PRINT SOURCE: Thomas Raddall Fonds, Correspondence. From Thomas Raddall to Mary Raddall, 15 June 1964. MS-2-202 46.72.
Subject HeadingsWhen a Miss Mary Raddall contacts him from South Africa, T. H. Raddall replies immediately with a concise and informative precis of his family history. He starts with his great-grandfather in Cornwall, England and traces the direct line down to his grandson in Liverpool, Nova Scotia. Along the way, Raddall gives details about his father's military career, his own creative writing career, his siblings and mother, and a visit he had made to see his father's sisters in England. Being curious about other Raddalls living outside England, Raddall concludes with a request for information about the South African Raddalls.
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Miss Mary Raddall 34 Homestead Way Pinelands, Cape Province, Republic of South Africa 44 Park Street 15 June 1964 Dear Mary: I was not only interested but delighted to get your letter, because like you I had thought there were no other Raddalls living outside of England. My great-grandfather was John Raddall, who lived on a farm called "Fleardon", in the parish of Lezant, near Launceston, Cornwall. He died there in 1905. My grandfather was Thomas Raddall, born 1851, died 1916. He was a draper in London and Portsmouth, and married Lucy Head of Farn- borough, near Aldershot. They had six daughters and one son -- my father -- whose name was Thomas Head Raddall. (So is mine.) My father Thomas H. joined the Royal Marines as a boy, and served some years on the China station in HMS "Narcissus". On his return to England he married Ellen Gifford, of Ash, near Canterbury, and took a post as instructor at the School of Mus- ketry (now called the Small Arms School) at Hythe, Kent. I was born there in 1903. In 1913 my father got a post as instructor with the Canadian army, and our family moved to Halifax, Nova Scotia. In 1914 Father went overseas with the 1st Canadian Division, was wounded at Ypres and Lens, and was killed while commanding the 8th Winnipeg Rifles in the great dash through the German lines at Amiens in 1918, only three months before the Germans asked for an armistice and ended the war. He was 41. At that time I was in my 15th year, but I fibbed about my age and got away to sea as a junior wireless operator in a small transport. After the war I remained for some years in the Canadian merchant marine and in the Atlantic coast wireless telegraph service. In 1923 I came to this little town on the south-west coast of Nova Scotia, working as an accountant in wood-pulp and paper mills, and spending all my spare time in the forest, fishing and hunting and canoeing. In 1928 I began to experiment with short stories for magazines, and in 1938 I was able to make it a full time career. To date I have published 16 books of various kinds, and I'm working on the 17th,1a novel of Halifax N.S. during the Napoleonic Wars. My mother died in Halifax some years ago, and I have 3 sisters. One lives with her husband, a mining engineer, in Alabama,U.S.A. The other two, both widows, live in Halifax. (I was the only boy.) I am married and have a son and daughter. My daughter is the wife of a doctor in Moncton, New Brunswick province, Canada. My son (whose name is also Thomas Head Raddall) is married and in practice here in Liverpool as a dentist. (He has a little boy who is also named T.H.R.!) A few years ago I had a letter from Thomas Raddall Kittow, posted in Toronto, where he and his wife were visiting their daughter, who had mar- ried a Canadian soldier in War Two. I wonder if this is the Toronto rel- ative you mentioned. I visited England in 1958, and called on two aunts (my father's sisters Florence and Jessie) in London. Both have died since. They told me that my great-grandfather John Raddall had a son named Frank, who lived at "Fleardon" farm, and had sons named Thomas, Francis and Herbert. None of these three sons married. Thomas died in 1942; and in 1958 Francis and Herbert were a pair of old bachelors living in Cornwall. Now, please, tell me about your branch of the Raddalls, and how they came to be in South Africa! Air Mail |
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1. THR is referring to Hangman's Beach (New York: Doubleday, 1966).