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F Company was formed in February 1941 by local residents of five factories, local farms and other local residents. Approximately 420 were members of the company in total, at peak numbers reached 345. Headquarters located at 66, Purley Way, Croydon. The company was under the command of Major S.J. Smith.

Arthur Anderson was born in Scotland, was the founder of the P and O Steamline and lived at Norwood Grove. Extract taken from the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography reads ' By the time of Andersons death in 1868 the P O had the largest commercial fleet of steamships in the world and provided the main link between Britain and its imperial possessions in India, the Far East, and Australia....At his home, The Grove, Norwood, South London, he endowed a working mans institute'. Anderson died of bronchitis at 18 Park Lane, London, on 27 February 1868

John Kenneth Hill was born in 1918 and lived in Craigan Avenue, Addiscombe, until the Hill family moved to Shirley Road in 1934. Around the age of 4 or 5, he developed polio, though within a few years was able to walk without the use of an iron splint. Both John and his brother Colin Hill attended Hadley House preparatory school and then went on to Whitgift. In 1934 John left school and became a junior Insurance Clerk for the North British and Mercantile Insurance Company.

John soon applied to join the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve (RAFVR), but due to his impaired health from the polio was refused on his first application, but was then accepted on his second attempt in 1938.

Pilot Officer John Kenneth Hill was killed on 17 April 1941 when the bomber he was piloting came down in County Wicklow, Ireland, on return from a raid on Berlin. All four crew on board died in the crash.

Harry Guy Simmons (1909-1964) worked as a service mechanic for Croydon Corporation Electricity Department. During World War II he served in No. 9 platoon, G Company, of the 32nd County of London Battalion of the Home Guard, which was made up of Electricity Department staff. He was initially a volunteer, but was promoted to Lance Corporal in about August 1942.

Charlotte Emily Mortimer (born 1867; known as Emily) was a teacher at the Princess Road Board School. She married Harry Marchant in 1896 and had a daughter, Constance Elsie.
She died in 1937.

Mrs Caroline (Carrie) Spratt was a dresser at the Grand Theatre (High Street, Croydon) at the same time as her husband was stage door keeper there.

Abel Garraway was the son of Daniel Garraway, grocer. Daniel died in 1832, when Abel inherited his copyhold property in Croydon, notably a messuage near the Cornmarket. He also owned some freehold property. He later seems to have lived in Hackney and Mitcham, and died in 1860.

Frederick Foss was a solicitor, who was active in the movement for the incorporation of Croydon as a Borough. When the campaign finally succeeded in 1883, he became the Charter Town Clerk: that is, he briefly acted as Town Clerk until the formal election to the post of CM Elborough. In 1886, he was elected to the Council, and he served as Mayor 1892-1893. In July 1893 he was elected Alderman; and later that year he was made a permanent Justice of the Peace. In 1895 Elborough fell ill and eventually died, and Foss again acted as Town Clerk for five months. The present album was given to him in recognition of this work at a Council meeting on 21 Sept 1896 (Croydon Advertiser, 26 Sept 1896). In 1902 he again acted as Town Clerk; and he was given the Freedom of the Borough in 1907.

John Whitgift was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1583 until his death in 1604.

Thomas Bainbridge, active 1778-1818, was a well-known land surveyor and cartographer of estate and enclosure maps. He was based in London in Grays Inn, but worked in all parts of the country.

Henry Grantham was employed as a Gamekeeper on the Ballards Estate, owned by Charles Hermann Goschen. He was born in 1861 in Ewhurst, Surrey

JR Bex, Builders and undertakers, was established by James R Bex in about 1889. It was based at Wyche Grove, South Croydon. The premises were initially unnumbered, but from about 1928 were assigned the number 25: after World War II, the firm extended its business into no 23 - previously a private house occupied by Walter J Bex - and used 23 Wyche Grove as its address. From the turn of the century until about 1916 it also had a timber yard situated on the opposite side of the road.

In about 1873 the firm was taken over by W Cullen and Sons Ltd and it subsequently operated under that name.

The firm appears to have run the two sides of its business in tandem. Some of its account books relate specifically either to building work or to funeral direction, but many relate to both.