Hickman
 The Family Story
The Lost Hickmans

When this photograph was taken around 1952, Archie and sister Mona Capper were two of only three surviving children of Charley Capper and Mona Mary Capper nee Hickman. Their only surviving sister, Lily, lived thousands of miles away in Australia where their other brother, Leslie had died almost twenty years before.

The pair look very happy in this photograph and indeed in life they always maintained a cheerful disposition and were extremely positive. This demeanour however hid a deep-seated loss in their lives carried from childhood - the loss of both their parents.

When, in 1917, both parents died in Crewe, barely in their thirties, they did not only leave four small children but two grief-stricken families - the Cappers of Crewe and the Hickmans of Drayton.

Charley Capper's parents both had died some time before this tragedy but Mona Mary Hickman's parents (and grandparents) out-lived their daughter and in the years that followed witnessed as Mona's children drifted further from their Hickman roots and even from their native country.

Throughout their lives, Mona's children bounced from situation to situation, always seeking to belong, always looking to fulfill the yearning for family but perhaps never fully satisfying this need left by the loss of both parents. Always close despite often being miles apart, family was crucial to them. So what of the significant family they seem to have lost and who lost them: The Hickmans of Market Drayton.