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Note: BIOGRAPHY: Mark and his two brothers were placed in West Grimstead Orphanage when he was 2 , so in 1904. They stayed there until at least 1908, as Bernard Thomas was born in Canada in 1907. West Grimstead is in Sussex. Mark emigrated to Australia on the SS Barrabool in 1929, with Mary (his wife) and children, Veronica, Monica and Thomas. Olive and Gladys came three years earlier on same ship. Their son, Edward came to Western Australia in 1924 then moved to Victoria. Monty went to Cambridge and then trained to become a Minister, however he converted to Catholicism due to his marriage to Mary McCormick. He studied with Robert Hugh Benson and they remained lifelong friends. Robert Benson went on to become a renowned Catholic Priest, however Mark (Monty) remained a lay person, although very religious. According to Ted (Edward) Stokes 7 Jan 2001, Monty and his family lived on the corner of Mount Road in Leicester - it was on the corner of Spinnyhill Park - there was a shop on the corner - unsure of whether they lived above the shop though. This was just around the corner, or the next street up from where Michael McCormick lived. His father considered him incompetent and set him up with annuities (which he sold off whenever he needed more money) but basically disinherited him for converting to Catholicism. Monty was offered 250 pounds for his parents grave stone as it was carved by a very famous sculptor, Burnjones?, but refused to sell it - he used to joke about it later and say he should have taken the money. It is a very beautiful carving of an angel. He met Mary McCormick on a train station and they got to know each other from that meeting . Mary was the breadwinner of the family as well as being the mother, as Monty had difficulty getting and holding a job. One time he apparently got a job as a road worker. His job was to wave a red lantern so that people approaching would see the big hole and not fall in it . Unfortunately he was so busy reading that he failed to see someone approaching and he lost his job after they fell in the hole!! The three eldest boys were placed in an orphanage and Mark, Mary and the three girls reputedly went to Canada. The orphanage was the West Grinstead Orphanage, now St Thomas More Centre - where they stayed for about four years. It was said that Mark and Mary had at least one child in Canada, Bernard Thomas, who died at nine days old, and upon their return from Canada they retrieved the boys from the Orphanage and again settled in Leicester. They lived in Derby for a time, near Holycross and then went back to Leicester. However, research has shown this to be a fabrication for reasons unknown. Mark travelled to the USA on two occasions, both times alone, to visit his brother Albert. No child was born to them in Canada and no child of theirs died in Canada, nor is there any existing record of their entry or stay in Canada. In fact there is ample evidence that, other than Mark, none of the family left England. The boys were placed in the Orphanage prior to Olive's birth and left there for at least four years. Mark had a speech impediment - similar but much more severe to my father, Mark James, has; and was an avid reader. In his old age he used to read first with one eye, then close that and read with his other eye, with the book held an inch from his face.
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