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Name: JOSSELYN, Edward
Nee: son of Frederick Josselyn
Birth Date: 8.10.1877 Kensington, London, bapt. 22 Nov
Death Date: 17 Sep 1934 Bulawayo, on business trip to Rhodesia
First Date: 1927
Last Date: 1934
Profession: Mechanical engineer, Mount Elgon Saw Mills.
Area: Endebess
Married: In Stockton 13 Aug 1912 Fanny Beatrice Martin b. 22 Sep 1882 Stockton on Tees, d. 1973 Newton Abbot
Children: Henry Edward DSC (24 May 1913 Newark, Notts-1983); Richard Kingsley 'Dick' (14 Dec 1916 Newark-1997); Mary Quinlan (Crampton, later Roberts) (1915 Newark-2000)
Book Reference: Red 31, Hut, Trans Nzoia Scrap Book, Burke
War Service: served in WW1 1915-18 as Capt. Yeomanry
School: MIME
General Information:
Gazette 5 Mar 1935 - probate
Trans Nzoia Scrapbook - Mount Elgon Saw Mill - In about 1910 Odin Sunde set up a saw mill on the Rongai River which flows down the North-East slope of Mount Elgon. His home-made water wheel drove the circular saw and the rawhide belt was regularly chewed up by hyenas at night. His Post Office was Soy, 45 miles away, and all timber had to be moved the 120 miles to railhead at Londiani by ox-wagons without benefit of roads or bridges.
In 1922, with a loan from Henry Mitford-Barberton and in partnership with Sven Lovan and Petter Axelsson, Odin established a new mill further north near the Chepchoine River.
In 1927 Edward Josselyn, late works manager of Arthur Ransome & Co., bought out Loven and Axelsson and two years later with Leigh Norman as third partner yet another mill with up-to-date equipment was built near the Kwoitobbos River. Two of Odin's sons, Odin and Arthur, were by then helping in the family business, and in 1930 Mount Elgon Saw Mills was registered in Uganda. The following year Leigh Norman left the mill and bought a farm near Endebess which he called 'Dunmillin'. When his friends enquired as to the origin of this unusual name, he would only look at them with a twinkle in his very blue eye and we have been left to speculate ever since!
In 1934 Edward Josselyn became the sole owner of what was by now a limited liability company, and his son Dick came out from England to learn the trade, which was a fortunate arrangement as Edward died that same year while on a business trip to Rhodesia. Since then the Mill has been run by his wife and son, but in 1937 'Tub' Roberts joined the firm as manager and in true tradition married the boss's daughter Mary. ……… Fanny Josselyn is now 86 and is going to live in England near her daughter Mary, and Dick's doctors have decreed that he must live at a lower altitude.