Our Family History

Madeline Tisdall was born on 14th August 1887 and  grew up in Shepherds Bush. Maybe the nearby locality of some famous Music Hall Theatres inspired her to have a career on the stage.

 

She became an Actress in a stock theatre company that toured overseas in Holland and Ireland. It is possible that she dreamed of joining her brother in the USA. She wrote to her brother William in 1910:

 

"You will see by this I am home again from Holland. The first time I went was to Amsterdam; this last time to Rotterdam. I had a lovely time. I think the Dutch people are very nice, especially the boys. They made a great fuss of us because we were English & gave us a good time. I am staying at home for a month. I do not know where we are going next. I should simply love to come to America. I am living in hope."

 

Madeline was still touring with the company during World War One and her mother worried about her:

 

"Madge is in Ireland - been to Dublin & Belfast and I think going to Cork. We did not like her going across the Irish Channel. They got there safe - but they have to get back."

 

From her mother's letters to her brother, it appears that a Gentleman called W.H. Son ran the Theatrical company and his sister, who was married and lived in America, chaperoned all the young ladies. She had evidently met Madeline's mother and had visited the family in person to re-assure them of their daughters saftey whilst she was away from home. The Tisdall's were respectable middle class parents  - to allow their unmarried daughter a career on the stage they would have needed the upmost assurance that everything was above board.

 

In 1911 Madeline was lodging at 55 King Street, Southsea Portsmouth.  The place was run as boarding house by the Kirby Family. Madge was working as a  Music Hall Dancer. Her future husband, fellow actor William Canning, was also boarding at the same address. They were part of the same theatre company for 6 years but he never told her how he truly felt about her. In order to make himself a financially viable suitor for Madge he went on to gain work as an Electrical Engineer.

 

Madeline was an attractive woman and as an actress, she had plenty of admirers. She had been seeing one young man on and off for a couple of years and in 1915 he proposed to her. When her friend William Canning found out, he finally declared his love for her, and asked Madeline to marry him too. Now she had to decide which proposal to accept.

 

On the 18th December 1915 Madeline and William Canning got married. The other young man apparently joined the Flying Corp after having his heart broken. Madeline's mother Emily approved of the marriage and helped her make the choice. She wrote to her son Bill in America about it in 1916:

 

"Madge is married.... to a very nice fellow who thinks the world of her and is making her a splendid husband - there is nothing on this earth that she wants that he will not get for her. So you see after having so many admirers she has settled down now....Of course she asked me what she should do and I told her to marry the one she liked the best. William is the same age as Madge but the other was younger and would not make the husband she has now, so we all think she has chosen the right one..."

 

In 1916 the Theatre Company was disbanded and Madeline left the stage to become a wife and help run her husband's business. In 1920 Billy bought a house at 40 Hatfield Road Bedford Park, Chiswick for Madge's Birthday - they moved in and sister Kate went to have dinner with them to celebrate. I do not know how much he paid for it back then, but in 2014 the property sold for over £1 Million!

 

Billy and Madge also owned a shop on Goldhawk Road opposite the Tisdall family buisness. When her Mother Emily became too ill to work, she and Madeline's spinster sister Kate both came to live with Madeline and her husband Billy Canning .  Madeline's mother had kept in regular contact with her son Bill, who went to America. After her mother's death in 1924 Madeline took over the letter writing.

 

 In Emily's will  she had fairly stated that her Estate be divided up equally between her living children. Madeline wrote to Bill asking that he waive his rights to inherit as Emily's dying wish was that Kate be given the £1,000 that was left after the funeral expenses and eveything had been settled. Kate was unmarried, in poor health and had been the one child who had worked in the business full-time for many years. She out of everyone had certainly earned it and needed it the most.

 

William however, refused this request and demanded his share of the money. He had his suspicions that William Canning and Jack Carter - his brother-in-laws -had somehow defrauded Emily out of some money from the sale of her business and property a few years ago. They had handled all the paperwork and financial transactions at the time. He wrote an angry letter to Madeline telling her what he thought - and she never ever replied to him.

 

What the real truth was we shall never know - Emily had always held Billy Canning in high esteem and she trusted him to deal with her financial matters. Hoever, before becoming a business owner, he had been an actor - possibly meaning he was good at deception - and sometime after Emily's death, he left Madeline and she never remarried. Perhaps he did swindle his Mother- In-Law out of her fortune - or maybe the accusations and suspicions from accross the pond caused too many arguments and resentments. When Madeline died, Sister Lily and Jack Cater apparently acted in a "Self-serving" manner, according to Grandson Edgar Tisdall.

 

The whole issue of the will and the inhertance meant that all correspondance stopped between The Tisdall Family in England and William Tisdall in America.

 

According to his children, this caused William much anguish over the years. His daughter- who was named after her Aunt, went so far as to write to Madeline in the 1930's - hoping for a reconciliation - but again, there was no reply. Stubborn pride and a row about money meant that all ties were cut.

 

Although Madeline suffered from diabetes, she lived a long life and died at the age of 77 in 1964.

 

 

YOU CAN READ MADELINE'S LETTERS TO WILLIAM BELOW