Stephen Charles Wade Holmes and Anna Emma Birch were married in Ipswich in 1886, a year after their first child, Percy, was born. They had five more children, Edith, Alexander James, Alfred Stephen, Daisy and Reginald.
In 1891, they lived in Spring Cottages on Melton Road with their eldest four children. Stephen worked as a carpenter. Around 1898, the family moved away from Melton to live in Bedford Road, Ilford, Essex, where their last two children were born. By 1911, however, they were back in Melton with Stephen’s widowed mother, Mary Ann Holmes. Their new address was Chesapeake Villa on Melton Road.
Three of their sons, Percy, Alexander and Alfred, enlisted and served during the Great War.