arthur duncan mallandaine + helen harding
Arthur was born on 16 July 1880 at the family home on Brown Street in Salisbury, the youngest son of Henry Hawkes Mallandaine and Lucy Ann New. Arthur spent his first 10 years in Salisbury and even sang in the boys choir at Salisbury Cathedral but in 1891, his father was transferred to Wolverhampton and a few years later to Leeds.
Both Arthur and his older brother, Francis, were enrolled in the Leeds Grammar School where Arthur was active in sports and played on the school cricket team. When his father retired from the Inland revenue, Arthur and his family moved back to Salisbury. In 1898, Arthur began an apprenticeship with his future father-in-law, Michael Harding, at his firm John Harding & Son Architects and Surveyors in Salisbury. Arthur appears in the 1901 Census with his family living in the White House in Laverstock, a small village outside Salisbury and his occupation was listed as Articled Pupil to Architect. It seems that Arthur followed his parents to Chandler’s Ford when they moved several years later as the Leeds Grammar School Admission Books note that Arthur was working for a firm called Leman & Bayard in Southampton and living at Fairlawn in Chandler’s Ford near Southampton in 1906.
The following summer Arthur’s father died and this may have been a catalyst for his decision to join the royal Irish Constabulary. For whatever reason, Arthur did not settle in Ireland, his resignation was accepted and he was discharged on 9 August 1907. He returned to England but only briefly as like many other adventurous young English men, Arthur was taken in by the newspaper advertisements offering free land for settlers in Western Canada.
He planned to stake his claim to a free homestead of 160 acres near Edmonton and when he was settled, his fiancé, Nellie Harding, would join him and they would start a new life together. Arthur left the south coast and travelled by train to the port of Liverpool where he board the Corsican on 14 May 1908. He arrived in Montreal on 23 May and travelled across Canada by train to Edmonton before making the final 70 mile journey to his homestead by foot, horse and cart. In order to prove the homestead, Arthur had to build a house and clear 30 acres of woodland for crops within three years. He quickly began working to meet these requirements but he had to return to Edmonton for medical treatment on an abscessed ear and never returned to the homestead.
He got a job at the Edmonton Penitentiary and built a small house on 93rd Street. Now settled in Edmonton, he sent word to Nellie and she sailed to Canada with a friend in 1910 before making the same long journey across Canada by train. Arthur and Nellie married in Edmonton on 2 July 1910 and their first daughter Margaret Helen, known as Peggy, was born in the family home on 93rd Street on 9 April 1911.
When the First World War broke out, Arthur considered joining the army but Nellie was not happy with the thought of him leaving and he chose to stay home and support his young family. The next few years were difficult for the family as money was in short supply but Arthur planted a large garden that provided vegetables for the family and he also raised hens for eggs and meat.
Elizabeth Norah was born at the family home on 24 November 1917. After Norah’s birth, Arthur built an addition on to the small house to accommodate the growing family but they were unable to keep up with the house payments and in 1918, they left the house and moved into a rented home. With the help of a friend from his homesteading days, Arthur was able to get a job with the Canadian Bank of Commerce. They eventually moved into the Mission House which was the residence for the Anglican priests who served the rural parishes surrounding Edmonton. Nellie did all the cooking and cleaning when the priests were in residence and Arthur helped with the general maintenance. Their son Arthur John, known as John, was born at the Mission House on 4 August 1921.
Arthur was an active member of the Anglican Church where he sang bass in the church choir at St Stephen’s and All Saints, organized annual Punch and Judy shows and took part in plays — he even volunteered little Peggy whenever a child actor was required.
By 1929, the family’s financial situation had improved and they saved enough money to buy a small house in the Forest Heights neighbourhood of Edmonton. They paid $1200 for the house that had a well and an outhouse but no running water. Nellie worked hard to clean the house so it was in a fit state for her family and Arthur put his carpentry skills to use repairing and painting.
After 25 years in Canada, Nellie returned home to England to visit her family and friends. In 1935, she set off by train for Montreal with her fourteen year old son John and they sailed on board the Antonia to the port of Liverpool; the passenger manifest listed their intended address as East End, Shady Bower, Salisbury. They visited relatives from both the Harding and Mallandaine families and young John had fond memories of the visit with his uncle, Jack Mallandaine, and kept his gift of a small sword for many years afterward.
After three months in England, Nellie and John returned to Canada; they set sail from Southampton on board the Ausonia on 19 October and arrived in Montreal 8 days later. After their return, John started junior high school several months late, Norah went back to high school and Peggy left to teach but not long after, Arthurrs health deteriorated and he was diagnosed with cancer. The limited medical treatments available were not successful and Arthur died on 23 April 1938, aged only 57 years, and was buried at the Edmonton Cemetery three days later.
After completing a Bachelor of Arts at the University of Edmonton, Peggy worked as a teacher in one room schoolhouses in rural Alberta including the Prestville, North Cherhill and Perryvale. She married John Brown in Edmonton on 8 October 1941 and they had one daughter. John had emigrated to Canada from Northern Ireland with his parents and farmed a homestead northeast of Cherhill.
Norah trained as a nurse and when World War II broke out, she joined the royal Canadian Army Medical Corps as a Nursing Sister and served at the North Camp Allied Hospital near Farnborough. While serving at North Camp, Norah met Douglas Noiles, Lieutenant in the North Nova Scotia Highlanders, who had been critically injured in the allied advance from Caen to Falaise. They married at Queen’s College Chapel in Kingston, Ontario on 15 May 1948 and went on to have four children.
John had a lifelong love of flying and flew his first solo flight in Edmonton in a Gypsy Moth on 14th September 1939. He joined the royal Canadian Air Force as an aircrewman but soon after he successfully applied for flight school and was posted to Borden, Ontario in September 1941. One year later, he received his RCAF wings and was posted overseas to Bournemouth on the south coast of England. He flew numerous missions including the last operational flight of the war following the German surrender of the Channel Islands. After the war, he returned to Edmonton and apprenticed as an electrician with Stanley Electric for ten years. On 20 October 1950, John married Margot Young, a widow with two young daughters and three years later, they settled in a new house on 132nd Street. John and Margot had two children of their own, a son and a daughter.
Nellie stayed in the house in Forest Heights for several years before moving to a new house on 123rd Street in Edmonton. She died on 14 February 1973 and was buried next to her husband Arthur at the Edmonton Cemetery.
After retiring from farming, Peggy and John travelled extensively and after John’s death in 1974, Peggy continued to travel the world — her favourite mode of travel was by freighter. In 2003, when her travelling days were done, she moved to Guelph, Ontario to live with her daughter. Peggy died in Guelph on 3 June 2004.
Norah and Doug lived in Jamaica for several years before returning to Canada and settling in Pointe Claire, a suburb of Montreal for 25 years. Doug worked as a Chartered Accountant at Alcan for many years and after he retired in 1981, they moved to Brampton, Ontario. Norah died in Brampton on 21 September 2005 and Doug died there three years later.
John continued to fly recreationally on weekend but he eventually gave up his job at Stanley Electric and started working as a bush pilot for the Swanson Lumber Company. In 1970, he started working as an Aviation Safety Investigator with the federal Department of Transport and travelled all over Alberta, the Yukon, and the North West Territories investigating aircraft accidents. His wife Margot died suddenly from a massive aneurysm on 28 February 1984 and three years later, John retired and married a second time. They retired to Bowser on Vancouver Island and lived there for many years before moving to Nelson to be closer to family. John died in Nelson on 22 November 2011.