Daniel William Claydon (1902-1949) and his brother James Edward Claydon (1900-1983) were transported aboard the SS Corsican in 1913 from Liverpool to Quebec, Canada as part of the child emigration scheme of the time. A third, younger brother named Walter (1904-1958) was sent the following year on a different ship. On the Corsican's passenger list, Daniel's surname is spelled CLAYDIN, and he and James are listed among 34 boys labeled the 'Roman Catholic Party' who were sponsored for the voyage from England by the Catholic Emigration Society. The family lived in the Marylebone area of London when their father was said to have abandoned them and they and their mother subsequently were in and out of the Northumberland Street Workhouse. Their mother died in 1908, and they were left with nowhere to go, and so they were taken into a series of Catholic orphanages. They spent some time in the St Joseph's Home, Holtwhite's Hill in Enfield in 1911, in St Vincent's Boys Home, Mill Hill in 1912, and may have spent a short time at Father Hudson Home (St. Edward's Home for Boys) in Coleshill, Birmingham, England before being sent to Canada. From Quebec, they were taken by train to the St. George's Home in Ottawa, Ontario, which was the main receiving and distribution center for Roman Catholic children from about 1895 until the last British Home Children arrived in the early 1930s. Daniel was ultimately sent to work on the farm of Alex D. St. Louis in Tecumseh, Essex, Ontario. James was sent to another farm in Ellaton, Ontario and later joined and served with the Canadian Expeditionary Force during WWI. James ended up emigrating to the US, where he married, raised a family, and made a career in the US Air Force. Walter went initially to a farm in Quebec, then was transferred to a family in Emily Township, Ontario. He married, raised and family, and spent the rest of his life in Quebec. I believe the brothers never saw each other again, though James designated a portion ($15) of each of his paychecks earned in the CEF be sent to Daniel in care of Farmer St. Louis. The story that has come down through the family is that, like many British Home Children, Daniel was mistreated by Farmer St. Louis, so he may never have known about the provision James had made for him. Daniel reportedly finally ran away (escaped) from the St. Louis farm at age 15 (which would have been about 1918) and made his way into the U.S. at Detroit. He married my grandmother in 1926 in Detroit and lived there until his death in 1949. Once he got to Detroit, he was known as Daniel George Clayton. He worked for Briggs Manufacturing as an auto worker.

Records subsequently found reveal that Daniel was actually born Daniel William Claydon on 24 Aug 1902 at the family's home at 63 Lisson Street in Marylebone. That he was apparently unaware of even his own date of birth is tragic.