February 2006
Railways to Royalty. Speaker Arnold Francklow.

Our speaker this month was Arnold Francklow, whose topic was “ Railways & Royalty – a family’s history over 300 years.” Arnold was born in Wolverton and had been brought up in Bletchley, right in the area where we were meeting. His father, grandfather and great grandfather had all been employed in the carriage works at Wolverton. His great grandfather, John Christian Francklow was born in Bethnal green in 1835, moved to Wolverton via Ashford after his marriage and died in 1944 aged 109. He had seen the funeral of the Duke of Wellington and lived through 6 reigns. He was the oldest man in Great Britain & the oldest retired railwayman in the world.

The Francklau family were from Germany, where they were court tailors to the Hanoverian court according to a family story. Arnold’s mother told him about a German family bible, which had been bought here with the family. His father’s cousin, who was still alive, had the family quilt which was made by her great grandfather, Wilhelm, court tailor to the German family; the quilt had been made from the cuttings of cloth from the waistcoats of George III and the German Royal family of the time. The Bible was sent to him by cousins, but it was in German so he had to have it translated. Recorded in the entries was the death of William Pitt. The earliest entry was the birth of Johan Christoph Francklau in 1727, his father being Christoph a carpenter born about 1700. The next entry is Johann’s marriage in 1757 to Christina Scheer at St Martin’s in the Field, so they had obviously arrived in Britain between 1751 when the Bible was published and 1757. The Bible entry for Johann Christoph says that he died “15 January 1814 aged 86 years 4 months and 9 days, having kept to his bed for 11 months 11 days!”

The bible charts the family through to John Philip Francklow, who became involved in the fight for votes for the common man at the time of Thomas Payne. John Philip was examined on 6 June 1794 and jailed for 7 months in Newgate Prison for high treason. Arnold has a copy of the indictment document, which was not carried out because the 3 main perpetrators were acquitted. John Philip & his family went to America in 1796 where he became a pastor in the Lutheran church.

The Francklow quilt was taken to South Africa in 1890 by James Joseph Francklow. It was returned to England in 1970 & was for a time in the County Museum in Aylesbury. According to the Anglo-German Society, there is only one Francklow remaining in Germany, a descendant of the brother of the Johann Christian who came here. A contact in America has provided a link from John Philip Francklow to the Coca Cola company.

Arnold concluded a fascinating talk by telling us of the birth of his first great grand son – the 10th generation of Francklows.

Anne Watson.