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Wives' Fellowship

The Wives' Fellowship (1916-fl 2008) is a Christian women's group founded in 1916 within the Church of England, but later was opened to members of all Christian denominations. It aims to bring together married women with a common interest in upholding Christian ideals in marriage, motherhood and community service. It functions as a network of local groups around the UK with a central administrative body run by volunteers. Membership has always been by invitation, with meetings held in members' homes. Annual Days (the yearly celebration of the founding of the Fellowship) and National Conferences are held in different locations around the UK. The group was originally called the Young Wives' Fellowship and aimed to provide companionship to young married women whose husbands were fighting overseas during the First World War. It was initially a sub-committee to the Mothers' Union, with strong links to the Girls' Diocesan Association. In 1921 it became independent under the title The Wives' Fellowship. It remained affiliated to the Mothers' Union until 1937. Most branches at that time were in the dioceses of the Church of England. During the 1920s groups were established in India and Sri Lanka (Ceylon) and, very briefly, in Cairo, Nairobi and Jakarta (Batavia). The Indian groups ceased after Indian independence and the Ceylon groups stopped in 1973. The central administrative body produces magazines, hosts events around the country, and organises the Annual General Meeting. It has always been active in charitable work. The main charities that have been supported are: the Josephine Butler house in Liverpool (funding the training of female social workers) 1921-1974; the St Michael and All Angels Fellowship, 1943-1976; the St Christopher's Hospice (for the terminally ill), 1975-onwards. It also had a 60-year affiliation with the National Council of Women. The Senior Wives' Fellowship was established in 1934 for members over the age of 40. The Wives' Fellowship and the Senior Wives' Fellowship merged on 11 Mar 2004. The organisation was still active in 2008.

Wittig , Karl , fl 1939-1950

During World War Two, Karl Wittig was a political prisoner in a number of Nazi concentration camps including Sachsenhausen. In the early 1950s Wittig was a key witness in the trial of Otto John, head of the West German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz), 1950-1954. John was found guilty of spying for the communists as a result of Wittig's evidence.

Gustave Jules Alphonse Witkowski was born in 1844 and trained as a doctor, presenting his MD thesis in 1872. He also wrote widely on a variety of subjects, chiefly upon medical history but also upon art and history in general. He died in 1923. A little further information may be found in [G.J. Witkowski], Docteur G.J. Witkowski : autobiographie (Paris?: no publisher noted, 1917).

Court baron was an assembly of the freehold tenants of a manor under the presidency of the lord or his steward. Such a court had a jurisdiction in civil actions arising within the manor, especially in such as related to freehold land. This jurisdiction began to decay at an early date, and is now practically obsolete.

Sir Frederic Wise, 1871-1928, was educated at Marlborough College and abroad. He entered banking in 1903 and later founded the stockbroking company of Wise, Speke and Co of Newcastle-on-Tyne. During World War One, he was Chairman of Volunteers and Military Representative for his county, and he also gave his services to National Service, the Food Ministry and the Treasury. In 1919, he was sent to Berlin to report of the financial position of Germany. He was also a financial advisor to Lord Byng's Committee of United Service Fund, a director of the Daily Express and a director of the Sudan Plantation Syndicate Ltd. He was Unionist MP for Ilford from 1920 and knighted in 1924.

Thomas James Wise was born in Gravesend, Kent in 1859, and was brought up in London. He joined the firm of Herman Rubeck and Co (dealers in scents and flavourings) aged 16, rising to become chief clerk and later a partner in the business. Alongside his business activities, Wise was a prolific book collector and an amateur writer and publisher. By the 1920s he had become prominent in the rare book trade and served as President of the Bibliographical Society for 1922-1924. Not until the 1930s was it discovered that Wise and his associate Harry Buxton Forman had produced and sold many forgeries and deliberately antedated reprints, and it was not until after his death that the extent of his deceptions (including thefts from the British Museum) and inaccuracy of his bibliographies were fully appreciated.

Frances Louise ('Loie') Greenhalgh married Thomas James Wise in 1900. There is no evidence that she ever assisted in his fradulent activities.

Pridham-Wippell entered the Navy in 1900. He became a midshipman in 1901, lieutenant in 1907, commander in 1919 and captain in 1926. Following several commands afloat and two spells at the Admiralty, he was promoted to rear-admiral in 1938 and vice-admiral in 1941. He was Vice-Admiral commanding the First Battle Squadron and second-in-command, Mediterranean Fleet, 1940 to 1941. He was then Flag Officer, Dover, from 1942 to 1944, in which year he was promoted to admiral. From 1945 to 1947 he was Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth, and he retired in 1948.

