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A dulcimer, case and photograph were donated to the Norfolk Museums Service
in 1974 by a Mrs Mann of Bayford Hotel, Asplands Road, Norwich. The
photographs were part of a set of four of her grandparents and uncles James
and George Ellis. Since that time, the items themselves seem to have been
dispersed around the county museums and there has not been sufficient
evidence to positively identify the player in the picture.
However we can now confidently say this is Samuel James Ellis from the
Thorpe Hamlet area of Norwich. He was known as James, had a brother called
George, and the key piece of evidence is the 1939 register which shows him
living with his sister, Ethel Bayford at Asplands Road. Their father, James
senior was licensee of the William IV pub in Thorpe Hamlet, whilst James
himself worked as a tram car driver, then as a barman in Cromer, was
invalided out of the army during the First World War on account of a heart
murmur and then worked for the railways in engineering maintenance and
repair. He served in the Army Veterinary Corps, but the uniform in the
picture seems very different; the most similar style we have found is for a
Citadel Army Band from 1905.
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