William George Soale

William George Soale was born in Hackney, London on the 10th of August, 1878. His parents were Richard William Soal (1847-1913) and Eliza Ann Forwood (1847-1933). He lived on Holly Street in Dalston, London with his parents and siblings. 

He was baptised on the 26th of August, 1878 at St James the Great, Bethnal Green, Tower Hamlets near Hackney and Dalston. 

William George Soale was the youngest of four. His three siblings included Annie Elizabeth Soale (born Hackney, 1873, died in 1919, Florida, US), his brother, Richard John Soale (1869-1923) and his sister named Helen Elizabeth Soal (1875-1958). He lived on Backstone Road with his mother, his brother, Richard, and his sisters Annie and Helen.

His father was a wine cellarman, a role which would eventually be passed down to him.

In 1881 William, his parents and siblings moved to live on Blackstone Road in Dalston, Hackney, London. 

During his late teens, he was a pattern card maker and would weave baskets for the wine merchant who his father worked for. 

William's years in Hackney likely became quite nostalgic to him as he would eventually move back during his 20s. 

It is possible that during the 1890s there was a rift between William George's father and his uncle, who was also a wine cellarman, leading to Richard William Soale taking William and his siblings to Walthamstow. 

William George Soale's first wife was Esther Ann Popkin (1874-1903), daughter of a stoker and engine driver for a steamship, who he married at St Michael and All Angels in Walthamstow on the 25th of December 1897, the same day as his brother. His brother married Elizabeth Bullock, daughter of a mariner. Both marriages may have been arranged by the parents of William George who also had roots in shipping.  

William George Soale became a cellarman for the wine merchant who his father worked for and lived with his wife in Walthamstow, London near Hackney on Wellington Road in Walthamstow, Essex, London. 

William George Soale lived near both his father and brother in Walthamstow and appeared to be working with his brother and father, who were also cellarmen. 

Richard John Soale, according to the account of a relative of his which I came across on Ancestry may have been a drinker and a gambler. 

William George and his wife had a child called Esther Ann Soal who was baptised on the 14th of March 1899 at St Marylebone, Westminster and died that same year.

They then had a child Hilda Esther Soale (born 1900) who was baptised in Walthamstow on the 15th of August 1900. She then died in 1902 and was buried in Walthamstow, Essex on the 8th of September that year.

Just a year later, in June 1903, his wife Esther Ann Popkin also died, aged 28 when William George Soale was just 25 years old. 

Esther Ann Popkin died in Surrey, London, but the circumstances around her death are not clear. 

By this time there had been a rift between William George Soale and the other Soales. 

In the 1903, when William George's sister, Annie Elizabeth Soale was married, the other Soale siblings were there, but nowhere in her wedding photo was William George Soale to be seen.  

Following the death of his wife Esther, he moved back to Hackney and married his second wife Emily Amelia Jane Kimpton (1884-1916), daughter of a draper and warehouseman and grandaughter of a basketmaker on the 17th of March 1906 in St Paul, Lower Homerton, London when he was 28 years old. They lived together on Ashenden Road, Upper Clapton, London. 

The marriage was witnessed by James George Kimpton, a ship clerk and his future wife Lily Hampshire. 

Interestingly, the marriage certificate has William George Soale down as a bachelor when he was in fact widowed. It could be that this was a mistake on the part of the person completing the certificate, or it could be an indication of William George Soale disguising his previous marriage. However, considering that he lied about his age (he is listed as 26 when he would have been 28), it may not be a stretch to consider that he also lied about being a bachelor. 

William George Soale's occupation was still wine cellarman, so perhaps he had continued that role but was now working for the Kimptons who were ship clerks and warehousemen. Some of the Kimptons were basketmakers so likely made wine baskets and perhaps needed a wine cellarman to organise the storage and maintenance of wine bottles.

Perhaps William George Soale collaborated with James Kimpton who introduced him to his sister Emily.

Lillian Ethel Barrett, the woman who would marry the son of William George Soale also had connections to wine cellarmen. Lillian Ethel Barrett's father, William Henry Barrett was a wine merchant's servant and was promoted to Wine Cellarman following the disappearance of William George Soale in 1906-1907. Perhaps Henry Barret, Lillian's father knew William George Soale or was his coworker. 

William George Soale and Emily Kimpton lived on Ashenden Road, Upper Clapton Road, London.

Around the time Emily Kimpton became pregnant with William Charles Soale in 1906, William George Soale disappeared.

Emily Kimpton gave birth to William Charles Soale in Hackney on the 4th of February 1907, but William George Soale was nowhere to be seen.

It wouldn’t be until the 21st of February, 1909, when William Charles Soale would be baptised in the church of St. Michael and all Angels in Hackney, without William George present.

During the 1911 Census, William George Soale’s wife and son, William Charles lived without him at the residence of Misses Kimpton (Emily Kimpton’s mother) and Emily Kimpton’s siblings. 

There is no record of William George Soale leaving the UK and he has no death certificate.

It is likely that he was presumed dead. By 1916, more than 7 years would have passed since his disappearance, which according to the law at the time, meant his wife could remarry. 

It is not known exactly how William George Soale died. One theory is that he may have drowned in The Thames or Regent's Canal but this only speculation based on the nature of his disappearance, death, occupation and given that he came from a family of mariners and avid sailors. It is possible also that he was depressed or had suicidal thoughts given that he had lost his wife, previous two children and was estranged from his family. 

Benjamin Swain, the man that Emily Kimpton would later marry in 1916 after William George’s death was also a brewery labourer.  

His life spanned the Russo-Turkish War (1877-78), The First Boer War (1880-81), The Mahdist War (1881-99), The Sino-French War (1884-85), The First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95), The Spanish-American War (1898), The Second Boer War (1899-1902), The Russo-Japanese War (1904-5), 1878 Treaty of San Stefano, 1879 Zulu War, 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War, 1898 Annexation of Hawaii, Russian Revolution of 1905, 1895-96 Italo-Ethiopian War, as well as the reigns of the British monarchs: Queen Victoria, King Edward VII, British Prime Ministers: Disraeli,  Gladstone, Cecil, Gladstone, Cecil, Primrose, Cecil, Balfour, Campbell-Bannerman, US Presidents: Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland, Harrison, McKinley, Roosevelt.