Born 15 May 1898 in Grimsby, Lincolnshire. Educated at Gresham's School, Holt, 1910-1916. Served in the World War One as a mechanic and motorcycle dispatch rider, Royal Flying Corps, Jun 1916-[Feb] 1919; Balliol College, Oxford, 1918-1920; visited Moscow, 1920; joined Communist Party Great Britain (CPGB), Feb 1923; assistant editor of Workers Weekly, 1923-1925. Married Elizabeth Emma Arkwright, 31 Aug 1923; imprisoned for sedition, Nov 1925-Apr 1926; editor of Workers' Life, May 1926-Jan 1930; editor of Daily Worker, Jan 1930-[1936]; founder editor of the Left Review, 1936; military correspondent of the Daily Worker, 1936. Joined the British Bn, International Bde, fighting with Republican forces, Spanish Civil War, Aug 1936-Aug 1937; machine-gun instructor for 11 Bn and 12 Bn, Nov 1936; commanded British Bn, 15 International Bde, 1937; wounded, Feb 1937; instructor at Officer's Training School, Albacete, Jun 1937; rejoined 15 Bde as a staff officer; wounded in Aragon, 25 Aug 1937; returned to England, Nov 1937. Expelled from the Communist Party, Jul 1938; divorced Elizabeth, Feb 1940; married Katherine 'Kitty' Wise Bowler, 25 Jan 1941; set up the Osterley Park Training School to provide instruction to the Home Guard, Jun 1940-[Jun] 1941; co-founder of the Common Wealth Party, July 1942; unsuccessfully ran in the 1943 by-election as Common Wealth Party candidate for North-Midlothian; unsuccessfully ran in the 1945 General Election as Common Wealth Party candidate for Aldershot. Died 16 Aug 1949. Publications: The Coming World War (Wishart Books, London, 1935), Mutiny: Being a survey of mutinies from Spartacus to Invergordon (Stanley Nott, London, 1936). English Captain. Reminiscences of service in the International Brigade in the Spanish Civil War (Faber & Faber, London, 1939). Armies of Freemen (G Routledge & Sons, London, 1940). New Ways of War (Penguin Books, Harmondsworth and New York, 1940). Deadlock war (Faber & Faber, London, 1940). Blitzkrieg, by Ferdinand Otto Miksche, translated and with introduction by Tom Wintringham (Faber & Faber, London, 1941). The Politics of Victory (G Routledge & Sons, London, 1941). Freedom is our weapon. A policy for army reform (Kegan Paul & Co, London, 1941). Guerrilla Warfare by Bert Yank Levy, ghost written and with an introduction by Tom Wintringham (Penguin, 1941). Peoples' War (Penguin, Harmondsworth and New York, 1942). Weapons and Tactics (Faber & Faber, London, 1943). We're going on!: the collected poems of Tom Wintringham, edited by Hugh Purcell (Smokestack, Middlesbrough, 2006).

Doris Winter was forced to discontinue her education at the school where she produced this work as she was Jewish; attended a boarding school in Sweden, 1934-1935; returned to Cologne and realised that she was unable to receive any training or qualifications; went to England and spent the summer in a holiday home for Jewish children from Leeds, April 1936; began nursing training, 1936; after the fall of France in 1940 she was asked to leave the hospital within 24 hours because of her official status as a 'friendly enemy alien'. Fortunately she had already passed her exams.

After a brief period of unemployment she worked at the Lingfield Epileptic Colony, Surrey and also at the Anna Freud nurseries in Hampstead under the American Foster Plan. She became matron of the 54 Camden Road Wartime Day Nursery, which was run by the Ministry of Health and the Board of Education, with the object of releasing women for essential work.

John Henry Ernest Winston was appointed Librarian at the Wills Library, Guy's Hospital Medical School in 1914, aged 21. During World War One he served in France, being taken prisoner in May 1918. Winston returned to Guy's Library after demobilisation in 1919. In 1921, he was appointed Assistant Clerk to the Dean of the Medical School, and in 1925, Secretary of the School. From 1950-1955, he was the Appointments Officer.

George Winston served with the Royal Marines during World War One. He was Wills Librarian, Guy's Hospital Medical School London, 1920-1930; Librarian at the Faculty of Science Library, Cairo University, 1930-[1933]. On his return to London, he was again appointed as Wills Librarian, a post he held until his retirement in September 1962. Winston was responsible for the evacuation of the historical collection and other valuable books to Wales at the outbreak of World War Two. During this time, he was also Commanding Officer of he Deptford Unit of the Sea Cadets. As librarian, Winston was also responsible for the care of the Gordon Museum collection at Guy's, as well as being business manager for the Guy's Hospital Reports. He died on 31 Dec 1867.

Born in Oxford, 1878; educated at Magdalen College School and New College, Oxford; MA; Cadet, Federated Malay States Civil Service, 1902; posted to Perak, and studied Malay language and culture; appointed District Officer, Kuala Pilah, 1913; appointed to the education department, 1916; stationed in Singapore for 15 years; DLitt, Oxford, 1920; first President of Raffles College, Singapore, 1921-1931; his recommendations were instrumental in the founding of a new teacher training college, the Sultan Idris Training College at Tanjong Malim, to which was attached the Malay Translation Bureau, 1922; acting Secretary to the High Commissioner, 1923; Director of Education, Straits Settlements and Federated Malay States (FMS), and member of Legislative Council, Straits Settlements, 1924-1931; CMG, 1926; member of Federal Council, FMS, 1927-1931; General Adviser to the Malay State of Johore, 1931-1935; retired from the Malayan Civil Service and was appointed KBE, 1935; lecturer in Malay, School of Oriental (later Oriental and African) Studies; Member of the Colonial Office Advisory Committee on Education, 1936-1939; Reader in Malay, School of Oriental Studies, 1937-1946; President, Association of British Malaya, 1938; member of Governing Body, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), 1939-1959; Director, Royal Asiatic Society, 1940-1943, 1946-1949, 1952-1955, 1958-1961, President, 1943-1946, 1949-1952, 1955-1958, 1961-1964, Gold Medallist, 1947, and Honorary Vice-President, 1964; during World War Two, broadcast in Malay to Malaya under the Japanese occupation; following the re-occupation his joint authorship of a letter to The Times played a role in the reversal of the British government's Malayan Union policy and the institution of a federal government which led ultimately to Malayan independence; Fellow of the British Academy, 1945; retired from SOAS, 1946; Honorary Fellow of SOAS, 1947; Vice-President of the Royal India Society, from 1947; Vice-Chairman of Executive Committee for Exhibition of Art from India and Pakistan, Royal Academy of Arts, London (and headed a delegation to India to arrange for collection of exhibits), 1947-1948; Hon LLD (Malaya), 1951; Honorary Member of South-East Asia Institute, USA; Honorary Member, Royal Batavian Society and of Kon Instituut voor Taal-Landen Volkenkunde, The Hague; died, 1966. Publications: numerous works on Malay language, culture and history.

