History of Lorna Tremayne  and Edmund Grant

by Gwenyth C. Noble (nee Grant) -

with additions by Lorna Harris and Ed Grant's writings

made May 15, 2009 and January 22 ff, 2023 and Dec. 4, 2024

 

Lorna Anne Emily Tremayne was born on June 6, 1887. The only girl in a family of four children, her parents were Agnes Pearson Ritchie Tremayne and Francis Geddes (F. G.) Tremayne.  Canon William Ritchie and Anne Sibbald (daughter of Susan Sibbald) were her mother Agnes’s parents. Lorna’s paternal grandfather was Rev. Francis Tremayne who married Emily Jane Kelly Geddes. 

F.G. Tremayne was a pharmacist and the family lived at Dryden Bank (40 River Rd., Sutton West, Ontario).  He had stores in Sutton and Keswick, and the family spent summer time at Sibbald’s Point.  Lorna was educated in Toronto at Ryerson Technical School in sewing patterns and designing clothes.  She lived on Chicora Ave. during that time.  (Gwen lived on the same street at number 17 from 1942 to 1946).  Lorna and her brothers saw the first Eaton’s Santa Clause parade at Hogg’s Hollow about 1912. 

Her parents wanted Lorna to marry her cousin, Charles Sibbald (?), who was considerably older than she was. However, she met Edmund Grant at St. James Church in Sutton when they were both about 20 years of age.  Ed had come to the Sutton West area from Wales when he was 17 years of age (in March 1906).

 

Sutton West, Ontario: Grand Trunk RR Station 1906

Edmund Graff Nichols Grant was born April 28^th 1887 just outside Cardiff in Llantrisant Wales (at 1 Brook St.), the last of 13 children born to Duncan Joseph Grant (1835-1916), and Margaret Jones (1842-1896).  

Duncan Joseph Grant

Children of Duncan Grant and Margaret Jones c. 1888

 

Margaret Jones

Nicholls was a family name being his paternal grandmother’s surname (Caroline M. Nicholls 1796-1883, who was married to John Grant 1797 -1848). Graff or Graf was apparently the name of a family friend. It does not appear in the family tree anywhere. In a letter to Gwenyth Noble, Ed’s brother Jim said he looked high and low for a connection even to phoning all the Grafs and Graffs in the Calgary phone book at the time (c. 1977) and concluded the name was German and that was all he was able to conclude. For that matter, Edmund is not a family name in the tree  so where it came from is a bit of a mystery too, but it is a Welsh name… so maybe from the Jones family?

 Ed’s father, born in Cawdor/Nairn Scotland, had a photography shop in Builth, Wales before Ed was born.

 When he was six years old, Ed’s mother Margaret died of scarlet fever (August 1896).  His father remarried (in 1897 to Sarah Ann Davies 1861-1909). Their daughter Nona Victoria was born in 1897 and died in 1906. 

Edmund Grant as a boy in Wales, photo likely by his father

According to Gwenyth, Ed’s father  couldn’t cope and he went to live with his daughter Louise Heard.  Ed, who had been living his father and his second wife, had been sent to live with his Aunt Jessica Escott (her husband Jim was a school teacher and a rather “rough man”).  His sisters Caroline (a nurse) and Margaret (a seamstress), who were both employed, paid for his education.  He studied Greek and Latin and was headed toward an academic career. In his reminiscences for the family, Ed Grant writes, “I attended Albany Rd.. Board School and Howard Gardens Higher Grade School. I served three years with the firm of A.& Y. Taylor, Duke St., Cardiff, S. Wales and learned the photographic and picture framing business.”

 He was interested in the Church of England while in Wales and often told Gwenyth he attended that service “rather than going to chapel.”

 When he emigrated to Canada, he made the crossing by second class in March 1906 aboard The Lake Manitoba. It took 12 days. He told his daughter Gwen he had water up to his knees most of the time.  Years before, when he had told his sister Margaret about that, she was very concerned she had not paid for a first-class cabin.  There were about 100 other men in the hold; he spent most of this time on deck even though it was chilly. Lots of the passengers were sea-sick but he wasn’t. They landed at St. John, New Brunswick and he took the train to Toronto and then the Grand Trunk Train to Sutton.

The Lake Manitoba

He worked on a farmed owned by a Mr. John. Kay at the recommendation of a friend in Cardiff. It was in Virginia, south of Sutton West. He stayed there for two years then went to the Macdonald farm less than a mile from Sutton.  He was young energetic and always busy, as they worked very long days.

Ed got to know the rector of the Anglican church and was invited to sing in the choir. There he met Lorna Tremayne and they soon became “fast friends.”

 Lorna’s father, F.G. Tremayne, said Ed could marry Lorna when he had $1,000 in the bank and a down-payment on a house.  This he accomplished over three years (1910-1013) in Calgary, Alberta.  Ed had older brothers in Calgary: Jim, Alex and Donald.  They owned a photography shop.  Lorna and he were finally married on May 14, 1913 in Sutton West. at St. James Church. Her grandfather Rev. Canon Francis Tremayne officiated and her Uncle Herbert Tremayne assisted.

