Studio portrait of George Skelton Stephenson J.P., M.D., M.B., C.M., physician and surgeon 1891.

An original cabinet card photograph by Jenkins & Remy, 7 Victoria Street West, Grimsby. The photographers were Edward Thomas Jenkins (1847-, born Kensington) and Auguste Remy.

George Skelton Stephenson was born in Grimsby in 1849. He was a son of Thomas Stephenson, a schoolmaster living in Flottergate and Ann (née Skelton) who were married in Grimsby on 30th July 1837. George studied medicine in Edinburgh and Vienna. He graduated M.D. in 1889, the year he moved to The Manor House, Brighowgate, Grimsby.

George Skelton Stephenson married Isabella Ann Leigh Grange (born Grimsby in 1856) on 18th April 1877. Isabella was the daughter of William Grange, solicitor of The Willows, Bargate. Their children were Wilhelmina ‘Elma’ Grange (1878-1965), Grace Muriel Skelton (1880-), Mildred Isabella (1882-1962), Winifred Margaret (1883-1943), Thomas Grange (1884-1965), Maud Christine (1888-1966).

George Skelton Stephenson J.P., M.D., M.B., C.M., physician and surgeon, Admiralty surgeon, and medical inspector of the mercantile marine, certifying factory surgeon, and public vaccinator Nos. 1, 2 & 3 districts Grimsby Union, of Manor House, Brighowgate, Grimsby died on 15th May 1929. His wife, Isabella Ann Leigh Stephenson of Wellow House, Abbey Road died on the 16th February 1937. They are buried in Scartho Road Cemetery.

Note: George Skelton Stephenson’s neatly written lecture notes from his student days in Edinburgh are preserved in his book ‘Reminiscences of a Student’s Life’ which he wrote later in his career.

Note: George Skelton Stephenson was a Freeman of Grimsby.

Note: Before he moved to Brighowgate in 1889, George Skelton Stephenson lived at 202 Victoria Street, where his children were born.

Note: Wilhelmina ‘Elma’ Grange Stephenson married Frederick Hans Haagensen, ship broker and later consul for Mexico in the UK, in 1899. Wilhelmina, then divorced, lived at 19 Ladbroke Gardens, Kensington, London when she died. Her ashes came back to Grimsby.

Note: Grace Muriel Skelton Stephenson married in Kensington in 1901.

Note: Mildred Isabella Stephenson married William Escombe, physician, in Grimsby in 1902. She lived in Cambridge in 1939 with members of the Grange family. She lived at 2 Manor Drive, Waltham, when she died.

Note: Winifred Margaret Stephenson married Lieutenant Gilbert Hilton Kellett R.N. in Grimsby in 1906. (Winifred is buried at Ashby-cum-Fenby with her husband Commander R.N. Kellett who died in 1935.)

Note: Thomas ‘Tom’ Grange Stephenson was still living with his mother at The Manor House, Brighowgate in 1931. By 1939, he was living at 99 Abbey Road. His sister Winifred was there too.

Note: Maud Christine Stephenson married Wilfred Harry Pryce, civil engineer in Chester/Sheffield, in Grimsby in 1918.

Note: Thomas Stevenson, George’s father, later became Treasurer of the Borough of Grimsby.

Note: Isabella Ann Leigh Stephenson was involved with the suffragette movement in Grimsby.

Note: Frederick Grange Haagensen of Hull (1911), grandson of George Skelton Stephenson, went to school at Sparken Hill Academy, Worksop. The family formerly lived at 14 Abbey drive East, Grimsby (1901).

Note: Frederick Hans Haagensen travelled extensively and eventually became a painter-etcher/artist and lived on the Essex coast with his second wife.

Note: Barbara Grace Haagensen, granddaughter of George Skelton Stephenson, was married to Air Commodore Noel Stephen “Peter” Paynter, CB (1898–1998).

Research by Grimsby & Cleethorpes Museum.