George Costin (1878-1961)

Post date: Nov 13, 2015 5:33:48 PM

George Lewis D Costin was born in Wateringbury in 1878 and at the time of the 1881 Census he was living with his parents, David and Anne Maria, and elder sister, Ann Sophia, on Red Hill. His father was a tree cutter (woodman).

He attended Wateringbury Boys' School and is recorded by the Head master in the school log for 1890 as follows: In a casual talk about influenza its preventatives and cures with the Upper Division , one boy, F. Newman said they wanted to take plenty of Poppy-head tea (opium) . G. Costin said “that was what you gave baby on washing days”. Several of the other boys intimated an acquaintance with this concoction. I impressed upon them that those who use such stuff ran a very great chance of imprisonment as it was a deadly poison and brain destroyer.

By the time of the 1891 census he was still in Red Hill but his mother had remarried Charles Curd, an agricultural labourer, and he had an additional brother, Alfred, and two young siblings from his mother's new marriage. She was aged 48 and the new children were aged 2 and 1. Although his younger sister is recorded by the census as a scholar George is not and no occupation is shown for him.

By the 1901 census George was still on Red Hill but now the head of the household of 4 is George's grandfather, Thomas Costin, aged 87 but recorded as a labourer on farm, whereas George is recorded as an ordinary labourer on farm. George married in 1905 to Eliza with whom he was still living at the time of the 1939 registration.

At the 1911 census he had moved over the parish boundary to The Brickfields in East Malling where he was with his wife and two young daughters and now described as a small farmer.

During the war he served, aged in his late 30s, number T4/045198 as a driver in the Army Service Corps. Being no longer from the parish he is never listed by Wateringbury's vicar but is included on Wateringbury School's list of those who served.

He died in 1961.