Edna Vera Cadden

1896–1990

The daughter who went east — married to the returned soldier who had written to the army for her family when her brother Jack died, and settled for sixty years in the bayside suburbs of Melbourne.

Born: 1896 · Perth, Western Australia
Died: 22 August 1990 · Brighton East, Victoria
Married: George Horace James (m. Victoria Park, 1922)
Lived: ~94 years

Edna Vera Cadden was born in Perth in 1896, the year after baby Vivian’s death at Hall’s Creek, and baptised at Victoria Park.¹ In September 1919, signing as ‘E. V. Cadden’, she took delivery for her father of her dead brother Jack’s commission.²

On 14 March 1922 — six weeks after Pearl’s wedding, and three weeks after Pearl sailed for South Africa — she married George Horace James at the Methodist Church, Victoria Park. The notice gave her parents’ address as King George Street, the new name of Oswald Street.³

Dongarra & the AIF, 1894 – 1918

George Horace James

George was the younger son of Charles James of Northampton, the farming and mining town north of Geraldton, and had been born at Dongarra on the coast in about June 1894. He enlisted at Perth on 4 January 1915, a twenty-year-old clerk already serving in the citizen forces.⁴ Back in Perth by November 1918, it was he who wrote to Base Records from Austral Hall, Hay Street, ‘on behalf of his parents’ — Edna’s parents — for the death certificate of ‘the late Lieut. Jack James Cadden’.² He was courting her three and a half years before the wedding.

St Kilda & Brighton, 1922 – 1990

Melbourne

Edna and George had two sons, David Brand James, born in 1922, and Kenneth Brand James, in 1924 — the middle name perhaps a family surname on George’s side.⁵ By 1931 they had moved to Melbourne, to 79 Alma Road, St Kilda West, George still a clerk; they were there in 1934, and in 1936 her mother’s death notice named her as ‘Edna (Mrs. G. H. James, Melbourne, Victoria)’.⁶⁷ After the war the whole family was at 13 Tiuna Grove, St Kilda: George by then a civil servant, and both sons clerks.⁶

George died on 28 July 1967. Edna lived on as a widow in a flat at 4/123 Dendy Street, Brighton East, a few streets from her son Kenneth, a bank officer, and his family in Clive Street.⁸ She died at Brighton East on 22 August 1990, aged about ninety-four, the last of John Mitchell Cadden’s children but one, and is buried with George at Springvale.⁹ Her younger sister May would be buried there too.

The Record

Sources & References

1
Birth and baptism

WA BDM birth index, reg. 2012/1896: Edna Vera Cadden, born Perth, father John Mitchell Cadden, mother Annie Pearce. Baptism (FamilySearch, FHL film 284856): born, baptised and resident at Victoria Park.
2
In Jack’s file

NAA: B2455, CADDEN J J — receipt for Jack’s British commission signed ‘E. V. Cadden’ for J. M. Cadden, 23 September 1919; G. H. James, Austral Hall, Hay Street, Perth, to Base Records, 14 November 1918.
3
Marriage, 1922

Wedding notice: ‘JAMES—CADDEN.—On March 14, 1922, at the Methodist Church, Victoria Park, George Horace, younger son of Mr. and Mrs. C. James, of Northampton, to Edna Vera, second daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. M. Cadden, King George-street, Victoria Park.’ WA BDM marriage index, reg. 206/1922, Perth.
4
George’s enlistment, 1915

NAA: B2455, JAMES G H — attestation (page 1), joined 4 January 1915: born Dongarra, WA; 20 7/12; clerk; single; next of kin father Charles James, Northampton; now serving citizen forces.
5
The sons

Family records: David James (1922–1982) and Kenneth James (1924–2007). Middle names from the Victorian electoral roll (see next reference).
6
Victorian electoral rolls

Commonwealth rolls, Division of Balaclava, Subdivision of St Kilda West, 1931 and 1934: James, Edna Vera, and James, George Horace, 79 Alma rd., clerk. Division of Isaacs, State St Kilda (undated, c. 1946–50), p. 160: David Brand (clerk), Edna Vera, George Horace (civil servant) and Kenneth Brand (clerk), No. 1, 13 Tiuna gr.
7
Her mother’s death notice

The West Australian, 18 June 1936, p. 1: ‘Edna (Mrs. G. H. James, Melbourne, Victoria)’.
8
Brighton East

Victorian electoral roll, Subdivision of Brighton East (c. 1975–85), pp. 16–17: James, Edna Vera, 4/123 Dendy St; James, Kenneth Brand, 46 Clive St, bank officer.
9
Deaths and burial

Victorian death index, reg. 20662/1990: Edna Vera James, died 22 August 1990, Brighton East, father John Cadden, mother Annie Cadden; probate granted 2 October 1990 (file 1030/231), ‘superannuant’. Springvale Botanical Cemetery: Edna Vera James, d. 22 August 1990; George Horace James, d. 28 July 1967.