Joshua Woolf (Moses) Moss (1857 - abt. 1926)

Born 9 Aug 1857 in Whitechapel [uncertain]

Ancestors

Husband of Elizabeth (Cohen) Moss — married 13 Mar 1884 in Great Synagogue

Descendants

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Lynda Keen [send private message]

Biography

The Moses family were Jews of Russian origin who came to Britain during one of the pogroms against Jews. Apparently birth records were often falsified to make it seem immigrants were born in Britain so I don't know when the Moses family actually came to live in London.

They Anglicised their surname to Moss early on but I'm finding records with both Moss and Moses for the same family.

Woolf's full name on some Census records was Joshua Woolf Moses. Woolf also used the first name William when he moved from Stepney to Bermondsey.

Woolf was a bootmaker.

Tower Bridge opened on 30 June 1894. This may have been part of the reason the family moved to Bermondsey, which was the tannery/leather wholesale centre in London. Woolf had business premises in Royal Mint St, a short walk across Tower Bridge from Bermondsey.

Bermondsey was the centre of the tanning and leather wholesale industry so perhaps a good place to be for boot makers like Woolf and his sons. But full of slums and very smelly and polluted because of the tanning industry.

The street the Moss family lived in London St is now Wolseley St. Three of the old buildings are still there but as I don't have their building's name it's impossible to identify which one they lived in. The buildings are named after Dickens' books. The buildings are residential, like Peabody Buildings; Lewis lived and worked from home not from a shop. The street is just across from jacob's Island, which Dickens described in Oliver Twist as a terrible slum. He also made it the scene of Bill Sykes' suicide.

Sources

Birth registered Jul-Sep 1857 in Whitechapel according to England and Wales Birth Registration Index, 1837-2008. GRO ref 1c 317 line 33. https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2X39-TPX

Synagogue records give Woolf Moses's date of birth as 9 August 1857. His name is Zev (Hebrew for Wolf) ben Natan ben Avraham. His mother's name is given as Phoebe/Fegella. Parents' address is 1 Eastman's Court, Wentworth Street. Ref is film number 94658 ref 4812 vol 113, page 229 0f Birth Records of the Great and Hambro Synagogues, Great Synagogue record 1770-1905.

1861 Census Address 2 Commercial Place, Whitechapel, parish of St Jude. Head of household Nathan Moss age 36, general dealer. Wife Phoebe 28. Children: Abraham 9, Catherine 7, Lewis 6, Joshua Woolf 5, Rebecca 8 months. Catherine Cohen 18 (she was a servant). Record says Woolf was born in Whitechapel.

1871 Census Address 77 Cambridge Road, Bethnal Green. Head of household Nathan Moss age 41 (this is wrong as he was 46) general dealer. Wife Phoebe 40 (also wrong as she was 38). Children: Abraham 18 tailor, Kate 17 tailoress, Lewis 16 boot riveter, Wolf 14 scholar, Rebecca 10, Maria 9, Frances 6, Mark 3, Hanna 1, Kate Cohan 23 domestic servant.

Marriage registered June 1884. GRO ref is 1c 149. Woolf Moss married Elizabeth Cohen in the Great Synagogue. Marriage registered at London Central/Mile End Old Town. Witnesses were Rebecca Levy and Aaron Leeds.

Woolf's marriage authorisation certificate from the United Synagogue is dated iyar (May) 1884. He married Elizabeth Cohen. His surname on the certificate is Moses but in the synagogue records is Moss. Neither had been married before. Both were natives of London. They married in the Great Synagogue (Duke's Place). Woolf's name is given as Ze'ev, which is Hebrew for Wolf. His father's name is Nathan. His brothers' names are Avram (Abraham) and ? (illegible). Elizabeth's father was still alive and his name could be Raphael (the Hebrew handwriting is really difficult to read). Their address was 23 Wentworth Street, Whitechapel. Rabbi at the Great Synagogue at that time was Nathan Marcus Adler, who was Rabbi from 1845 to 1890.

1891 Census Woolf Moss age 34 bootmaker, Elizabeth 30, Lewis 7, Julia (misspelt Dolie) 6, Raphael (misspelt Rappel) 3, Abraham 1. Living at 31 Cable St, Whitechapel, East London. The address may be a mistake for 311 Cable St.

Trade Directories for 1890, 1891 and 1893 give Woolf's bootmaking business address as 311 Cable Street. In 1890, he has a second trade address too, at 66 Royal Mint St. In 1893, he is listed at both 311 Cable Street and 20 Stepney High Street.

In the 1894 and 1895 Trade Directories, Woolf is listed as bootmaker at 22A & 24A Durham Row, Stepney. These are the ground floors of two houses. The family lived above the shop as 22 Durham Row is the address on Stepney Jewish School records when both Lewis and Julia started school in 1893 and 1894 respectively.

1898 Address on Stepney Jewish School record when Raphael started school is 131 Duckett St. This is just around the corner from Durham Row, a wider street. The family must have moved up in the world a bit.

Phoebe and Sarah were both born in South-East London so the family must have moved from Stepney to Bermondsey sometime between Isaac's birth in 1895 and Phoebe's in 1898.

1901 Census shows Woolf as William Moss age 44 boot maker working from his own home and born in Tower Hamlets. His wife Elizabeth 40, born in Spitalfields. Son Lewis musician on his own account age 16 born in Whitechapel, Julia 15 born in Barking, Raphael 12 born in Whitechapel, Abraham 10 born in the parish of St George's in the East, Mark 7 born in Stepney, Isaac 6 born in Bethnal Green, Phoebe 4 born in Barking and Sarah age 2 born in Bermondsey. The family was living at 98 and 100 Wolseley Model Dwellings, Bermondsey, South-East London. The street name is not given on this Census but was London Street, now Wolseley Street. The parish was Christ Church.

In 1900, 1901, 1902 and 1908 Woolf's eldest son Lewis Moss is in the Trade Directory as boot maker at Wolseley Buildings London Street, Dockhead, Bermondsey. In 1903 and 1905, William Moss (Woolf changed his name in 1901, see Census above) is in Trade Directories as a bootmaker at 229 Jamaica Road, which is not far from London Street. Neither Lewis nor Woolf/William is listed in the 1904, 1906 or 1907 Trade Directories, though, or from 1909 onwards.

His wife Elizabeth died in 1908.

1911 Census shows Julia age 25 single, housekeeper for her father, living at 80 Globe Rd, Bethnal Green with Isaac 16, Phoebe 13, Sarah 12. Also with a Rosa da Costa 63 and her single daughter Sarah da Costa 30. Woolf/William is not listed on the Census as living there.

1911 Woolf/William is not on the electoral register for 80 Globe Rd.

1918-1925 Electoral registers show Woolf Moss at 117 Oxford Street, Mile End Old Town, East London. This street was confused with Oxford Street in the west end so the name was changed to Nottingham Place. Electoral registers from 1922 show both street names, with Nottingham Place used for lower numbers and Oxford Street for higher ones. The street is now called Stepney Way. At the same address as Woolf were Abraham Nathan Silverberg and Morris Silverberg.

Death GRO ref is 1b 669, registered at Holborn. Woolf Moses, died age 68 in March 1926.

Woolf Moses is buried in East Ham Jewish Cemetery. Date of death is given on United Synagogue burial records as 4 March 1926 (15 Adar 5686). His grave is in Section T, Row 11, Plot 13.