Fellmonger House 1915 - 2025

Fellmonger House 1915 - 2025

Family tragedy
William Dellar's 2 eldest sons served in WWI. Both returned uninjured. That was not the case for George Dellar's eldest son. George Housden Dellar worked as a law clerk. When WWI started in 1914, he joined the St Ives volunteers. By 1915, he enrolled with the Hunts Cyclists. George married Grace Harlick in January 1916. By summer 1916, he was in France, transferred to the Bedfordshire Regiment.

George Housden Dellar, 1916.

On 3 September 1916, his battalion took part in a huge attack on Leuze Wood, part of the Battle of the Somme. The aim was to go on and capture Falfemont Farm. This was a German fortified strong point on high ground. At 6pm, the Bedfordshires attacked the south-west edge of Leuze Wood. They had to cross 1,000 yards of open ground to reach their goal. German artillery and machine gun fire caused casualties. Among these was George, wounded in the chest.

Doctors thought George's wounds were not serious. Then a wire to his parents and wife said he was in a dangerous state at a base hospital. George Snr and Grace travelled to France, where they found him much better. They returned home, expecting George to recover. He returned to England, to King Edward 7th Hospital, Windsor.

Unfortunately, his condition again deteriorated. George's faltering health was probably from repeated bouts of infection. Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928. It was the first antibiotic to combat infection. It came too late to help the injured of WWI. Geroge's father and wife again travelled to be with him. George died at King Edward 7th Hospital on 4 December 1916, aged 27yrs.

George was popular in St Ives. On the day of his funeral, businesses closed and mourners lined the streets. George got a full military funeral. During the service at the Free Church, the Rev. Hooper said 93 of their congregation had joined up. Of those, 10 died, but only 2 had received a memorial service. Many of the congregation were in tears as he read out the 10 names.

George's grave is at Broad Lees Cemetery, St Ives. Besides the St Ives War memorial, his name appears at St Ives Free Church, St Ives Literary Society and All Saints Parish Church. 

The artillery piece that killed George?
After WWI, towns and villages throughout England sought a war trophy to display. St Ives Town Council was quick off the mark, a suggestion arising in December 1918 that a request for one or two cannons ... to place in the town should go to the War Office. In June 1919, the War Office offered St Ives a German 15cm sFH13, a heavy field howitzer. It was a most important and common piece of German artillery. One of hundreds displayed around England after the Germans surrendered their weaponry. It could fire 3 shells a minute. This howitzer caused many deaths and injuries in the British trenches.

St Ives War Memorial unveiled to remember the dead, 1920.
At that time the German howitzer, a potent reminder of the War, was hidden away.

Displayed on Sheepfold, there was opposition to such a potent image of WWI. No doubt the widows and mothers of those who died objected. They didn't want such a prominent reminder of the War. Particularly of the very gun that might have caused the death of their husband or son. So the trophy found its way into a backyard, still hidden away in February 1921. The Comrades of the Great War applied pressure. The howitzer moved to the Waits, on display later in 1921.

A family photo on the Waits, the German howitzer in the background, c1930.

George Dellar's death might have been from a shrapnel wound to the chest. Possibly, the shell that killed George came from a German 15cm sFH13 howitzer. How devastating must that thought have been to George's father and his family? They lived within yards of the cause of his death.

Further family tragedy
In 1920, George's eldest daughter, Doris, married Harry Holmes. Born in Elsworth in 1893, by 1911 Harry's family lived in Royal Oak Yard, another of the 49 yards of St Ives. Harry worked as a monitor, or teaching assistant, for Hunts County Council. He qualified as a teacher and took up a post at St John's Boys Council School, Spitalgate, Grantham.

Harry also enlisted with the Hunts Cyclists in November 1915. He transferred to 14th Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment. Harry embarked for France in 1916.

Some of the fiercest fighting during the 1916 Battle of the Somme was for High Wood. The location was important. It crowned a 100ft ridge, with views for some distance around. Between July and September, British and German forces fought for control. Inclement weather turned approaching roads to mud. Trenches and shell holes filled with water. This made infantry movement very difficult and exhausted the soldiers.

On Sunday 3 September, the British Army planned another attack on High Wood. Early that afternoon, Harry's Company came out of their trenches. They advanced towards the wood. With their right flank open to German machine gun and rifle fire, Lt Col Murray wrote in his war diary.

Under these conditions the impossible was being asked. Both Coys advanced very gallantly and in splendid spirit, but at once coming under very heavy M/G (machine gun) fire and losing heavily, they began to wither away.

The attack failed. Casualties were 2 officers killed, 7 injured. Other ranks 141 killed or missing, 152 wounded.

Harry was one of the other ranks reported killed or missing. Hit by shell fire, he lay unconscious and seriously wounded on the battlefield for some time. He could have been one of the 32 of 74 men named on St Ives War Memorial who have no known grave. But Harry survived. The Hunts Post reported on 15 September 1916 that his parents had received news. Harry was lying in a French hospital, severely wounded and partially paralysed. His thigh and pelvis smashed to splinters, his left leg paralysed with 4 serious wounds in his back.

Stout hearted nurses more than winced when his wounds were dressed (for he was back to consciousness), but all through his agony neither murmur nor complaint ever passed his lips. To enquirers, he was always getting better.

In hospital for 15 months, Harry spent 11 months laid face down. By September 1918, he left the hospital. Harry was back teaching at St John's Boys Council School, Grantham. His injuries meant he needed a stick to get about. Harry suffered a relapse and spent another year on his back recovering at his parent's home in St Ives.

