, I believe, they will have more stories too I am sure.

The Birth and Death of Mr P A D Sheppard

From the Barnet Press, 12 January 1974

The funeral of Mr Philip Anthony Dwight Shepaprd, of Athenaeum Road, Whetstone, took place in St Mary Bathwick Church, Bath Somerset, yesterday, Thursday. He died at his home last Thursday aged 53.

Mr Sheppard, whose family moved from Swansea to Bath when he was three, was educated at Christ's Hosptial, Sussex. He joined the RAF as an apprentice in 1937 and during the war he was commissioned as an officer and was responsible for maintaining electrical equipment. he served in different parts of England and in Nigeria.*

After leaving the RAF, he opened a club in Bath. He became the Young Conservatives' organiser for the south-west but left the post to join the Barnstaple Repertory Company. He went on from this to form his own repertory company.

In 1955 he married his wife, Mrs Sally Sheppard, who is a milliner, property maker and designer. They moved to Whetstone in 1963.

Mr Sheppard appeared in a Blackppol prodution of "The Blue Lamp" with Jack Warner and in "Maigret" with Rupert Davis in the West End. He did a lot of television work including commercials and "Z Cars". Recently he appeared in the Danny la Rue Film "Our Miss Fred" and played Mr Knibbles in a Children's Film Foundation production that has won a number of awards.

Mr Sheppard is survived by his widow and two children, Philip and Carolyn."

* I have two albums of photographs from those days in Nigeria. He brought back two native knives too, which I donated to the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Cambridge.

This is from a newspaper cutting, and in the same envelope is the following announcement (newspaper unidentified):

SHEPPARD - on 29th January 1920, to Mr and Mrs P N F Sheppard, 86 Eaton-grove, Swansea, a son.

Places and names

As well as the pedigrees, many places and names are mentioned. To help geneaologists find this site through search engines, here are some of the other family members and places mentioned. For many of them I have illustrations and photographs:

Peasmarsh Church, Sussex
Tetbury, Gloucestershire
Avening Church
Colesborne
Balsham
Archbishop Markham
York Minster
Mary Markham
Scone Palace
Lady Jarvis
Martha Jarvis
Mrs Ricketts
Honora Lysons - nee Jarvis
Madmoiselle Choisy
The Earl of St Vincent, First Lord of the Admiralty
Midford
Swainswick
Fed Markham
Jack Markham
Maria Markham
Mrs Rice Markham
Rice Markham
Miss Rice Markham
Whitfield Monument, Tenterden Church
Swainswick Church
Swainswick Rectory 1836
Longleat
Llandough Castle
Coytrahen
Haynes, Bedfordshire
Bettws Church near Coytrahen
General Blackwell
Nurse Paul
Mrs Blackwell
Lady Elizabeth Murray
Mrs Palmer
The Abbey House, the Seat of Miss Masters
Hamswell House
Bathampton Church
Bathampton Church and School
Bathampton Manor House 1846
Mrs Primatt Maud
Revered John P Maud
Bouchier Maud
Mrs London
Mr C J Maud
William S Maud
Miss Jane Garrett
Lady Charles Thynne (pictured)
Lady John Thynne and her daughters
Revered Lord Charles Thynne (pictured)
The Rectory, Longbridge Deverill
Reverend Edward Ferryman
Mrs E Ferryman nee Bessie Maud
Revered Lord John Thynne
Longbridge Deverill Church
Reverend Francis Ashpitel
Mrs F Ashpitel
W Lelewellyn of Courh Colman (?)
Mrs Lewellyn of Courh Colman
Miss Rhodes
Reverend E D Rhodes
Mr N Hurst

Contemporary name include Long, Goddard, Causton and Richer.

These are from Volume I. Already I am intrigued to know how these people all interacted. I can see how some married in (one of the Sheppard girls married into the Thynne family, hence the Longleat connection) and all those Reverends!

These pictures are all pre 1889 - so they may be of interest to regional historians as well as geneaologists.

