William was born in 1831 in Bath but he was part of a Lyme Regis family who later returned there. He was a seaman and in 1856 was awarded the Silver Gallantry Medal from the Royal National Lifeboat Institution for saving a life at sea. The following is from a passage from the Lifeboat “Gallantry”: William Callaway, Seaman By 1861, he was a master mariner and on the Census of 1861 is aboard the ship called “Ajax” which he co-owned (with Greenfield) along with a Thomas Mills, mate from Bridgport and Frederick Bryant, boy from Lyme. This ship was a cutter. In the 1861 census in England his children; Emily, Ellen and Reginald are all boarders at a school in Colyton Devon run by the misses Seaward. Emily was 8 yrs. Ellen 7 yrs. and Reginald 5 yrs. His first wife Sarah had died in 1851. William married for a second time to a lady called Lavinia Crago a widow of James Lusby of Alderney. In the next census of 1871, 1881, 1891 she is down as the landlady and shop owner of the Army and Navy Inn on Alderney. Along with other family members, William also had shares in another boat, this time a ketch called the “THOMAS and ELIZABETH”. 46 tons. William seems to have spent his life carrying cargo between the Channel Islands and South Coast and French Ports and when he died in 1905 left £2000 a large sum for those days. William′s son Reginald John lost his life in 1885 while serving on a ship called “Zoe”. Reginald drowned at sea off the coast of Gibraltar and so he never saw his second daughter as she was born in Bradford a few months after his death. In his Will Reginald left £250 which was again a good sum for that time. |
