Eastern Artefacts

There are several items that have been passed down in the family, that were said, by my mother, to have been brought back from China and India, when my great-grandfather, Herbert Havet Smith (1866-1950) went on a tea buying trip for the family’s grocery business. I looked for evidence of this journey but nothing can be found in the outgoing passenger lists for destinations on the Indian sub-continent or the Far East; it is however difficult to know what port they may have called at on the way. It is also possible that the trip was before lists began in 1890. There are three passport applications for H H Smiths[1] but those available only run up to 1903, and perhaps Herbert travelled after this date. In any case, passports were not essential prior to the First World War. The application records are for March 1884, August 1884 and April 1903.

What does not sit well with this story, is that Herbert consistently states that he works in the corn trade as a ‘factor’, ‘buyer’, ‘broker’ or ‘salesman’. By the 1921 census he is retired but lists his most recent employer as Benjamin Smith and sons, corn merchants.[2] Was it perhaps not Herbert at all but his father, William Joseph (1825-1887), who made the trip? William was a fruiterer and florist, before running the public house, The British Queen in St. Pancras later in life. It is, in fact, the Seears, rather than the Smiths, who were tea dealers, so was it Herbert’s father-in-law, Frederick Seear (1829-1884) who was the overseas traveller? Frederick was a grocer and by 1866, was describing himself as a tea dealer. There is no passport application for Frederick and his death occurred before the commencement of comprehensive passenger lists.