Wedding Day May 14, 1913

They then moved to Calgary.  Due to WWI, business was poor once men went to war, but Ed always found a job. Ed was not accepted into the armed forces because of varicose veins in his legs — these he had all of his life and were about the size of one’s thumb. 

 As there was so little business in the photo shop, Ed and Lorna decided to be homesteaders near Airdre and built their own log cabin and tilled some land with the help of Grace, their work horse.  They used wood or coal for fuel, the latter gathered from an old surface mine nearby in Davenport.  Ed had owned a Harley motorbike with a side-car, but he sold it prior to homesteading.

 

Davenport Alberta 1913: The motorbike is not in the picture!

Lorna lost her first baby in 1914. Their second, Agnes, was delivered by an RCMP officer on March 2, 1915. 

Lorna Tremayne Grant with Agnes Margaret Grant in Calgary 1915

On January 18, 1917, Francis Duncan was born. By this time, although they had some good neighbours in Airdre, they were too isolated and gave up homesteading and lived in a comfortable house in Calgary where Ed drove a milk truck.  There are pictures of the house(s) in the photo album, taken years later about 1960.  Lorna’s parents came to visit once together, and her father came at least twice. 

 

Grandpa Tremayne with Lorna Grant, Francis, Gwenyth and Agnes (Bow River, Calgary c.1920) 

Then calls for help came from Lorna’s parents.  Lorna had done all the care and housekeeping while she waited to marry Ed, and her parents were not used to being with a paid housekeeper – these latter were very poor workers.  Lorna came back twice to help when her mother was not well, bringing first one, then two children with her.  She and Ed returned for her mother’s funeral in 1917 (she is buried in Sutton).  They left all their belongings in the homestead.  Nothing was ever disturbed although travellers used the shelter, as was the custom.  The strangers always replenished the fuel and the water.

 As Lorna had stayed behind to help her father, Ed’s and her third child, Gwenyth, was born in Sutton on October 23, 1918.  Lorna and the three children could not get seats on the train due to the demobilization of the armed forces after WWI ended.  Finally, in the spring of 1919, she returned with Agnes, (four years), Frances (two years) ands Gwenyth (about six months). 

 From her husband's (Rev. Edmund Grant) reminiscences written in 1966, "The government appeared apathetic to the needs of the returning veteran. There was much unrest in various places in the country. When Mum [sic i.e., his wife Lorna] passed through Winnipeg, Hugh Lyall (cousin of Lorna) met her at the train, but things were so unsettled, that police were swarming all over the R.R, station. and no one was allowed to enter it. It was threatened to be blown up. The train did not wait long but continued its journey West."   (Winnipeg General Strike – May 15 to June 25. 1919). 

The little family departed amid huge crowds.  Agnes remembered her mother saying “You and Frances hold my skirt and I will carry the baby and the suitcase.”  The men in charge said, “Make way for the women and children,” at the top of their voices, so Agnes remembered.  Finally safe in Calgary, Gwenyth and her father met for the first time.

The fourth trip back to Ontario in 1922 proved to be a permanent move from Calgary.   By this time there were four children, Geddes Llewelyn having been born in 1920. Four trips east had taken a toll on their savings, but they did have enough wherewithal to travel first class.   I believe on this trip, they took a steamer through the Great Lakes. One of the children fell on the deck and hurt himself and Mum remembers a crew member mopping up the blood – nose bleed?

Lorna took over housekeeping for her father and she and Ed worked at his pharmacy.  Ed took training in theology from Rev. Mr. Bouskill in preparation for entering Trinity College for formal theological training at the University of Toronto.  The three older children attended school in Sutton and church at St. James. Gwenyth remembers it as a nice time.  In 1924, the school burned down. Gwenyth attended the empty ice cream parlour for classes and sat at a little iron table and chairs.  Agnes and Francis were in the church hall.

 Lorna’s brother Maurice returned from the war, went back to high school (he had gone out west at age 13 or 14 and had left school) and then undertook pharmacy studies at University of Toronto. Once he graduated, he married May Chalmers in 1925 in a quiet wedding at her grandmother’s home in Toronto. May’s husband was a miller originally from Prince Edward Island. Maurice and his new wife took over Dryden Bank, as he had been left it in his mother’s will.  He went into the business with his dad, and then took it over on his own after his father died in January 1925. Maurice and May had one son Frank and two daughters, Beth and Anne.

Lorna’s brother John attended the Engineering Faculty at University of Toronto. Another brother, Francis Ritchie Tremayne,  had died at age 16 of pernicious anemia. 

Lorna Tremayne with brothers Francis, John, and Maurice in Sutton West

Ed and Lorna moved to Toronto where they took over a large rooming house at 43 Avenue Rd. for one year.  Then they moved to 30 Tranby Ave., while Ed completed his theology degree at U. of T. (The house sold in 2007 for $850,000!)  According to his daughter Gwen, he had a splendid voice, won the music prize and also the prize for Greek studies.  (Lorna was also musical; she played the violin and later taught music to church choir members). The children attended Jesse Ketchum P.S., where Mr. Kirk was the principal. Edmund Ogilvie, the youngest child, was born in 1926. 

