Vital Statistics
Harold West Pinsent: 1900 – 1962 GRO0392 (Businessman, Nottingham)
Lilian Mary Kirk: 1902 – 1977
Married: 1925: Leicester, Leicestershire
Children by Lilian Mary Kirk:
Daughter (GRO0803)
John Michael Pinsent: 1930 – 2004 (Married Joan M. Wilson, Birmingham, Warwickshire, 1966)
Family Branch: Tiverton
PinsentID: GRO0392
References
Harold West was the second son of Adrian (a.k.a. “George”) Pinsent – a shoe-finisher, who later became a foreman – by his wife Hannah West. He was born in Leicester in 1900, and grew up there, on Gipsy Road, with an elder brother, Arthur Pinsent, who had moved out by the time of the 1911 census. Harold was a “schoolboy” living at home. He must have had a good voice as he was a soloist at a Sunday School concert give at the Belgrave Chapel on Claremont Street in 1912 (Leicester Evening Mail: Monday 13th May 1912) and again in 1913 (Leicester Evening Mail: Monday 21st April 1913). Harold’s father may have raced pigeons as we find that H. Pinsent was designated as a time-keeper for the “Holly Bush Short Distance Flying Club” (Leicester Evening Mail: Monday 14th July 1913). He played a similar role for the “Waggon and Horses Club” the following year (Leicester Evening Mail: Tuesday 13th October 1914).
After leaving school, Harold attended “Leicester School of Art” and one of his colour print designs was “commended” in a National Competition in 1915 (Leicester Daily Post: Monday 26th July 1915). He was still musical and he contributed to a programme put on the “Saxby Street Wesley Guild” in January 1920 (Leicester Evening Mail: Monday 5th January 1920) and to a “Boy’s Home” concert later the same year (Leicester Evening Mail: Monday 20th December 1920). Harold was later to join the Leicester “City Drama Society” and play a prominent role in its production of “The Merry Wives of Windsor”. The Chronicle’s drama critic felt that: “The suitable amount of tragic weighting to the play was judiciously provided by Mr. Edgar Tyler in the role of Ford, who did not overstep the rage of the seemingly betrayed husband, and Mr. Harold Pinsent made a good foil to him as the quiet, trusting, Page” (Leicester Chronicle: Saturday 5th July 1924).
Harold was too young to serve during the First World War. He was living at home with his parents when the Census was taken in 1921 and he was still living there when he married a “typist,” Lilian Mary Kirk, who was the daughter of a “Gentleman’s Outfitter.” They married in July 1925 in the Wycliffe Congregational Church. The Leicester Chronicle newspaper covered the event and placed a photograph of the happy couple in its Saturday 25th July edition. Harold was, by then, a “commercial traveller” (Kelly’s Directory: 1928) who most likely worked for a firm in the leather business, as this was to be his later occupation.
Harold and Lilian were either staying or living with Harold’s brother Arthur and his wife, Hannah (née West) in Aberystwyth when War-time Register was compiled in 1939. However, Harold was actually away from home at the time. He appears in the register as a “travelling leather trade technician” lodging in Colne, in Lancashire. After the war, the couple moved to Yorkshire and they lived on Parish Ghyll Road in Otley (Ilkley) from 1946 to 1950 (West Yorkshire, England, Electoral Registers: 1840 – 1962).
Harold later became a director of “William Lawson and Sons (Tanners), Ltd.” – one of the biggest manufacturers of cut chamois skins in the country – and he was very conscious of changes in economic conditions. In 1948, he told a journalist from the “Yorkshire Observer” that although forty percent of the firm’s production was sent overseas, the firm would continue to struggle until the home market improved. He pleaded with the government to reduce the purchase tax and increase the supply of coupons issued to home-buyers (Bradford Observer: Tuesday 4th May 1948).
From Otley, the couple moved to Bramcote Hills in Nottingham, where they lived on Arundel Drive between mid 1950s and the early 1960s (British Telephone Books). He seems to have joined “Thomas Bayley and Co. Ltd.”, of Leengate, in Lenton as Managing Director as he was on hand to present a long-time worker with an eight-day chiming clock on his retirement in March 1955 (Nottingham Evening Post: Thursday 17th March 1955). Harold was a member of Nottingham Rotary Club and he took part in its annual transatlantic golf match with Rotarians in Philadelphia in 1959. The scores were transmitted by cable (Nottingham Guardian: Wednesday 9th September 1959)!
Harold and Lilian had two children. Their daughter was born in the mid-1920s. Harold and Lilian’s son John Michael Pinsent also married into the Wilson family. He married Joan Margaret Wilson, in Birmingham in 1966. John Michael’s life is described elsewhere.
Harold West Pinsent died in Bramcote Hills in January 1962. Lilian, was granted probate of his effects the following month (National Probate Calendar: 1858-1966: Ancestry.com). She moved to Keyworth in Nottinghamshire and died there in 1977 (National Probate Calendar: 1858-1966: Ancestry.com).
Harold’s nephew, Philip James Noel Pinsent wrote to my father R. J. F. H. Pinsent in the 1970s and his correspondence confirms that his uncle ran a leather-works in Nottingham.
Family Tree
Grandparents
Grandfather: James Pinsent: 1831 – 1902
Grandmother: Emma Jackson: 1831 – 1903
Parents
Father: Adrian Pinsent: 1864 – 1945
Mother: Hannah West: 1865 – 1934
Father’s Siblings (Aunts, Uncles)
Hannah Martha Pinsent: 1857 – xxxx
Georgiana Pinsent: 1859 – 1925
James Pinsent: 1862 – 1936
Adrian Pinsent: 1864 – 1945 
Fanny Pinsent: 1866 – xxxx
Charlotte Ann Pinsent: 1868 – xxxx
Emily Pinsent: 1870 – xxxx
Arthur Edwin Pinsent: 1872 – 1938
MALE SIBLINGS (BROTHERS)
Arthur Pinsent: 1888 – 1978
Harold West Pinsent: 1900 – 1962
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