Harry Shelvoke

Who was Harry Shelvoke?

Harry Shelvoke was one of the founding members of the British coachbuilding and engineering company Shelvoke and Drewry. He was one of the last members to bear a family name that is documented to have become extinct in modern times. The name lives on in only three company names connected to Harry's family: the two engineering firms of Accles & Shelvoke, Shelvoke Ltd and Shelvoke Pickering and Janney, a firm of chartered accounts in Cannock, Staffordshire.

He is descended from those associated with Manor of Shelvock in Shropshire and families bearing the name of Shelvock. Historical records show that the spelling variant of Shelvoke is first recorded in 1722 at Eccleshall in Staffordshire, NW of Stafford, before recurring in the 19th-century industrialised West Midlands towns of Wolverhampton and Willenhall, probable ancestors of Harry.

James Shelvoke, Harry's grandfather, headed the family centred in nearby West Bromwich and Aston, part of Birmingham. James married Catharine Harper in Aston in 1833. They had three children:

James - an extinct line