 Ed graduated in 1929, having been Deacon at St. John’s Garrison church in Toronto.  He also conducted some services at St. Hilda’s church in the Toronto suburb of Fairbank (now the busy corner of Eglinton and Dufferin). In addition, to supplement his income after his first year at university, he pumped gas.  In the summer months in subsequent school years, he and the family were sent to parishes in Flinton, Ontario (1927) and Parham (1928). 

 

Grant children at Westport 1929 (L to R Geddes, Gwenyth, Frances, and Agnes with Ogilvie in front)

In 1929, after he was priested by Bishop Seager, the family moved to Westport and Ed had the church there and in Bedford Mills (in the Diocese of Ontario).  The town of Westport was very pretty – about 35 miles from Kingston – on the Rideau Lake and on Sand Lake on the west end – very good for swimming.  The family had a great outdoor life, vegetable garden in the summer, some meals from parishioners in lieu of funds, as the depression was very severe. Lorna’s brother John and family came to visit, as did Maurice’s.

 (Interestingly, Gwenyth’s granddad the Rev. Francis Tremayne was at Bedford Mills years before where he worked as a bookkeeper as he was too young to be priested; he eventually owned 60 acres of land near Charleston Lake where many years later at Athens, Gwenyth’s youngest bother, Edmund Ogilvie lived.) 

 Lorna and Ed saw a lot of her brother John, his wife Isobel, and their three children: John (called Peter??), Agnes, and Bill.  Lorna had birthday parties for them, and Uncle John would bring ice cream. After a summer visit in 1928; several of the cousins went back to Toronto whereupon young John came down with polio and died. My mum recorded his date of death (Sept.2, 1930, just a couple of months before his eighth birthday) among other items on a very scribbled sheet of paper. After it she wrote POLIO. It must have been a huge shock to her as a 12-year-old and to the rest of the family. There is a possibility she came down with polio as well as Agnes. Mum remembers having to be carried up and down stairs for a few weeks as she couldn’t walk. Later in life she suffered the symptoms of post-polio syndrome.

 Uncle John was unemployed for about three years during the depression, as there were few engineering jobs.  He broke his heel bone at a job in Windsor.  However, fortunately, he continued to have sufficient funds during this time and lived with his family at 82 Walker Street in Toronto.

 In about 1932, Ed was moved to Roslin where the family stayed 11 months, then Bancroft for five years, where the older children went to continuation school by correspondence and wrote the department of education exams in Belleville.  In 1937 the family moved to Wellington, which had a high school. The bishop frequently moved Ed because he had a reputation for being able to build up parishes.  He never took a holiday.

The children all had a good education.  Agnes had her high school diploma and her ATCM accreditation form the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto.  Francis had a diploma as a wireless operator and served in the Merchant Navy in WWII, as his health would not allow him into the regular navy. Geddes took tool and die training at Harbord Collegiate in Toronto and then went into the Air Force.  Ogilvie enlisted in the Air Force in 1944.  Gwenyth became a Registered Nurse and took a post-grad in Obstetrics, as well as receiving her bachelor’s degree in nursing from the University of Toronto Faculty of Nursing, specializing in public health nursing. She worked at Prince Edward County Hospital in Picton, Ottawa Civic Hospital, Women’s College Hospital and the VON in Toronto.  Later, beginning in 1960, she worked at St. Joseph’s Hospital in London, Ontario and for the City of London department of public health.

Gwenyth recalls, “We had a great life.  We had nothing much given of a material nature, but we had caring parents and a wonderful education.”

Bancroft: the five Grant children

March 9, 1930 Westport: Gwenyth snowshoes

 Photo by Jean Prescott

Ed and Lorna lived in Wellington for 10 years and Ed spent his final years as a priest in Maitland, where he and Lorna eventually retired for 20 years to a cosy home they had built there. Their bungalow was comfortable, and Lorna loved the garden.  They enjoyed going across the border to Watertown, U.S.A. once or twice a year.  Frances and family and Agnes and family were in Ottawa, and Geddes and family were near Prescott. Gwenyth and family were in London and Ogilvie (Ed), in Toronto.

Tyn-y-Maes Maitland, Ontario

50th wedding anniversary Maitland

Their children and grandchildren visited them frequently; Edmund and Lorna also had many friends.  Lorna suffered diabetes after age 76, but it was controlled by insulin.   She lived to be 89 years of age.  

Ed suffered memory loss due to senile dementia and lived for two years at the Island Park Lodge in Ottawa.  He died at age 92.  Ed was an energetic, cheerful, unselfish kind man.  He was well liked by all his friends and congregations.  He and Lorna worked tirelessly for the church. Lorna organized concerts and pantomimes in which the children performed.