Frederick Albert Winsor, born Friedrich Albrecht Winzler in Moravia, came to London in 1803 to exploit his ideas for the provision of public and domestic lighting from gas. When Winsor arrived in London he had much public scepticism to contend with. He established himself in Cheapside and in May 1804 obtained a patent for gas-making apparatus. Over the next five years he was to be awarded three further patents for gas generation. He began his campaign in 1804 with a series of public lectures at the Lyceum Theatre, and included a demonstration of an ornate chandelier and an explanation of how gas could be conveyed to different rooms in a house. He acquired premises for gas manufacture in Mayfair. In 1806 he relocated at 97 Pall Mall, and in 1807 he staged spectacular public demonstrations of gas lighting on the walls of Carlton House and in Pall Mall. All this was accompanied by a volley of colourful pamphlets and advertisements, some in other languages.

In 1807 Winsor issued a prospectus for the grandiose New Patriotic Imperial and National Light and Heat Company. He claimed that annual profits would amount to £229 million, of which nine-tenths would go towards redeeming the national debt. Individuals subscribing £50 could expect an annual return of £6000 and an eventual capital appreciation of £120,000. Few were taken in by this (though Winsor is said to have raised nearly £50,000 by subscription) and he was publicly ridiculed by such well-known public figures as Walter Scott and Humphry Davy. Nevertheless, hard-headed businessmen began to feel that there might be money in gas. An important consideration was that Winsor had recognized that the future of gas lay not in local generation but in central generation, and in distribution to a large number of customers through a network of mains and pipes.

In the same year a group of influential backers, led by James Ludovic Grant, met at the Crown and Anchor in the Strand to try to launch some sort of public venture. At that time any company raising capital by selling shares was deemed a partnership: if it failed, all its members were held personally liable for losses. It was therefore decided to seek a charter by act of Parliament. An initial application in 1809 seeking to raise £1 million failed, largely through opposition by rivals such as Murdock and the younger James Watt. However, a more modest application for £200,000 was successful in 1810, though stringent conditions were attached. By 1810 these had been fulfilled and on 9 June the Gas Light and Coke Company-commonly known as the chartered company-was formally established, with Grant as its first governor.

Source: Trevor I. Williams, 'Winsor, Frederick Albert (1763-1830)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004

Winifred House Invalid Children's Nursing Home was founded in 1890 at Wray Crescent, Tollington Park, London. It had 20 beds for invalid children recovering from disease after treatment in hospital or at home. It was originally known as Mrs Hampson's Memorial Home and moved to Barnet around 1937.

The London Rubber Company Limited annual report on 1967, printed in The Times newspaper of 29 August 1967, reports that: "we have converted a number of our principal off-licences to a supermarket style of operation trading as Wine Ways (Supermarkets) Ltd., with concentration on a range of nationally advertised wines, spirits and beers offered at reduced prices". Presumably this subsidiary was later sold to the Victoria Wine Company.

A deed is any document affecting title, that is, proof of ownership, of the land in question. The land may or may not have buildings upon it. Common types of deed include conveyances, mortgages, bonds, grants of easements, wills and administrations.

Conveyances are transfers of land from one party to another, usually for money. Early forms of conveyance include feoffments, surrenders and admissions at manor courts (if the property was copyhold), final concords, common recoveries, bargains and sales and leases and releases.

Probate (also called proving a will) is the process of establishing the validity of a will, which was recorded in the grant of probate.

From the British Records Association "Guidelines 3 - Interpreting Deeds: How To Interpret Deeds - A Simple Guide And Glossary".

Winchester Brewery Co Ltd

The Winchester Brewery Company Limited operated the Winchester Brewery, founded before 1812. In 1923 the Company and its 108 licenced houses were taken over by brewers Marston, Thompson and Evershed Limited of Burton on Trent. The Brewery was closed in 1927 and used as a bottling plant until 1969.

Born, 1926; read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, -1949; took the Oxford BPhil degree; Lecturer then Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University College, Swansea, 1951-1964; Reader in Philosophy, Birkbeck College, London, 1964-1976; Professor of Philosophy, King's College London, 1976-1984; Professor of Philosophy, University of Illinois at Urbana, 1984-1997; died, 1997.

Publications: The Idea of a Social Science and its Relation to Philosophy (1958)
Ethics and Action (1975)
Trying to Make Sense (1987)

Nathaniel John Winch was born on 20 December 1768 at Hampton, Middlesex. He was apprenticed to Robert Lisle, hostman, in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1780. Winch developed an interest in the study of botany, particularly the geographical distribution of species around the Northumberland, Cumberland and Durham areas. Indeed his devotion to the subject was considered to be behind the failure of his merchant businesses in 1808 when he was declared bankrupt.

He was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society in 1803, became an honorary member of the Geological Society in 1808, and was an active member of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle. He died on 5 May 1838, leaving his manuscripts, library and herbarium to the Linnean Society. His valuable mineralogical collection was left to the Geological Society.

Wilson, Sons and Company Limited has its origins in the coal and steamship agency started in 1837 in Bahia, Brazil, by the brothers Edward and Fleetwood Pellew Wilson. This business grew rapidly throughout the South Atlantic, being concerned with coaling, stevedoring, lighterage, towage, ship repairs and general trading. A London office was established in 1845 and incorporation as a British limited company took place in 1877. The records relate to the British company and start in 1877.

