Grave 6

Reuben Somers

1854  – 1941

Unmarked grave

Reuben was a long-standing and well known member of the Bath Jewish community. He was a Russian subject and in 1873 came to this country from Poland with capital of £20 and worked as a tailor in London.

His wife Annie (Crowsey) was also born in Poland and their first three children were all born in Shoreditch, London. They moved to Newport where three more children were born, before moving to Bath by 1885 when the birth of another daughter was registered in July followed by another daughter in 1889.
 
Reuben is listed in the 1889 Bath Directory as a master tailor living at 15 Kingston Road. In the early 1890s he moved his workshop to 7 Railway Place. 

In 1890 he signed a 21-year lease for the synagogue in Corn Street, and he was treasurer for the synagogue from 1892 until its closure. 

In June 1902 Reuben moved to London to set up a tailors shop. It was not a successful venture. At the debtors court in 1904 it was reported that 'he purchased for £20, money given to him by a friend, the fixtures and fittings of a tailors shop at 57 Goldhawk Road. He traded there unsuccessfully until January 1903 when he closed the shop and has since been in employment in the trade'. 

By 1905 he was back in Bath working and living at 4 Pierrepont Street. He and Annie ran a boarding house: 'Apartments with or without board, strictly kosher at Washington House Pierrepont Street' which was regularly advertised in the Jewish Chronicle. They held services there at Yom Kippur and the Jewish New Year. 

After Annie's death in 1915, Reuben moved to 5 Cleveland Place West where he continued to run an orthodox boarding house. He was president of the Jewish community 1920-26.

By 1927 he was living with his daughter Mary in her private hotel at 33 Henrietta Street, which advertised as strictly orthodox. Reuben died in 1941 in St Martin s Hospital of heart failure. 
His great granddaughter reported that he and his wife Annie are buried here near the cottage with no headstones.
Reuben and Annie Somers had eight children, three of whom were buried here; Abraham, Hyman and Rose, see below, opposite. The other five, listed below, are buried elsewhere.

Adelaide Somers b 22 March 1883, d 12 June 1963
Adelaide Somers is not buried here but there is a memorial plaque to her on the south wall. She lived in Bath for most of her life and never married. The 1911 census records that she was single, a housekeeper to a dental surgeon living at 26 Gay Street. The Bath Directory for 1911 lists Francis H Woodward, Dental Surgeon, at this address. 
Nothing more is known about Adelaide s life until 1939 when she and her sister Clara, together with their elderly father Reuben were living with their eldest sister Mary (Willcox Jones) who from the mid 1920s ran a private hotel at 33 Henrietta Street. 

Adelaide was recorded as single, occupation  paid domestic duty . Her great niece reports that she continued to help run the hotel until Mary died in 1950. Adelaide lived the last two years of her life in Tonbridge Kent and died there in 1963. Her great niece arranged for the plaque commemorating her death to be moved to Bath in 2006.

Clara Somers b 1873 d 1960
Clara did not marry. She died in 1960 in Mendip Hospital Wells. It is not known where she is buried 

Mary Somers b 1873 d 1950
Mary married George Willcox-Jones (b Exeter 1871, d Bath 1919). They had six children. Mary died in Bath in 1950. It is not known where she is buried.

Miriam Somers b 1882 d 1944
Miriam married Adrien Charlebois. Their son Anthony was born in Bath in 1919. Miriam died in Bath in 1944 at 33 Henrietta Street. She is buried in Ridgeway Jewish cemetery Bristol.

Rachel Somers b 1889 d ? 
Rachel is listed in the 1911 census aged 20 and unmarried living in a 'Lodging House for Working Girls' in Aldgate, London. Nothing else is known about her life. It is possible that she is the Rachel Somers, Suffragette, arrested in London in 1913. 

Census records
  1881   24  LLanarth Street   Newport
Name | Age
Birth
Relationship
Occupation
Poland 
Head
Tailor
Poland 
Wife
Wife
London 
Daughter
scholar
London 
Daughter
scholar
London 
Son
Child
Monmouth 
Daughter
Child
  1891   15  Kingston Road   Bath
Name | Age
Birth
Relationship
Occupation
Poland 
Head
Tailor
Poland 
Wife
Wife
London 
Daughter
Tailoress
London 
Daughter
Apprentice
London 
Son
Apprentice
Monmouth 
Daughter
Scholar
Monmouth 
Daughter
Scholar
Monmouth 
Son
Scholar
Bath 
Daughter
scholar
Bath 
Daughter
Child
Poland 
Other refer DT
Apprentice
  1901   15   Kingston Road   Walcot
Name | Age
Birth
Relationship
Occupation
Poland 
Head
Tailor
Poland 
Wife
Wife
London 
Daughter
Unknown
London 
Daughter
Unknown
Monmouth 
Daughter
Unknown
Monmouth 
Daughter
Unknown
Monmouth 
Son
Clothier
Bath 
Daughter
Unknown
  1911   4   Pierrepoint Street   Bath
Name | Age
Birth
Relationship
Occupation
Poland 
Head
Tailor
Poland 
Wife
Wife
London 
Daughter
Unknown
Newport 
Daughter
unknown
  1911   4   Pierrepoint Street   Bath
Name | Age
Birth
Relationship
Occupation
Poland 
Head
Tailor
Poland 
Wife
Wife
London 
Daughter
Not given
Newport 
Daughter
Not given
  1921   5  Cleveland Place   Bath
Name | Age
Birth
Relationship
Occupation
Poland 
Head
Tailor
London 
Daughter
none
Newport 
Wife
wife
Bath 
Son
Child
Associated addresses
  1919-1927   5  Cleveland Place West    Bath
  Strictly Orthodox boarding house
     33  Henrietta Street   Bath
  Boarding House / Hotel runs by Mary Somers, now Mrs Willcox Jones.
       St Martin's Hospital   Bath
  Hospital. Place of death Reuben Somers