Harry returned to Grantham, reported by the Hunts Post on 13 September 1918. In 1920, he married Doris and she moved to Grantham.

In 1923, Harry caught typhoid fever. Outbreaks were common, caused by consuming contaminated food or water. Harry's injuries had a detrimental effect on his constitution. He developed pleurisy, a common complication. Harry died on Sunday 7 January 1923 at Grantham.

Harry's funeral took place in St Ives the following Wednesday. His gravestone is in St Ives Church cemetery, Westwood Road, St Ives. The Hunts Post reported his death on 12 January 1923.

What happened to Doris? It appears she had a troubled time. In 1939, Doris was one of more than a thousand patients at the Three Counties Hospital. Once, this was the Three Counties Asylum. Doris died at St Ives in 1965, aged 70 years.

Erection of the Norris Museum
In 1932, building work started 2 doors along from Fellmonger House. This was on the other side of what had been the Queen Victoria pub. Builders demolished the old maltings down to its medieval stone footings. There was great interest and pride in St Ives at what was to take its place. A new museum to house the vast collection of Herbert Norris. But St Ives came close to losing the museum to Cambridge.

Herbert Norris

Born in St Ives in 1859, Herbert's family was an established shoe and boot maker in the town. Herbert trained as a jeweller and silversmith. He had an intense love of St Ives, its surroundings and history.

Herbert moved to Cirencester and took over a business there, living over the shop. Trade was good, and with 3 servants tending to his every need, Herbert wanted for nothing. Except, he was homesick for St Ives. Herbert collected anything about St Ives and Huntingdonshire. He kept in touch and travelled home several times.

Herbert never married. In retirement, he seemed intent on returning to live nearer St Ives. He bought Ferrar House in Huntingdon, planning to open a county museum. It would house a prodigious collection. Books, documents, prints, paintings, photographs. Objects about the history of the local area. Herbert died before plans reached fruition, on his 72nd birthday in 1931. His grave is in Cirencester.

Herbert's study at Cirencester.
Full of material on the history of St Ives and the local area.

The Gloucester Citizen reported the value of Herbert's estate at £20,000. Today's value would be £1million. In his will dated, some 30 years before his death, Herbert left everything to St Ives Town Council. They were to establish a library and museum. St Ives had to enact the will as written within 12 months. If they didn't, the entire estate went to the Cambridge Antiquarian Society.

It was clear from pencilled notes on his will that Herbert intended to alter it. He meant to provide for his sister, Emily, and the aged employees in his jewellery shop. The Town Council did the decent thing. They started paying Emily an annuity of £3 a week (today £7,500 a year). Herbert's manager bought the Cirencester shop on favourable terms. Albert Hughes, another employee, got £50 (today £2,500).

The Cambridge Antiquarian Society challenged the administration of the will. If they could prove St Ives had misused the funds, the entire estate would pass to them. St Ives halted a payment to the last employee, Elsie Pope. The Gloucester Citizen interviewed Charles Coote. Charles was Mayor of St Ives the year before, when the Town Council made the payments. The position the Town Council found itself in amazed and dumbfounded him.

A report on the court case appeared in the Peterborough & Hunts Standard in August 1932. Lump sum payments, sale of the shop and the amounts paid to Herbert's sister should stand. The Town Council were to make no more payments. All the remaining money must go on setting up the Norris Museum. St Ives Town Council had a narrow escape. Emily faced a bitter irony. Living in poverty whilst passing the Norris Museum. A prominent display of Herbert's wealth.

Building work started in late 1932. Sidney Inskip Ladds, architect and local historian, designed the museum. It reflects his deep love and expertise for Gothic and medieval architecture. This extended to the use of bricks from the 1700s in its construction.

Norris Museum plan by Sidney Inskip Ladds, 1932.

The museum opened in September 1933. Emily was the secretary of the museum. Elsie Pope moved to St Ives to become the museum's first curator. The canny Town Council paid both an income.

End of fellmongering
George died in 1939, aged 75 years. In that year, William's occupation was fellmonger and woolstapler. William died in 1943, also aged 75 years. This brought the trade of fellmongering at the house to an end.

William Dellar's family at Ada Dellar's 80th birthday, 1952.
Ada is at the centre, wearing glasses.

William's wife, Ada, continued to live at Fellmonger House until her death in 1958, aged 86 years. Ownership stayed with various members of the Dellar family until 1971. Maurice and Jennifer Smithers then bought the property. In 1973, they extended the living room, built a garage and carport, and added dormer windows.

In 1988, the property received a much-needed upgrade by local architect, David Pitts. His business operated from Harry Anderson's old butcher's shop on the Waits. David's sympathetic treatment won a Huntingdonshire Conservation Award.

Further work took place in 2001, again supervised by David Pitts. The redundant stable became a separate dwelling, 37a the Broadway. The Smithers rented it out. Nicholas and Heather Wells bought 37a in 2017.

When Jennifer Smithers died in 2018, Colin and Christine Phillpotts bought Fellmonger House. Further renovation took place. A double garage built to domestic specification replaced the old carport and garage. Such is the house seen today.

To read more articles about this house, click Fellmonger House. To view stories of other interesting houses and their residents in St Ives in the style of David Olusoga's BBC television programme, click A House Through Time. To access more topics on the social history of St Ives, its resident and the surrounding area, click St Ives 100 Years Ago.