Wilsons traded from 57 Gracechurch Street (1873-8); 7 Draper's Gardens, Throgmorton Avenue (1879-1901); Salisbury House, London Wall (1902-59); 5 Queen Street (1960-82); and moved to 14 King Street in 1982.

Wilsons obtained their supplies of Welsh steam coal from the Ocean group of companies and had contracts to supply the Royal Navy and many commercial steamship lines. In 1908 a new British company, Ocean Coal and Wilsons, was formed to formalise this arrangement, and acquired both Wilsons and the Ocean group. Ocean Coal and Wilsons traded from Salisbury House, London Wall, 1909-55.

All these companies traded profitably until the early 1950s, when a recession in South American trade, and the change from coal to oil bunkering, led the group to withdraw from all countries except Brazil. The head office of the group has been in Brazil since 1971.

The collection includes records of several other companies owned or taken over by Ocean Wilsons (including Ocean Coal and Wilsons Limited, British Italian Shipping and Coal Company Limited, Burnyeat, Brown and Company Limited, Glenavon Garw Collieries Limited, Peacock Iberia Coal Company Limited, Petsaly Coal Company Limited, Rio de Janeiro Lighterage Company Limited, Taff Merthyr Steam Coal Company Limited, United National Collieries Limited and Citygate Investment Company).

Born 1875; educated village school at Holme St Cuthbert, Cumberland, Agricultural College, Aspatria, West Cumberland, and Royal College of Science and King's College, University of London; Teacher at a school in Towcester, Northamptonshire, 1896-1898; Mathematics Master, Beccles College, Suffolk, and Craven College, Highgate, 1898-[1901]; taught in Berlitz School of Languages, Elberfeld, Germany, and at branches of the school in Dortmund, Münster, Barmen and Cologne, [1901-1902]; Student of Mathematics, University of Leipzig, Germany, 1902-1906; Assistant Lecturer, Wheatstone Laboratory, King's College, University of London, 1906-1920; Reader in Physics, King's College London, 1920-1921; Hildred Carlile Professor of Physics, Bedford College, University of London, 1921-1944; Fellow of the Royal Society, 1923; Fellow of King's College London; Professor Emeritus, [1944]; retired 1944; died 1965.

Publications: translated Nuclear Physics (Methuen and Co, London, 1953); A hundred years of physics (Gerald Duckworth and co, London, 1950); Theoretical Physics (Methuen and Co, London, 1931-1940); The microphysical world (Methuen and Co, London, 1951).

Born 1904; MB, BS, University of London, 1930; joined Royal Army Medical Corps (Territorial Army) Lt 1930; Capt 1935; Lt Col 1939; Head of Surgical Division, 21st General Hospital, British Expeditionary Force, Feb-May 1940; captured at Boulogne, France, 25 May 1940; transferred to Camiers, 31 May 1940; transferred to Lille, 3 Jul 1940, transferred to Enghien, 6 Oct 1940; transferred to Sondershausen, Germany, 8 Nov 1940; Senior British Medical Officer, Hildburghausen, Germany, Dec 1940-Feb 1943; transferred to Oflag IXA/H, Germany, Feb-Mar 1943; Senior British Medical Officer, Lamsdorf and Bevier (Stalag VIIIB/344), Germany, Mar 1943-Mar 1945; Senior British Medical Officer, Memmingen, (Stalag 7B), Germany, Mar-Apr 1945; liberated at Memmingen, 26 Apr 1945; Consultant Surgeon, Eastbourne Hospital, 1946-c.1970; Col 1955; died 1999.

Thomas Wilson, of the Oaks, Tenterden, Kent, was a medical student at one of the London Hospitals in the late 18th century. A note at the front of the volume states that he had two daughters who died unmarried, and a brother, Edward Wilson, DD.

William James Erasmus Wilson, generally known as Erasmus Wilson, was born in Marylebone, in 1809. He was educated at Dartford Grammar School and at Swanscombe in Kent. At the age of 16 he became a resident pupil with George Langstaff, Surgeon to the Cripplegate Dispensary, and began to attend the anatomical lectures given by John Abernethy at St Bartholomew's Hospital. In 1831 he became assistant to Jones Quain, Professor of Anatomy and Physiology at the newly formed University College, and was soon afterwards appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy. He lectured upon anatomy and physiology at Middlesex Hospital, in 1840 and became assistant editor of The Lancet. He was also Consulting Surgeon to the St Pancras Infirmary, and was elected FRS in 1845. At the Royal College of Surgeons Erasmus Wilson sat on the Council from 1870-1884, was Vice-President in 1879 and 1880, and President in 1881. In 1870, at an expense of £5,000, he founded the Chair of Dermatology, of which he was the occupant till 1878. He became particularly interested in the study of Egyptian antiquities, and in 1877 he paid the cost (about £10,000) of the transport of 'Cleopatra's Needle' to London. He was President of the Biblical Archaeological Society, served the office of Master of the Clothworkers' Company, and was President of the Medical Society of London in 1878 after he had given the Oration in 1876. He died in 1884.

Wilson was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1895. He was educated at King's College, London and Charing Cross Hospital Medical School, London where he undertook his first research at the suggestion of W.W.C. Topley. He served in the Royal Army Medical Corps during the First World War, rejoining Topley at Charing Cross in 1920 as Demonstrator in Bacteriology. He moved with Topley, first to Manchester University as Lecturer in 1923, and then to the newly established London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) as Reader in Bacteriology in 1927. In 1930 he was appointed to the Chair of Bacteriology Applied to Hygiene, a post he held until 1947.

