Eva Norman Graves was born in Roorkee, Bengal, India, on the 5th June 1868, the daughter of Henry William and Kathleen Sophia Graves (née Seale).
On the 28th August 1886, she married Harry Seymour Hazelgrove in Lahore, Bengal, India. He was a career army officer, seven years older than her, and on the 1st December 1888, the couple had a son – Norman Seymour Hazelgrove.
As was customary, Norman Seymour Hazelgrove was sent to be educated in England, and was a boarder at the United Services College, at Abbotsham, Devon. This college was established by a company of army officers in 1874, primarily to educate the children of British Army officers who were serving abroad, mainly India. The college closed its doors in 1903; however, the junior school remained open until 1914. One of its most famous students was Rudyard Kipling!
Harry Hazelgrove was transferred to Aden in 1902, and Eva decided to go to England, presumably to be closer to her son. She arrived in England in 1903, and was living on a generous allowance of £400 per annum, given to her by her husband.
Sometime shortly after her arrival in England, Eva began to use the forename –“Evelyn”, and on the 16th August 1904, she gave birth to an illegitimate daughter. She claimed the father of the child was a merchant, named ‘Alexander Francis’, and she named her daughter Margaret Francis.
In May 1906, Harry Hazelgrove arrived in England with the intention of reuniting with his wife, and it was only after his arrival that he learned that his wife had had another child. He began divorce proceedings, on the grounds of his wife’s adultery, which went uncontested, and was granted a divorce on the 11th January 1907. In the course of the proceedings, he revealed having received the following letter from his estranged wife: -
Dear Harry,
What I am about to say will not, I think, surprise you very much, because our married life for years past has been such that I daresay you will be glad to end it. I do not intend to return to you. I have made up my mind to spend the remainder of my life with the man whom I care for more than I do for you, and with whom I have lived since the beginning of last year. Because you and I have not been happy together, there is no reason why you should not be happy in future with more congenial companionship, and I hope that you will be.
Yours,
ENH
By the time of the divorce court ruling, Eva (or Evelyn, as she now styled herself), was residing in West Africa with Joseph Alan Dredge, usually known as ‘Alan’, a produce manager, and taking the contents of her letter to her husband into account, it would appear that she had been living with Alan Dredge since late 1905 or early 1906, and that he was the likely father of her illegitimate daughter. In fact, it was stated during the divorce proceedings that the identity of Alexander Francis was unknown, and it was believed that the name was fictitious.
In early 1908, now that she was divorced, Evelyn married Alan Dredge in St. Giles, London, England. The couple spent much of their time in West Africa, returning periodically to see Margaret Francis. On passenger manifests that survive from this period, Evelyn stated that she had been born in London, and took a number of years off her true age!
By 1911, Margaret Francis was being referred to as ‘Margaret Evelyn Dredge’, and was a boarder at St. Augustine’s School, Cliftonville, Margate, Kent. Her place of birth, according to school records, was India!
In 1910, Alan Dredge became the manager of The Belize Estate and Produce Company in British Honduras, and Evelyn accompanied him to Belize. They continued to make almost annual trips back to England to visit Margaret.
In the spring of 1915, Alan and Evelyn Dredge decided to return to England once more, and on the 23rd April, they travelled from Belize City to New Orleans, and then onto New York City, where they joined the Lusitania on the morning of 1st May, at Pier 54 on the west side of the city, with ticket number 46134, having booked their saloon passage through Busk & Daniel, of The Produce Exchange, in New York. Once on board, they were taken to saloon room B33 which was in the care of First Class Waiter James Holden who came from Liverpool and was acting as a first class bedroom steward on what became the Lusitania’s final voyage across the Atlantic.
The liner did not leave her berth until just after noon on that day, despite the fact that she was scheduled to leave at 10.00am. The delay was caused because the British Admiralty had requisitioned the Anchor Lines vessel Cameronia for service as a troop ship at the end of April and all the passengers, some of the crew and the cargo had to be transferred to the Lusitania as a result. Six days out of New York, on the afternoon of 7th May, the Cunarder was torpedoed and sunk off the southern Irish coast, by the German submarine U-20, only hours away from her Liverpool destination.
Both Evelyn and Alan Dredge were killed as a result of the sinking and as neither of their bodies was ever recovered and identified afterwards, neither has a known grave. Evelyn Dredge was 46 years of age, although on joining the liner she stated her age to be 37 years!
Waiter Holden whose job was to look after the couple in room B33 also perished in the sinking and never returned to the River Mersey.
India Select Births and Baptisms 1786 – 1947, India Select Marriages 1792 – 1948, Register of Births, Marriages and Deaths, 1911 Census of England & Wales, UK Incoming Passenger Lists 1878 – 1960, UK Outward Passenger Lists 1890 – 1960, New Orleans Passenger Lists 1813 – 1963, Cunard Records, Nottingham Evening Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, Nyle Monday, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.