GRENFELL, Julian Pascoe (d 2019)

[colinp]

From the Daily Telegraph 22 October 2019 - GRENFELL Julian Pascoe, peacefully on 16th Oct 2019 aged 83 after a long illness. Brother of Bobby (Cape Town), husband of Sylvia, cherished father of Claudia and Colin, beloved grandfather and great grandfather, uncle of six, stepfather to Simon and Sarah. Funeral service 30th October 12:40 p.m. Torquay Crematorium. No flowers please, but donations, if desired, to The Alzheimer’s Society.

Presumably a distant relative of the present Lord Grenfell (Julian Pascoe Francis St Leger Grenfell)?

[dpth...@gmail.com]

I've been trying to figure him out all day. It's an amazing coincidence that two men with the same unusual name are born within a short period of time but don't seem to be related. It's not surprising that someone named Grenfell might be named "Julian" so soon after the young poet died, but adding "Pascoe" makes it seem more than a coincidence.

[G. Willis]

I found a book by the horticulturist Diana Grenfell dedicated 'to Claudia and Colin'; her husband in all sources is Roger Grounds. I located a 1996 marriage record for Diana M. E. Grenfell and Roger R. P. Grounds (established, by reference to the Cambridge List and other sources, as 'Roger Rainford Paterson Grounds'). There was no birth record for a Diana M. E. Grenfell, but I located the 1965 marriage record of Julian P. Grenfell (evidently he of whom we treat given the children's names) and Diana M. E. Lane. I checked for the births of Grenfell children, mother Lane, but found Claudia and Colin's mother to be 'Roberts'; the marriage in 1957 of Diana M. E. Roberts and Terence F. E. Lane seems to have cleared this aspect up.

As everyone else has already no doubt checked, I could find no U.K. birth record for Julian Pascoe Grenfell, nor in 'world records' on Find my past, which usually helps in such situations. As Mr Theroff says, just 'Julian' would be unsurprising in an unrelated Grenfell; the 'Pascoe' (also Colin's middle name) is very definitely a strong hint of relationship to the Barons Grenfell. I checked branches up to the first Lord's siblings and couldn't find any likely options; the problem (if such it can be called) is that there are details of several preceding generations of Pascoe Grenfells which means there are numerous possibilities for this Julian Pascoe Grenfell being a descendant of one of these branches; I checked through several generations on thepeerage (citing BP 2003) and found nothing, which isn't conclusive by any means. Several individuals are shown as married but given no issue, allowing for the possibility that there were children- it'd probably take a great deal of research through each line to ascertain from which J. P. Grenfell originated, given what appears to be a lack of any presence in published sources or records for him.

[dpth...@gmail.com]

Here is their entry in the 1875 Burke's Landed Gentry. All the sons mentioned in it are also shown in a recent Burke's Peerage with their descendants, so it seems unlikely that there are unknown Grenfells descended from Pascoe Grenfell (1761-1837).

https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=ZNEKAAAAYAAJ&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA547

[G. Willis]

Oh well, that's fairly conclusive then- possibly a link through earlier generations? There appear to be two more Pascoe Grenfells and a John Grenfell preceding he b. 1761, and several sons for whom details are lacking. Hopefully someone will be able to root out the facts!

[Richard R]

Thanks all. Needless to say I looked at this death notice along with other postings I made early yesterday and checked many of the avenues others have checked and came up with nothing. I therefore decided not to post as could find no connection with the families of whom we treat. I reflected that sometimes people adopt names (not saying how, when or where) other than their birth names and wondered if it had happened in this case?

[G. Willis]

You're right of course, Richard- that is always a possibility. At any rate, not that on its own the information is incredibly helpful, but his birth date was 22 August 1936, based on a tribute on his son's website https://lovely.lighting/

[G. Willis]

Based on the point you raised, Richard, I've had a bit of a dig around, and find that indeed several families seem to have simply adopted 'Pascoe' and other names relating to the Lords Grenfell, presumably based on 'family tradition' that there's a common ancestor or simply for aspirational purposes. An extensively researched Grenfell family history website helpfully illustrates this.

For example, a Warwick Pascoe Grenfell (1893-1986), father of a Brian Pascoe Grenfell (b. 1923); his father was Henry Osborne Grenfell (1863-1948). The name 'Osborne' appears to be linked to the Grenfell name only by the 1834 marriage of Lord Sidney Godolphin Osborne (s. of Francis Osborne, 1st Baron Godolphin) and Emily Charlotte, dau. of Pascoe Grenfell (1761-1838), as in posts above- ancestor of the Lords Grenfell.