Wilson's researches, initially with Topley, encompassed the Salmonella group of bacteria, brucellosis and tuberculosis, milk hygiene and the control of diphtheria. Topley and Wilson established courses for the Diploma of Bacteriology at both Manchester and the LSHTM, and their celebrated text book Principles of bacteriology and immunity (first published in 1929) had its origins in these courses. After Topley's death in 1944, Wilson continued to revise the publication with A. A. Miles, reaching a seventh edition in 1984. With the approach of the Second World War, Wilson was involved in the planning of the Emergency Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS) and became its Director in 1941. He continued as Director of the peacetime PHLS until his retirement in 1963, when he returned to LSHTM as Honorary Lecturer in Microbiology. Wilson died in 1987. He was elected FRS in 1978 (Buchanan Medal 1967). He was knighted in 1962.

Sir Graham Selby Wilson was born on 10 September 1895 in Newcastle upon Tyne and educated at various schools, including Mill Hill School and Epsom College, and entered King's College London, 1912. During World War One he joined the clinical school at Charing Cross Hospital, where he qualified MRCS, LRCP in 1916; later joining the Royal Army Medical Corps serving as a captain and specialist in bacteriology, until 1920. He then joined the department headed by William Whiteman Carlton Topley (1886-1944), at Charing Cross Hospital and moved to the University of Manchester in 1923.

Wilson became reader in bacteriology at the University of London, 1927 and was appointed Professor of Bacteriology as Applied to Hygiene at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 1930. Prior to World War Two, Wilson assisted Topley in creating plans for an emergency bacteriological service, to be mobilized in the event of war to control expected epidemics of infectious disease. Wilson assisted in the development of the Emergency Public Health Laboratory Service (EPHLS) and was appointed its director, 1941-1963.

Among his achievements Wilson was elected a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, 1930; fellow of the Royal Society in 1978; knighted, 1962, and received an honorary LLD from Glasgow University, 1962. He died on 5 April 1987 in the Westminster Hospital, London.

Publications include: The bacteriological grading of milk By G S Wilson and others (H M Stationery Office, London, 1935) and The hazards of immunization: based on University of London Heath Clark lectures, 1966, delivered at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (Athlone P, London, 1967).

Born 1884; educated, Clifton and Sandhurst; served in 32 Sikh Pioneers; Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (Life Member), 1907-1940; Indian Political Department, 1909; British Commissioner on the Turco-Persian Boundary Commission, 1914; political officer with Indian Expeditionary Force, Mesopotamia; Deputy Civil Commissioner, 1916; Acting Civil Commissioner and Political Resident in the Persian Gulf, 1918-1920; Anglo-Persian oil company, 1920-1932; MP, 1933; Pilot Officer in the RAF, Oct 1939; died in action, Nov 1940.

Publications:
The Persian Gulf, by Sir Arnold Talbot Wilson, (Oxford, Clarendan Press, 1928).

Ronald (Ronnie) Haig Wilson (1917-2005) was a prominent educationalist who devoted his life to the advancement of international adult education in UK and Europe.

Born 1917; studied German and French at St Andrew's University, 1935-1938; part of an exchange scholarship to Germany from 1938-1939, where he had first-hand experience of the Third Reich regime and Nazi propaganda. Joined the army after completing his MA , 1940, Royal Artillery; volunteered for the intelligence corps and was based at Fort William, where he was responsible for military security and counter intelligence. In the last months of the War he was stationed in Germany; after the war he was in a unit which gathered intelligence necessary for the aims of the occupation to be carried out and was seconded to carry out work for Education Control; discharged, 1946; worked for the 'Education Branch of the Internal Affairs and Communication Division, Control Commission for Germany (British Element)'; posted to Rhineland/Westphalia, 1947; moved to the adult education section; worked for the Education Branch (Control Commission for Germany), later the Cultural Department of the British High Commission, 1947-1958, moving to Berlin in 1950, and Bonn in 1956; part of the Cultural Relations Group, Berlin; helped found the Deutscher Volkshochschul-Verband (DVV), a German adult education association, 1953. In 1957 the British Government closed the Education branch and Wilson returned to the UK. Senior Adult Tutor at Ivanhoe Community College in Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire. 1958-1962; served on Leicestershire County Council (1958-1962); Educational Organiser (Further Education) for Huddersfield, 1962-1964; served on the Huddersfield Education Authority (1962-1964); head of Manchester's College of Adult Education, 1964-1980; retired, 1980; President of the Educational Centres Association, 1994-1996; died 2005.

Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer, commonly known as Albert Speer, was born 19 March 1905, was an architect, author and high-ranking Nazi German government official, sometimes called the first architect of the Third Reich.

Speer was Hitler's chief architect before becoming his Minister for Armaments during the war. He reformed Germany's war production to the extent that it continued to increase for over a year despite increasingly intensive Allied bombing. After the war, he was tried at Nuremberg and sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment for his role in the Third Reich. He was the only senior Nazi figure to admit guilt and express remorse. Following his release in 1966, he became an author, writing two bestselling autobiographical works, and a third about the Third Reich. His two autobiographical works, Inside the Third Reich and Spandau: the Secret Diaries detailed his often close personal relationship with German dictator Adolf Hitler, and have provided readers and historians with an unequalled personal view inside the workings of the Third Reich. Speer died of natural causes in 1981, in London, England.

