Jane Maynard of Grahamstown – a soldier’s wife

Does anyone know Jane Maynard of Grahamstown?

This is a story from the 1880’s: it began when I bought the reference book of John William Maynard.

He had signed up to join the British army in Chatham in Kent and went on to serve around the world, He finally was sent to Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape, where he seems to have met Jane, whom he married in January 1898 in Aldershot on his return to England.

Thanks to Lynn MacCloed for sharing this information about John.

He was registered in the church of St Mary Magdalene, as having been born on 09 Nov 1868. His mother was Margaret and his father, John, was a Cabinet Maker. They lived at 14 Warwick Street, Woolwich.

It is possible that John was the grandson of George Maynard, an Engineer with the Royal Navy, who died on 17 October 1853, and is buried in Woolwich churchyard.

Warwich Street

We know more about Warwick Street from this survey from the The Bartlett School of Planning.

This states that: ” Warwick Street (given the preface Lord in 1939) was the first street to be laid out in Church Street’s hinterland, an early fruit of John Bowater’s building-lease Act of 1779. It was divided into parcels for speculative developers, who probably emanated from the dockyard’s workforce, and 61-year leases were granted; the freeholds fragmented in 1812.

The street’s western end was built up in the late 1780s with opposed rows, each of about twenty brick-built four-room houses, and the rest, about another thirty houses, followed, mostly in the 1790s.

From the outset there was an Earl of Warwick public house on the north side, and the street’s name may derive from the hostelry. It is an intriguing name in Woolwich, possibly, given the radicalism of dockyard artisans in the later decades of the eighteenth century, a commemoration of Robert Rich, 2^nd Earl of Warwick, the naval commander, parliamentarian and staunch ally of Cromwell’s. The Powerful and the Yorkshire Grey were other public houses, both at the street’s west end.

Much of the north side of Warwick Street was rebuilt in the 1880s. A greensward on the south side that now opens through to Lamport Close marks the site of Paradise Place, a wide court of 1799–1807 that benefited from open ground beyond.”

More information?

Does anyone have any additional information about them?

Many thanks Martin.

John William Maynard, 1st Royal Berks