I haven't even begun to list the many Sheppards, but I will. They can have a post all their own!

Pedigrees

Until I can work out how to transfer the family trees onto here, I'll just list the different families who's pedigrees are mentioned in the Family History. Here is the surname, region and years that are covered.

Sheppard of Minchinhampton, Gloucester: From 1623-1960
Sheppard of Colesborne, Gloucester: 1713-1770
Sheppard of Hackney and Muswell Hill, Middlesex: 1734-1803
Worth of Buckington, Wiltshire: no dates
Pleydell of Amney Crucis, Holyrood Amney Gloucester: 1555-1728
Capel of Rookswood, Essex: 1449-1688
Chamberlayne: starts with John, Chamberlayne to Henry I - 1685
Freme of Lipiatt, Gloucester: no dates
Eyre: 1713-1835 (yes! I have a Jane Eyre in my history!)
Coxe or Cocks: 1654-1864

Elizabeth Mary Sheppard

In 1882 Elizabeth Mary Sheppard wrote in longhand two enormous tomes of family history. There are paintings of her as a young girl and in the front of volume I a picture of her as a woman. She looks severe, very Victorian, and I am very grateful for the hours and hours she must have spent researching, collating and writing these amazing books.

Here is the Preface:

When our dear mother was taken from us in 1885 the idea suggested itself to me that I would compile a short family history from the diaries she had kept with much peseverance and faith. ... (unreadable) for upwards of half a century. When I began the work I found I had much interesting material in my posession referring to events anterior to the time when she began to write and I therefore thought it best to "begin from the beginning".

For the early records of our family I had to refer chiefly to family histories while old letters and papers furnished me with much that was intersting in the early life of our paents, which such time our dear mother took up the pen.

I wish some abler hand than mine could have undertaken the work, but I have done my best, and as the work to me has been one of love and duty, I hope my brothers and sisters will accept it as it is, that the ensuing generatsions with each with no ...... interested the simple record of the lives of those who have gone before, and with whom they are connected by the heir of blood and affection.

Mary - this is the first time I have read this Preface and for the first time ever, in the years I have treasured and shown these books proudly to others, the first time ever I have felt the strength of connection of one writer to another.

I think you would appreciate this blog, dear great, great, great auntie Elizabeth. Thank you for the paintings and drawings, photographs and lithographs, and the extremly complex and thorough family tree. Thank you.

Minchinhampton

Minchinhampton is the family 'Seat'. Gatcombe Park was the family home, and there are still plaques and graves in Minchinhampton Church with the Sheppard name.

This picture (small one scanned, I have a huge version in the attic somewhere) says 'Minchinhampton the Seat of Philip Sheppard'and there's a small version of part of the family arms too*.

When I was much younger, the family took a trip to Minchinhampton. We went into the church and there were the name plates on the wall... we met the church warden and he saw us looking at them. He said something disparaging, about name plates on church walls not being right, in answer to an innocent question from my brother. Not very nice of him.

In the graveyard was a huge monument to some members of the family, I'll scan in the picture at some point.

* Coat of arms is the shield, the crest, the supporters and the motto. What people usually call a family crest is actually just the shield. I did some work on heradldry when I was working for a University.

Anthony the Actor and Writer

This is Anthony as a younger man. Probably in his 20s. In the next picture he is probably about the same age, but made up. As you can see (from the 'Victorian' photo), he aged slightly differently to the way he was made up.

Films and plays he was in included Guns of Navaronne, Our Miss Fred and The Blue Lamp. I remember him being on TV in Z-cars, The Adventure Club (kids programme), The Saint and The Avengers. Always an extra. I went to see him in the theatre once in The Importance of Being Ernest, but he was understudy, so I never actually saw him perform in that play.

