Perim Island
The Morris Family on Perim part 2
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One is assuming that Alfred went out to Perim in the autumn of 1883 when the PCC was being set up. The only families there in 1885 were those of the manager and the blacksmith. Alfred would have had occasional periodic leave to the UK but at some stage it appears that he deserted his wife (that is according to her entry in the 1891 census). Whatever the circumstances and the legality of the separation by around 1889 he had remarried, his second wife being a soldier’s widow, Sarah Bailey. Given the absence of any record of her in the UK it is possible that she was living in Aden when she met and married Alfred. There is some doubt about where their first son was born; although he was christened Edward Perim is appears he was not born there. Family lore has it that he was born at sea on the way to Perim.
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The year is 1890 (or possibly 1889) and at that date no European children are known to have been born on Perim. Assuming family lore to be correct, he was nevertheless christened Edward Perim Morris. It is not known when Edward was sent to live with his grandfather John Thomas Morris in Bristol but given the custom of the time it was probably prior to the birth of his sister in 1895. (One red herring in our research is that in the 1901 census both Edward and his sister – who are living with their grandfather Thomas - are recorded as having been born in Somerset.)
Daisy Perim Morris when aged around 19
Edward Perim Morris, early 1914, newly appointed as 3rd Engineer of the SS Iddesleigh
But Daisy Perim Morris was definitely born on Perim as shortly after her birth her father asked the Assistant Resident if he could baptise Daisy. Lieutenant Sangster could not do this himself and instead arrangements were made for the chaplain at Steamer Point to travel on the next station steamer going to Perim to conduct the service of baptism.
It is not clear when Daisy came home to stay with her grandfather, but it is likely to have been by 1899 when her sister Phyllis Victoria was born in Bristol. No one has found any mention of either Phyllis or her mother in the 1901 census and the inference must be that they both went out to Perim before then. As has been mentioned, both Daisy and Edward were staying with their grandfather at the time of the 1901 census. It is not known if Daisy ever returned to Perim between 1901 and 1911 because, as we come to next, her brother Edward was there for half this period.
Returning to Edward, having finished his schooling in Bristol when he was 15 or 16, he then began a 5-year apprenticeship as a fitter for the PCC, quite possibly – at least initially – lodging with his father. This apprenticeship ran from 6th December 1905 to 6th December 1910 when Edward returned to the UK on leave. Edward is the ‘E P Morris’ fielding on the leg side in the 1908 photograph illustrated in the book ‘The Postal History of British Aden’ published in 1985. Edward is almost certainly in all three team photographs which were taken in the period 1908-1910. My guess is that his father is the umpire in one of the photographs.
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This more or less completes the jig-saw puzzle with those pieces that have been found so far. Some yet to be found would tell us if any other members of the Morris family were employed by the PCC on Perim between 1911 and 1936? Favourites are Alfred Henry and William J. Incidentally in 1903 this Alfred had married Alice Bailey, the daughter of the Sarah Bailey who became Alfred Redman’s second wife. In the 1901 census Alice, aged 19, had also been living with her step-grandfather John Thomas. Perhaps Alice lived on Perim for a while after she was married?
The final piece of the jig-saw in my possession, which has yet to be placed, is the Mr Morris who died of a heart attack whilst working for the PCC on Perim in 1931. He could be a complete red herring and be unrelated to any Morris mentioned so far. But with even in 1930 there being no more than about 25 Europeans working for the PCC, the odds are stacked in favour of it being one of those mentioned in this article, or a close relation. It could conceivably be W A R Morris, who would have then been about 63 – a bit old in that era to still be employed in the tropics. As far as one can see , there is no sign of his having died in the UK.
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To conclude, two members of the family, Daisy Perim and her 1st cousin Ronald William, were born on the island and they may well have been the only two British subjects to have been born there – certainly one would not need more than the fingers of one hand to count the total number.
Where might some of the missing pieces of the jig-saw come from? One so far untapped possible source of information is archival material in the public record office in Liverpool, where the head office of the Perim Coal Company was located. [Since reading the first draft of this article, one of the three ladies I mentioned in the introduction decided to contact the record office and it seems that there is nothing there that can fill any of the gaps.] Another might be from other descendants of the Morris family on Perim who might read this article! Postcript 31 July 2011. Since writing the original article a grandson of Edward Perim Morris has also come up with some very interesting information, providing some of the missing pieces of the ‘jigsaw’. These have been incorporated into a rewrite of relevant passages. Who will be next?!
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Morris Family Update December 2011
Since I wrote the last postscript a fifth Morris descendant has been in contact! She has been able to fill in many of the gaps concerning Sarah Bailey, the mother of Edward Perim and Daisy Perim Morris. Sarah Rosabel Burton had married William Bailey in Aden in 1881. Their daughter Alice Maud Bailey was born in Aden on 12th March 1882. William died in India in 1887 when it is thought he was a Warrant Officer. [My guess is that he was working in one of the logistic branches of the Indian Army and that he and his wife are quite likely to have met Alfred Morris in Aden in sometime between Alfred's arrival on Perim in June 1883 and their returning to India.]
Be that as it may, Alfred married Sarah in Bombay in 1888. Edward was born on board the ship taking Sarah from Bombay to Perim in October 1889 [just possibly 1890, but this has now been more or less discounted.]. Of considerable interest is that Alice Bailey also travelled with her mother and it seems that she remained on Perim until Sarah travelled with Edward and Daisy to England in early 1898. [It is possible that Edward had returned to England two or three years earlier to go to school. Unfortunately there is no sign of Sarah and her family in incoming passenger lists for that period.] What we do fortunately have is a family photograph taken in England in March 1898. Sarah is the lady on the left, with Daisy next to her; Edward is on the stool and the middle girl of the three in dark dresses is Alice Maud. The other two are also Morrises.
As soon as she was 21 Alice Maud was free to marry her step-father's son Alfred Henry Morris, the family having opposed the wedding. Family lore has it that Alice never went back to Perim and that her husband didn't either, and in fact never went there. I am not convinced that this last is true as there is still one Morris who was on Perim unaccounted for and Alfred Henry is the only known candidate. It is also possible that he was on Perim at same time as Alice when she was an impressionable young teenager aged 14 or 15 – the same age her mother had been when she had married William Bailey!