William Whorlow Bunting

William Whorlow was the elder son of William Ellis Bunting. William Ellis and his brother Alfred came into the business  in the early 1880's. Upon the death of his father in 1916 William Whorlow became the sole proprietor. He married Alice Bull in 1895 but they remained childless.

William Whorlow became quite active in local affairs being a Town Councillor, Justice of the Peace, an Overseer, President of the Boy Scouts Association and a deacon of Lion Walk Congregational Church. He set up the Bunting Rooms Gymnasium off Culver Street, in 1909 and in his will left the building in Trust for the use of Colchester Boy Scouts. The "Bunting Rooms" were subsequently relocated to their present position in Essex Street, behind the Playhouse.

1920 saw the centenary of the business and William Whorlow had an illustrated souvenir card (right) printed and issued to mark the occasion. This souvenir showed portraits of the principals of the Lexden Road business past and present, with a list of the firm's employees past and present on the reverse, also recording the names of those who served and perished in the service of their country during the First World War. 

A rift between the two divisions of the family following the split between William Ellis and his brother Alfred, deepened when the childless William Whorlow left the entire business upon his death to an employee, with a proviso that his widow should receive £250 per annum from the profits.

William Whorlow appears to have greatly overestimated the employee's abilities, for within four of five years of William Whorlow's death the business had failed and closed down. Fortunately the side of the business set up by Alfred, later joined by his son Eric, prospered and Eric stepped in to purchase the trading title of Bunting & Sons for the princely sum of £100, ensuring the continuation of the name and the firm to the present day.