The Manor of Hampstead was sold in 1707 to Sir William Langhorne of Charlton, Kent, an East India merchant. The manor passed to his nephew William Langhorne Games, with 14 remainders. On Games's death in 1732 the manor passed to the 14th tenant in tail, Margaret, widow of Joseph Maryon and a Langhorne descendant. Her son John Maryon (died 1760) left the manor to his niece Margaretta Maria Weller (died 1777) and her daughter Jane, widow of General Sir Thomas Spencer Wilson. Their son Sir Thomas Maryon Wilson (died 1821) left the manor to his son, also Sir Thomas Maryon Wilson, who died childless in 1869. The manor passed to his brother Sir John Maryon Wilson, and then to John's son Sir Spencer Maryon Wilson (died 1897), and to his son Sir Spencer Pocklington Maryon Maryon-Wilson, who died in 1944. By this time the manorial rights had lapsed. The lands were inherited by Sir Spencer's brother, Canon Sir George Percy Maryon-Wilson. In 1978 the baronetcy became extinct on the death of their cousin Sir Hubert Guy Maryon Maryon-Wilson, and the estate passed to Sir Spencer's grandson Shane Hugh Maryon Gough.

From: 'Hampstead: Manor and Other Estates', A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 9: Hampstead, Paddington (1989), pp. 91-111 (available online).

The Manor of Charlton was sold to the Langhorne family some time after 1659. It subsequently followed the same succession as the Manor of Hampstead, belonging to the Games family, then the Maryons and Maryon-Wilsons.

From: 'Blackheath and Charlton', Old and New London: Volume 6 (1878), pp. 224-236 (available online).

The Fitzjohns Estate in Essex was sold by Sir Spencer Maryon-Wilson in 1900.

Born 1884; Confidential Liaison Officer, B B Chemical Co Ltd (Bostick), Leicester, 1940-1945, coordinating efforts of BB Chemical, the Ministries, the Armed Forces and various industrial organisations to develop waterproofing for armoured vehicles, particularly in preparation for D Day; died 1973.

Wilson , Joseph

The London Schools Swimming Association was created in 1893 and promotes aquatic sports for all primary and secondary schools in the thirty two boroughs of London and the City of London.

John Whitridge Wilson was born 21 Jan 1905; educated at Manchester Grammar School and Dulwich College; read Natural Science at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge; joined staff of Repton School; left to study piano and organ at Royal College of Music; appointed Assistant Director of Music, Tonbridge School, 1929; appointed Assistant Director of Music, Charterhouse, 1932, and Director, 1947-1965; taught keyboard and score reading, RCM, 1962-1980; resumed Sixth Form teaching, Charterhouse, 1980; died 16 Jul 1992. Hymns for Church and School was published by Novello & Co in 1964. It was the retitled fourth edition of the Public School Hymn Book (PSHB), first published by Novello in 1903. Each edition was edited by a committee of the Headmasters' Conference, established in 1869, and including heads of all the major public schools and others eligible for representation. The 1903 publication comprised some 349 hymns and included hymns by contemporary schoolmaster-composers. A Companion to the Public School Hymn Book by Dr W M Furneaux, Dean of Winchester, was published in 1904, giving biographical details of the authors and indicating the sources of the hymns. A second edition of PSHB appeared in 1919. The volume had increased to 426 hymns and many of those which had appeared in 1903 were excised. Work on a third edition started in 1937 but was interrupted by the war, and it was not published until 1949. Craig Sellar Lang and Ralph Vaughan Williams had collaborated on editing this edition, and which had a supplementary revision in 1958. Some 100 hymns of the 1919 edition were rejected, and 250 new hymns added in their place, to give some 554 hymns and 484 tunes grouped according to seasons and purposes. In 1960, following publication of an article by John Wilson on the 1949 edition in The Hymn Society Bulletin, it was decided to appoint Wilson as Organising Secretary of a Committee of the Headmasters' Conference responsible for publishing a new edition. This contained 346 hymns (with 20 new additions) and 389 tunes, including 23 newly written by among others Sir William Harris, Herbert Howells and John Gardner. The Methodist Hymns and Songs was edited by Wilson and published by the Methodist Publishing House in 1969, as a popular supplement to the 1933 Methodist Hymn Book.

Born, Cairo, 1875; educated at St Paul's School; studied civil and mechanical engineering, Central Technical College, 1893-1896; joined the firm of Sir John Fowler and Sir Benjamin Baker, 1897-[1914]; worked on the Aswan dam, Egypt; partner in the practice of Booth, Wilson and Pettit, [1918]-1932, mainly in the field of bridge construction and structural steelwork; independent practice, 1932; honorary consulting engineer, Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings; President, Section G (Engineering), British Association, 1935; died, 1955.

James Wilson was born, 1765; surgeon and from 1799 teacher of anatomy at the Hunterian School of Medicine in Great Windmill Street, London; father of James Arthur Wilson; died, 1821.

James Arthur Wilson was born, 1795; educated: Westminster School, 1808; Christ Church, Oxford, 1812-1815; entered his father's school in Great Windmill Street; studied at Edinburgh, 1817; MA at Oxford, 1818; MB, 1819; MD, 1823. Travelled through France and Switzerland to Italy as Physician to George John Spencer, second Earl Spencer, and his wife, 1819-1820; Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, 1825; practised in London and was Physician to the Lisson Grove establishment, 1829; Censor of the Royal College of Physicians, 1828 and 1851; Physician to St George's Hospital, 1829-1857; consulting physician to St George's Hospital, 1857-; left London for Dorking, 1869; died, 1882.