The ancestry of Henry Osborne Grenfell is meticulously traced back to a John 'Grenfill' who m. Margaret Bray in 1763; the tree shows no shared ancestry with the Lords Grenfell, who are similarly extensively treated on the site. The only previous member of Henry Osborne Grenfell's family to bear the name 'Osborne' was his uncle Thomas (b. 1840), and 'Pascoe' only appeared in Henry Osborne Grenfell's own children and onward, not at all before. Similarly, the children of his first cousin Horace Charles Grenfell (1876-1958) are liberally festooned with 'Pascoe' and 'Osborne'. So in this case the use of these names bears all the hallmarks of vague notions or intentions of claiming some kind of kinship, with no evidence to support this at all save that both families have Cornwall connections. Even if there were some extremely distant relationship, the grounds for claiming the use of 'Osborne' and 'Pascoe' appear nonexistent.

This at the very least serves to endorse the possibility of Julian Pascoe Grenfell having been of a similar family and not having been (at least per established pedigrees) related to the Lords Grenfell. It's perhaps worth observing- whilst noting same not to be by any means conclusive- that he doesn't appear anywhere on the site in question.

[S R Eglesfield]

A difficulty here is that, presumably for reasons of space, the Burke's Peerage article on the Grenfell family concentrates on the descendants of Pascoe Grenfell (1761-1838), who of course include the extinct Barons Desborough and St Just as well as the extant Barons Grenfell, but this Pascoe Grenfell's brothers and uncles are not named in the article, and their descendants are not shown there. However, it would appear that a relationship does exist in this instance.

When Julian Pascoe Grenfell married Diana M E Lane (registered Q1 1965 - Chelsea), his christian names were shown in two formats in the GRO index - "Julian P" and "Pascoe J". Similarly, when he married Sylvia R Wood (registered Q1 1988 - Surrey NW), his christian names were again shown as "Pascoe J". This led me to believe that his first given name might have been Pascoe, rather than Julian, despite the later ordering. It turned out that his christian name at birth had, indeed, been registered as Pascoe (Q3 1936 - Chelsea), and his mother's maiden name was shown as Plowes.

Pascoe E Grenfell married Joan Plowes (registered Q3 1929 - Kensington). As well as Julian Pascoe, they were also parents to a daughter, Barbara (birth registered Q4 1939 - Amersham) - presumably, she is the "Bobby" mentioned in her brother's death notice.

Pascoe Ernest Grenfell was born on 6 April 1904 (registered Q2 - Reading). His wife, Joan, was born on 31 October 1905 in South Africa - there is a family tree for her on geni.com at https://www.geni.com/family-tree/canvas/6000000060838046936. It appears that they emigrated, with their two children, to South Africa in 1946, although Julian obviously returned to the UK at a later date.

Pascoe Ernest Grenfell is shown on family trees posted on the ancestry.com website as either the son of Charles Spurrier Grenfell (1877-1909) or of his brother, Arthur Gordon Grenfell (1875-1923); his mother's name is in each case shown as Winifred Haskins. Family trees on the ancestry website need to be treated with caution, as some of the relationships shown there are speculative, to say the least. However, the marriage certificate of Pascoe Ernest Grenfell shows his father to have been Arthur, and this appears to be conclusive. It is also borne out by a family tree on geni.com at https://www.geni.com/family-tree/canvas/6000000040599758951.

Arthur Gordon Grenfell married Winifred Haskins in Rhodesia in April 1903. His ancestry can be found on the Grenfell family website at http://www.grenfellhistory.co.uk/familytrees/grenfell-o/up/chart-001.htm#aui74-511http://www.grenfellhistory.co.uk/familytrees/grenfell-o/up/chart-001.htm#aui74-511. On this basis, the late Julian Pascoe Grenfell was therefore a fourth cousin once removed downwards of the present Lord Grenfell through their common descent from Pascoe Grenfell (1729-1810) and Mary Tremenheere.

A further point of interest is that Winifred Haskins' sister, Lillian Sealey Haskins, married as her third husband (she was his second wife) Lieutenant Colonel Sir Francis Claude Shelmerdine CIE, OBE, FRAeS (1881-1945), who was Director General of Civil Aviation in the Air Ministry from 1934 to 1941. Their first cousin, Minnie Louise Haskins (1875-1957) was a poet and academic, best known for being quoted by King George VI in his Royal Christmas Message of 1939. Her poem is inscribed at the entrance to the George VI Memorial Chapel in St George's Chapel, Windsor, and in a window at the Queen's Chapel of the Savoy in London. It was also read at the funeral of HM Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother in 2002.

[G. Willis]

Fantastic; thank you very much for this- it's cleared the whole thing up nicely!