Comments

Thank you for the reply daveerasmus - I did know about the fire service provided by the insurance companies. I have since been given a reference to what the foreman actually did. It seems they would be responsible for a team that would actually put out the fire and it was usually a part-time role.

When Insurance Companies were first established there was no national fire service. So Insurance Companies who insured against the risk of fire ran their own fire brigades and they did indeed attend fires (in order to reduce the costs of any claims). Norwich Union would have been one such company.

Norwich Union will definitely have an archivist. Should be relatively easy to track him/her down. In my experience archivists are only too happy to delve into their records to help researchers.

Hi, I recognised the name DYER. There was a George Dyer who was apprenticed to my 3 x great grandfather, Joseph James, a builder, in 1857. I have something written about him on my blog about my ancestor below. However the dates would be quite different so maybe it’s a different one? https://meetmyancestor.com/ancestors/joseph-james-1805-1875/

No pun intended!! haha

Thanks Graham, how frustrating! So does this basically mean that he was buried in St John's graveyard somewhere, but we'll just never know where? Argh! Hate hitting a dead end haha!