Henry Leonard Wilson was born at Sheffield on 17 May 1897, the only child of Cecil Henry Wilson, Labour MP, JP, and gold and silver refiner of Sheffield. The family was Congregationalist, and Wilson was sent to a Quaker school at Stramongate, Kendal. He left school in 1914 to work in a bank and train for the family business. However, conscription began and, as a conscientious objector, he joined the Friends' Ambulance Unit. At the end of the War he entered Emmanuel College, Cambridge, to study medicine. It was whilst a student that he became a member of the Society of Friends. During his studies at Cambridge and St Bartholomew's Hospital (St Barts), where he was house physician, he won several prizes. He qualified with the conjoint diploma in 1925. Also in 1925 he became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, and a licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians.

After graduating MB BChir in 1927, he became clinical assistant at the Bethlem Royal Hospital, and registrar and resident medical officer at Maida Vale Hospital. From 1929-31 he was senior assistant physician at the Retreat in York. In 1931 he returned to London and became medical superintendent at Bowden House, Harrow, under the psychologist Hugh Crichton-Miller, and physician to the Institute of Medical Psychology. In 1932 he graduated MD, and in the following year was appointed clinical assistant in psychological medicine at St Barts.

In 1936 Wilson joined the Department of Neurology at the London Hospital, as clinical assistant to the neurologists George Riddoch and Walter Russell Brain. During the Blitz of the Second World War, 1940, he displayed `highly original qualities' establishing a service for psychiatric casualties at the Hospital (Munk's Roll, 1982, p.468). He was a pioneer in the field of psychiatry, and his strength lay in his clinical skills. Wilson was instrumental in forming the Department of Neurology and Psychiatry in 1942, and joined the consulting staff as physician. He held this position for twenty years, inaugurating a modern psychiatric service at the Hospital. In 1943 Wilson became a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians.

Wilson made many contributions to medical journals including The Lancet, the British Medical Journal, The Practitioner, the London Hospital Gazette, and various specialised psychiatric journals. He was said to be `expert in the psychiatric analysis of historical and literary characters' (ibid).

Wilson had been a member of the Medical Art Society since its early years, and was an accomplished water-colourist. In 1947 he became the Society's honorary secretary, and in 1951 its vice-president, serving in this office until his death. Wilson was an examiner for the Royal College of Physicians for 1951-55, and 1959-62. In 1952 he was vice-president of the Section of Psychiatry at the Annual Meeting of the British Medical Association.

In 1961, on Brain's retirement, Wilson became head of the Department of Neurology and Psychiatry. He retired from the London Hospital in 1962, and moved from London to Cambridge. He was president of the Section of Psychiatry of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1962-63.

He had married in 1927 Ruth Taylor of Letchworth, with whom he had two sons and one daughter. He suffered much ill health throughout his life, for prolonged periods in later years. Wilson died in the London Hospital on 8 April 1968, at the age of 70.

Henry Joseph Wilson (1833-1914) was born on the 14 Apr 1833 in Nottingham. One of the 7 children of William Wilson, cotton spinner, and Eliza Read of Sheffield. His parents were non-conformist radicals and his father was the Chair of the Nottingham Anti-Slavery committee. Wilson was sent to London University College to study in 1850, but returned home the following year when his mother died. After this, he was sent to work on a farm in Gloucestershire and then to his father's own farm in Mansfield in 1853 where he remained until his father's death in 1866. There he was deeply involved in non-conformist religion, the temperance movement and he was instrumental in the foundation of the Mansfield Co-operative Society of which he was the first president. It was in the 1860s the three Contagious Diseases (or CD) Acts were passed in an effort to regulate prostitution and the spread of venereal disease. Wilson was one of the many that opposed the Acts on the grounds that it would establish the state regulation of vice. He and his wife Charlotte [nee Cowan], whom he had married in 1859, began their careers of public speaking and political activism. In 1871, they attended a meeting of the Royal Commission on the implementation of the CD Acts in Sheffield that was also attended and addressed by Josephine Butler. When the latter perceived in 1872 that it would be impossible to run the whole anti-CD Acts campaign from London, Wilson became one of those who were to be central to the formation of the Northern Counties Electoral League for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts (known as the Northern Counties League). Branches of the National Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts had already been set up in the north east but it was felt that a strong central body was necessary. Edward Backhouse was the first Chair with Joseph Edmonson as the Treasurer and Wilson as the secretary. Their aim was to make known in their area the 'atrocious character' of the Acts and to raise the issue of them at elections. The group immediately began to send out petition forms and circulars were distributed to churches and chapels throughout the region. It was with their support that Josephine Butler came to Pontefract to address the crowds at the by-election and was caught up in the chaos that ensued. In 1877 it was decided to broaden the objects of the League and to reflect this change its name was officially changed to the 'Northern Counties League for Abolishing State Regulation of Vice and for Prompting Social Purity and the Rescue of the Fallen'. Wilson remained an integral part of the organisation, despite his growing number of commitments. He was present at a conference on the state regulation of vice which was held in Liverpool in 1875 and it was there that the British, Continental and General Federation for the Abolition of Government Regulation of Prostitution was established. Wilson became joint secretary along with Butler. However, the CD Acts did not solely occupy his attention. Since 1872 he had been the Chair of the Sheffield Reform Association, which had merged with the Sheffield Liberal Association two years later and in which Wilson remained the honorary secretary. In 1876 he was elected to the Sheffield School Board and in 1885 he was elected a Liberal MP for the constituency of Holmfirth in West Riding. He had been a fervent supporter of Home Rule for Ireland since the beginning of the 1880s and retained this position in the House of Commons. In 1892 he was selected to be a member of the Police and Sanitary Committee and then of the Royal Commission on Opium Traffic three years later, a position which involved him travelling to India in 1893-4. Despite the repeal of the CD Acts on British soil in 1886, they effectively remained in force in India through the Cantonments Act and the Contagious Diseases (India) Act and there were threats to re-introduce them in areas such as Guernsey after an increase in venereal disease in the 1890s. Consequently, his work in this area continued through the last decade of the nineteenth century. Despite his unpopular opposition to the Boer War, he remained an MP until his retirement in 1912. He died in 1914.

