Amazing pics

After we got back from Cornwall and I started going through the albums Cathy had lent us I had some great surprises.
First from an album dated from 1904 I found pictures of Grandpa with his mother and with his Granny when he must have been about 12. There were also some from when he was even younger with his brother "Cubby"
Grandpa must have been in some army cadet type organisation and there are pictures of him at a camp. It looks very much as it would today I suspect!
In our searches in Barry last year we had found a cutting from the local paper about Grandpa leaving Barry. It said "Presentation to Barry Man" and reported that Grandpa had "secured a lucrative position in Shanghai and had been sent off with the good wishes of his colleagues in the Barry Borough Council where he worked as an assistant surveyor. A bit of nepotism here perhaps because his dad was the Borough Surveyor! He had been presented with a travelling overcoat, a compass set and a book.
I turned the pages of that very early album and came across a picture entitled "on the way to the station!" There was Grandpa with I think his father and three other people, two girls and a young man and over Grandpas arm is the travelling overcoat! He had not got any other baggage, probably because he had sent it on to the station. I think a similar picture taken when we leave Romilly Road will show us fairly well laden down!
The picture was very faded but a clever man in Totton has restored it for me and it is now clear to see and a great find.
There are pictures of the train crash and again the clever man has lightened them a bit. Considering they were taken at 4.30 in the morning after the crash which happened as Grandpa was going to bed they have come out quite well and it seems that Grandpa and his friends Wall, Gimson, Smythe and Murray are in the picture. You can see the rails and the train on its side. What I find amazing is that according to the diary they go going again fairly early the day after the crash.
There are pictures throughout the time Grandpa and Granny were in Shanghai including some of their trips home to England. A real treasure trove which will take quite a long time to catalogue. Very exciting