George Dobbs

George was the eldest son of Samuel and Mary Dobbs (née Brown).

Samuel was born in Sheffield and Mary in Selston; they were married at Selston St Helen's on 26 March 1894. Samuel was a miner and Mary of no occupation; both lived in Selston.

The couple had 12 children, one of whom died in infancy: Lucy b. 1894, George b. 1896, Elizabeth b. 1899, Hilda Mary (birth reg. 1901 JFM), Ethel (b. Dec. 1902, reg. 1903 JFM), Annie (b. 1904), Arthur (b. 1906), Mabel (b. 1909 d. 1909), Eliza (b. Jan 1911), Frederick (b. 1913) and twins Elsie and Flora (b. Jan 1915). Eliza, Elsie and Flora were baptised at Alfreton Primitive Methodist Circuit in June 1911 and September 1916 respectively. Samuel and Mary were living in Lower Mexbro, Selston, when Eliza was baptised and on Mansfield Road, Selston, when the twins were baptised in 1916.

Samuel, a coal miner/hewer (underground), his wife and their four children, Lucy, George, Elizabeth and Hilda, were living at Alma, Selston, in 1901.

At the time of the 1911 Census the family was living on Mansfield Road, Selston: Samuel, Mary and seven of their eight surviving children: George, a pony driver underground, Elizabeth, Hilda, Ethel, Annie, Arthur and Eliza. Their daughter Mabel, born in 1909, had died at a month old. The eldest child, Lucy, whose occupation was given as 'service', was included on the census but her name then deleted so she was probably a domestic servant who 'lived in'.

Eliza was baptised later that year and her parents' address was given as Lower Mexbro, Selston. However, Samuel and Mary were again living on Mansfield Road in 1916 when the twins were baptised, and still at Mansfield Road at the time of the 1921 Census with Arthur, Ethel, Annie and the four youngest children, Eliza, Frederick, Elsie and Flora. Samuel was now employed as a coal miner/stallman with the Pinxton Colliery Company and his son Arthur was employed as a ganger with the same company although the census was noted 'out of work'. Ethel worked for the Co-op Society in Selston as an assistant (grocery) and her sister Annie was an assistant (grocer/greengrocery) working for James Hooley, Selston.

Samuel and Mary were living at Lilly Villas, Selston, in 1939 when the England & Wales Register was compiled. Only two of their children were still living at home, Eliza a hosiery mender and Frederick who was described as an invalid. Also in the household was John Wesson (b. 1932) who was probably the son of their married daughter Lucy (m. 1920 Frederick Wesson, res. Nottingham in 1939). Three other children, Ethel, Elsie and Flora, have been identified on the 1939 Register: Ethel had married Caleb Coles, a coal miner/hewer, in 1923 and was also living on Mansfield Road, Selston, while Elsie was an assistant nurse at the Isolation Hospital, Basford Sanitorium, and Flora a domestic servant at the Cedars Hospital, Mansfield Road, Nottingham.

Mary Dobbs died in 1943 and her husband Samuel in 1950.