Henry Wilson was born in Liverpool in 1864. He studied Art at Westminster School and the Royal College of Art and at various times he assisted John Oldrid Scott, John Belcher and John D Sedding, whom he succeeded in 1891. From 1895 on, he devoted himself to visionary church decoration schemes, metalwork, jewellery, lecturing and writing. He was associated with the circle of William Richard Lethaby in the Liverpool Cathedral Scheme of 1902. Wilson was both Master of the Art Workers Guild and President of the Arts and Crafts Society. He was a brilliant church interior designer who worked in a variety of styles.

Helen Mary Wilson (1864-1951) was born in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire. She was the daughter of Henry J Wilson (1833-1914), MP for Holmfirth, and Charlotte Cowan. Helen was educated at Sheffield High School for Girls, Bedford College London and the London School of Medicine for Women. She became House Surgeon to the London Temperance Hospital in 1892 and then entered private practice in Sheffield where she worked from 1893-1906. In addition to her medical career, Helen Wilson carried on her father's campaigning work against the state regulation of prostitution and was Honorary Secretary and President of the Association for Moral and Social Hygiene. Her other voluntary activities included settlement and probation work and serving as a JP. In addition, Helen Wilson was President of the Sheffield Women's Suffrage Society, which was a branch of the North of England Suffrage Society. She died in 1951.

Born 1883; Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, 1914-1963; qualified as a surveyor, 1911; Second in Command of the Boundary Commission set up by the Bolivian Government to establish the boundary between Bolivia, Peru and Brazil, 1912; took command of the Commission, 1914; government service in Tanzania, 1920; government service in Uganda, his surveys included the Western Ugandan Railway and the Wilson Dam; died 1963.

Born 1863; entered King's College London as a Demonstrator in the Electrical Engineering Department, 1890; Assistant Professor, 1897-1898, and Professor of Electrical Engineering, King's College London, 1898-1911; William Siemens Professor of Electrical Engineering, King's College London, 1911-1930; resigned 1930; Emeritus Professor of Electrical Engineering, King's College London, 1930-1932; died 1932.

Publications: Electrical traction (1897).

Douglas Wilson, of Bearsden, Glasgow, studied medicine at Glasgow University, finishing MB ChB in 1911. In this year he also registered with the General Medical Council. While living in Glasgow, Wilson was Honorary Surgeon at the Surgical Wards and Throat and Nose Department at the West Infirmary, Glasgow; Honorary Surgeon of the Gynaecological Wards at the Royal Infirmary, Glasgow; and Honorary Surgeon of the Indoor Department at the Glasgow Royal Maternity and Women's Hospital. At some point before 1921 Wilson relocated to Wanganui, New Zealand, where he worked in Wanganui Hospital.

Born in Glencorse, Midlothian, Scotland; educated at Greenheyes Collegiate School, Manchester; BSc, Owens College Manchester; MA Cantab; BSc. Vict; Fellow, Sidney Sussex College, 1900; University Reader in Electric Meteorology, Cambridge; Jacksonian Professor of Natural Philosophy, Cambridge, 1925-1934; elected FRS, 1900; Vice President of the Royal Society, 1928-1929; received Hughes Medal, 1911; Royal Medal, 1922; Copley Medal, 1935; Nobel Prize (Chemistry), 1927.

Charles McMoran Wilson, Lord Moran of Manton (1882-1977) had a long and active life. He was a prominent figure in the medical world, firstly as Dean of St Mary's Hospital Medical School (1920-1945), when he was responsible for rebuilding the premises and promoting the school as an undergraduate honours school. During this period he contributed to the debate on medical education, notably in his article `The Student in Irons', published in the BMJ in March 1932. He was elected president of the Royal College of Physicians (RCP), London, in April 1941, narrowly defeating the traditionalist Lord Horder, and was re-elected annually until he stepped down in favour of Russell Brain in 1950. He promoted the influence of the RCP as an independent voice for the consultants in the negotiations over the introduction of the National Health Service. He was created a baron in the New Year honours of 1943 and made his maiden speech in June of that year in the debate on the Beveridge report. He spoke powerfully in many of the debates on the NHS and was also a member of the second Spens Committee, which devised the merit awards system for consultants. He was the first chairman of the Awards Committee from 1949 to 1962 and with his vice-chairman, Sir Horace Hamilton, travelled extensively every year, working on the detail of individual recommendations for awards.

In addition to his role in medical politics he published two influential books. The Anatomy of Courage, published in February 1945, a study of the psychological effects of war, was a result of his experiences as a medical officer in the First World War and his work on shell-shock at a stationary hospital in Boulogne and later in Cambridge, where he met his wife, Dorothy Dufton. Throughout the 1930s he lectured to army colleges on morale in war and eventually brought all these thoughts together in the course of the Second World War, when he was travelling with Winston Churchill as his doctor. It is probably as Winston Churchill's doctor, that Lord Moran is best remembered and his second book Winston Churchill: Struggle for Survival, published fifteen months after his famous patient's death, was the subject of much controversy about the ethics of a doctor publishing information about a patient.

For further biographical information see Churchill's Doctor : A Biography of Lord Moran, by Richard Lovell (London: Royal Society of Medicine, 1992).