Charles Clarence Brachi (1881-1960)
Charles Clarence Brachi was born at Islington, London on 22 January 1881. He was the second of seven children born to Peter Charles Brachi (1856-1945) and his wife Clara Harriet Brachi neé Fry (1857-1935). His father was a Tobacco and Snuff Manufacturer.
By 1891, the family moved from Islington to East Barnet. Charles attended Leamington College and represented them at cricket from 1897 to 1900. He then went on to Cambridge and represented them at cricket, rugby
In 1911, Charles, then aged 30, was an Assistant Schoolmaster at Kings School, Peterborough. He served with The King’s Own (Royal Lancaster Regiment) from 1913 to 1920, rising from Second Lieutenant to Captain. He fought at Gallipoli and was mentioned in dispatches.
While in the Army, Charles married Winifred Mary Ellis (1883-1942) at Tyneham on 10 June 1915. Just 15 days later he was photographed with D Company, 10th (Service) Battalion at Kingsbridge in South Devon.
After WW1 Charles became an instructor in the Royal Flying Corps and the family lived in Sleaford, Lincolnshire and later Berkhamstead, Hertfordshire.
Charles later was given the title Squadron-Leader.
Charles died on 26 May 1960.
Winifred Mary Brachi neé Ellis (1883-1942)
Winifred was born in 1883 to Robert Owen Ellis (1839-1905) and his wife Elizabeth Ellis neé Matthews (1854-1897). She was the fifth of seven children.
When Winifred was 13, her mother Elizabeth died of post partum infection. Winifred was brought up by Elizabeth’s sister, Mary Jane Wheeler neé Matthews, in Bournemouth and later at The Bungalow, Worbarrow. Winifred’s father Robert, a Draper’s Assistant, died when Winifred was 21.
In later years, Winifred lived in Hertfordshire at Mill House, Bourne End, Boxmoor. She died at West Hertfordshire Hospital at Hemel Hempstead on 9 September 1942.
Children of Charles and Winifred Brachi
Charles and Winifred had three children:
● David Peter Brachi (1916-1983)
David was born in Wareham Hospital on 3 November 1916. During his childhood, David often stayed at his great aunt Mary Wheeler’s home, known as The Bungalow, on the cliffs overlooking Worbarrow Bay. During WW2, David worked at the Allied Central Interpretation Unit at Medmenham, Buckinghamshire. His future wife, known as Joan, also worked there but their paths did not cross until 1945. They married in 1946 and later settled in Hull, where David was appointed lecturer in the geography department of the University. David and Joan holidayed in Dorset regularly and, in the early 1950’s, they bought an old coastguard cottage at Kimmeridge, which they regularly visited with their four sons during school and university vacations. In the mid-1970’s David and Joan retired to Kimmeridge where David did most of the original groundwork for a book on the history of Kimmeridge. After his death in 1983, his widow Joan took over the compiling of this book and it was later published under the title ‘The Kimmeridgians’.
I remember them all well. We used to stay in the adjacent coastguard cottage in Kimmeridge Bay.
CH
Joan Brachi was a lovely lady and we visited her often in both Kimmeridge and Corfe after she moved there.
BS
● Elizabeth Anne ‘Anne’ Brachi (1918-2009)
Anne, also born in Wareham hospital, married Vincent Gerard Doyle (1914-1999) in 1946 at Chelsea. Their eldest son David lives in Kinsale in the south-west of Ireland and he and his wife Angela regularly visit Tyneham and Worbarrow.
● Mary Winifred Brachi (1922-2012)
Mary was born at Sleaford in Lincolnshire where her father was based at the time. She worked as a physiotherapist in Midhurst, Sussex and in 1964 married Hartley Sharpe and moved to live in Spain. Her husband died in 1979 and Mary lived on the coast in Sussex for many years, eventually moving to Ireland to be near her sister Anne. She died in Kinsale, Co. Cork, Ireland in December 2012.
The three children spent a large part of each year at Worbarrow and they regarded The Bungalow as home. After Mary Jane Wheeler’s death in 1933, their aunt, Elizabeth Maude Ellis, continued to run The Bungalow and the Brachi family continued to spend time there after until it was requisitioned in 1943.
Page last updated: 4 November 2022