As he died when I was only 13 I don't have a tremendous collection of memories of him performing. What I do have though is a copy of the one film he was the lead character in. And the strange thing is, he is a rabbit! It was a Children's Film Foundation version of the invisible rabbit story, called "Mr Horatio Nibbles". My only record of him in film is therefore as him dressed as a very dapper rabbit and they used another voice over, so it's not his voice on the film. But it is still, despite the costume and the change in voice, very much him. The mannerisms, the way he moved, those I remember. Oh, and I'm in the film too! A child extra (aged 11).

His wife (my mum) Sally made the costume, complete with watchchain and twitching nose, waistcoat and a top hat that let his rabbit ears stick out the top.

But Anthony was also a writer, and one of his short stories was made into a film: "Talk of the Devil". We went to see it in the cinema when I was small and at the end I am told that I stood up when I saw my father's name and yelled out 'That's my daddy!'. Oh how embarassing! Only matched by my going up to the front of the cinema and yelling 'What's on the other side?' (referring to TV channels). I guess I didn't like the film!

As an Actor Anthony was liked. He was tall (Bernham and Nathan's, the London costumier, had a Police Uniform with his hame on it he was so often asked to be a policeman) and distinguished looking (don't you think?). Though not a 'lead man' (unlike his buddy at the time, Sean Connery, who was also great at schmoozing with the agents and directors whilst Anthony had a family and went home to them), he had a face that was very expressive. I don't know if he was a good actor, but I'm guessing he must have been good enough.

When my parents were first married they lived next door to Shiela Hancock and her first husband, Alec Ross (also an actor), in a small flat in London. I will ask Sally more. Sally's theatrical exploits deserve a whole blog on their own, but insted I will just have special posts for her. Though this blog is for those researching the Sheppard family, there will no doubt be people looking for other geneaology links who may well find themselves here!

Phillip Sheppard

To confuse the hell out us, every Sheppard son was called Philip. But - each alternate son was known by their middle name. So my grandfather was Philip Neville Freme Sheppard, known as Philip. My father was Philip Anthony Dwight Sheppard, therefore known as Anthony. And my brother is back to being Philip. I am going to start this blog with my father. That's him at the top.

Anthony was the son of Elsa May Sinclair and Phillip Neville Freme Sheppard. He was the first born son, and he was joined by a sister, Angela (must find out her middle name!). I think Angela was two years younger than him. He was born in 1920 and his father was much older than his mother. His mother was an actress (she's a beauty, isn't she?) and a singer. She was in the very first performance of Peter Pan by JM Barrie (I have letters from JM to Elsa still) and it was a bit of a scandal that a gentleman such as Philip should marry an actress!

Elsa died very soon after giving birth to Angela, and Philip did not take on two small children on his own. It wasn't done! Not in those days, anyway. So the two children were given to the care of two older aunts - Minnie and Bobo.

But back to their son, Anthony. He died on 3rd January 1974, aged just 53. He was an actor and a writer which meant he spent a lot of time at home. He married Sally April Long (I'd better find out the year!) and they had two children: Philip (my big brother) and me.

What I remember about him as a man is big, strong, sort of damp tweed smell, beard, tall, typewriter, smiling, glasses, fishing (deep sea), chunky jumper, camping, Humbers, well spoken, articulate, humourous, kind.

We lived in Netherhall Gardens in Hampstead (when I was very, very young), and then moved to Barnet. I believe my aprents bought the house for £5,000 - agreed on a handshake. Houses in that road now, even with the recession, are in the region of half a million. How times change, eh? Mind you, in those days we were in the countryside, now it's all part of London.

But I'm rambling (you'll get used to that, it's my style). Maybe this isn't the best format for a family history but - I don't need to research it, I don't need to chase down distant relatives or documents, I have them! - so I intend to make this as readable as possible.

Philip Anthony went to Christchurch School - he was a 'Bluecoat Boy'. That's him in his school uniform at the beginning of this blog. I think he was not a particularly happy child, the two aunts doted on the little girl but were not really sure what to do with the boy. Perhaps that's why they sent him away to school.

That's enough for a first post! I'll put dad's obituary up soon, along with photos of him in various guises. He was an actor, so the photos we have of him (apart from holiday ones) are all quite staged.