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LIVES OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE
The E.J. Boys Archive

Added 31st May 2012. Last amended 6.2.13. Minor edits 12.4.14.

Lieutenant Edward Lennox JERVIS — 13th Light Dragoons

Birth & early life

Born at Westminster, London, on the 12th of April 1834, the son of Sir John Jervis (Barrister-at-Law, Court of the Common Pleas, Knight Bachelor in 1846, Privy Councillor, 1850, Lord Chief Justice, 1850, and M.P. for Chester 1832-50), and his wife Catherine Jane, daughter of Thomas Muddle, Esq., of Great George Street, Westminster, London.

1841 Census

Fairhill, Shipborne, Kent.

John Jervis, 39, Barrister.

Catherine, 39.

Annie, 12; Edward, 7; Grace, 2.

Educated at Eton School. He also travelled widely on the Continent with a tutor and later as a day-pupil with a military tutor.

Service

Ensign in the 21st Fusiliers: 11th of February 1851.

Lieutenant, 21st Fusiliers: 18th of June 1852.

Lieutenant in the 13th Light Dragoons: 6th of July 1862.

Captain, 13th Light Dragoons: 8th of December 1854.

Major, 13th Light Dragoons: 21st of February 1860.

Major in the 6th Dragoon Guards: 4th of September 1860.

On to half-pay from the 26th of July 1861.

Major in the 11th Hussars: 20th of July 1866.

Resigned, by the sale of his commission, on the 24th of March 1869.

Campaign service

Captain Jervis served the Eastern campaign of 1854-55, including the reconnaissance to Silistria with Lord Cardigan, the affairs of the Bulganak, MacKenzie's Farm, battles of the Alma (horse shot), Inkerman, the Tchernya, Siege and fall of Sebastopol and was present with the Light Cavalry Brigade in Eupatoria. (Medal with four Clasps and the Turkish Medal.)

Medals

Entitled to the Crimean medal with clasps for Alma, Balaclava, Inkerman and Sebastopol and the Turkish Medal.

Commemorations

Life after service

Lived at "Fairhill", Tunbridge Wells, Kent, and said to have been a J.P. for the county (although no proof can be found of this). Also lived at 47 Eaton Square, London.

1881 Census

30 Tregunter Road, Kensington, London

The 1881 Census Return shows him as Late a Major in the Army, aged 46, born in Westminster, London, with his wife, Mary A., 40, born in Cheshunt, Herefordshire.

Two Domestic Servants are also shown.

[PB: next para needs checking and sorting.]

This knowledge makes the family set-up even more curious. Was his wife (as shown) the same lady with whom he was living in Balham a few years later? And if so, why would they both pass themselves off as "single" then? And yet she called herself his widow at his death and was later buried with him as such.

1891 Census

77, Fernlea Road, Streatham.

Mary A Makeham, single, 58, living on her own means, born Cheshunt. [Shown as head of household?]

Edward L Jervis, single, 56, Army Officer, Major in the Army retired, born Westminster.

Note: no relationship is shown between them.

Death & burial

He died on the 6th of May 1900 at 77, Fernlea Road, London, SW12 (the house no longer exists, having been destroyed in WWII) in his 67th year. He was buried in St. Nicholas's churchyard at Tooting on the 9th.

Photographs of the headstone (EJB, 1980s?)



(Click on image to enlarge)

The erected gravestone shows the inscriptions:

"Here rests EDWARD LENNOX JERVIS, Major, 13th Hussars. Born April 12th 1834 — Died May 6th 1900. Alma, Balaclava, Inkerman and Sevastopol. Into the Valley of Death rode the "Six Hundred."

Also MARY ANN JERVIS, who died April 23rd 1922, aged 89 years."

1983: The stone is now in a very poor condition.

By 1996 it had become virtually unreadable, the bottom half of the stone (and its inscriptions) being all flaked away.

He did not die on the 14th of April 1899, as stated in Burke's Peerage, neither can any trace be found there of the lady buried with him ["Mary Ann Jervis"]. Perhaps she was his wife, although Burke's also states that he was "unmarried" — but since they had the date of his death wrong, the fact of his being unmarried may have been so as well.

[PB: The next para needs sorting out...]

The mystery of Mary Ann Jervis [wife?]

The couple are connnected in their respective death certificates, his in 1900 and hers in 1922.

His shows him as a "Retired Major, 11th Lancers" [sic] who had died at the age of 66 years from "Cirrhosis of the Liver, Ascito, 14 days." [PB: "Ascito" is presumably "Ascites" — the accumulation of fluid in the peritoneal cavity that most often results from liver cirrhosis, heralding a serious deterioration]. An M.A.Jervis, Widow of Deceased [sic], was present at, and the informant of, his death.

Her certificate describes her as Mary Ann Jervis, aged 89 years, Widow [sic] of Edward Lennox Jervis, Major, 13th Hussars, the cause of death being "Syncope, Valvular Heart Disease." A Gertrude Lee is shown as being present at, and the informant of her death.

Mary Ann Jervis died at 28, Jerningham Road, New Cross, London. S.W.14, but what is confusing is that a Mary Ann "Makeham" appears in the local Directory of 1884 living at 77, Fernlea Road, Balham, and also on the list of Rate-payers and Voters in the Balham Ward for the years 1898-89 and (the latest available) 1900. Edward Lennox Jervis is not shown in any of these records.

No wills or newspaper obituary notices can be found for either, so the question arises whether the lady in question is one and the same person, as every known fact seems to suggest, and did she perhaps change her name by deed poll after his death, perhaps under the terms of an as yet unfound will?

Entries in the first available Kelly's Street Directory (1903) show a Hamilton Frederick Geary was living at 28, Jerningham Road, but from the next (1910) as Thomas Critcher Lee, until the last one (1926).

This was probably the husband of the Gertrude Lee shown as being present at her death. No mention can be found of Mary Ann Jervis/Makeham living there, or whether there was any known relationship to the Lee family.

Further information

St Nicholas, Tooting

Sale of the Fairhill Estate (1873)

Genealogy

Kinglake, Invasion of the Crimea, mentions [CHECK]

1901 Census

63, Thorne Road, Lambeth.

Gertrude St Autyer, 34 Dressmaker, born Marylebone.

cousine and boarder.

Mary A Gervis [sic?, widow, 68, born Cheshunt.

1911 Census

28, Jermingham Road, New Cross [the home of Thomas Critcher Lee and wife Gertrude, married 6 years]

Mary Ann Jervis, boarder, 78, widow, born Cheshunt.

Another boarder and a Servant are also shown.

Death registered

Mary A Jervis, 89, June Quarter 1922, Greenwich.

References & acknowledgements

Additional Census information for 1841, 1861, 1871, 1881, 1891, 1901, 1911, and details of a number of registrations of deaths kindly provided by Chris Poole.


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