According to Simon Willis in his book ‘How our Ancestors Died‘, at least one in six people died of tuberculosis during the Victorian period. Tuberculosis was also known as phthisis as well as consumption.
My own family (as well as those families living in Great Ellingham), were no exception in being affected by this disease.
My Great Grandfather’s Family
Robert Hawes was born in South Lopham in 1847. He is my great grandfather.
One of nine children born to George and Rose Hawes, Robert was their only child to reach ‘old age’. He died at the grand old age of 92.
Whilst three of his younger siblings did not thrive and survive their first year (and another brother died of epilepsy), four of Robert’s siblings died of phthisis.
Samuel at the age of 12, Walter at 27, James 30 and Sophia at the age of 34. At least three of them suffered from the disease for around 1-2 years. Apart from the infants, they all died between 1862 and 1886.
Indeed Robert’s wife (Eliza nèe Womack) later succumbed to the disease at the age of 51 in 1894.
Great Ellingham
A death certificate will usually contain the cause of death. Accordingly, I know that 34 year old Robert High and 30 year old Alfred Cook both died of consumption in Great Ellingham. Robert High in 1891 and Alfred Cook in 1894.
Further, John Penson’s wife, Nelly (formerly Ellen Downes), also fell victim to the disease in 1929.
George & Louisa Edwards
Here we look at the story of Great Ellingham born George Edwards and his wife Louisa. They too died from the disease – and within weeks of each other.
George
George William Edwards was born in Great Ellingham on the 12th December, 1854. His parents, Jeremiah and Sarah (nèe Lincoln), took infant George for baptism at St James’s Church on the 1st April, 1855.
He was the first child to be born to the couple following their marriage which took place in Deopham on the 29th October, 1852. However, George was not Sarah’s first child. She had given birth to Martha Lincoln in 1849.
Wood Lane, Little Ellingham
The 1861 census captures 34 year old Jeremiah Edwards with his 30 year old wife Sarah in Wood Lane, Little Ellingham. With the couple are their children 6 year old George and three year old Ellis.
The household also includes 13 year old William Harvey and 11 year old Martha Lincoln. These two children are described as step-children to Jeremiah Edwards. On his marriage to Ann Maria Fox in 1874, William Harvey gives his father’s name as Jeremiah Edwards. Likewise, at the time of Martha Lincoln’s marriage to George Skitmore in 1871, she too gives her father’s name as Jeremiah Edwards.
The census also confirms that Jeremiah Edwards was born in Great Ellingham. His wife Sarah nèe Lincoln was born in Deopham. George and Ellis were also born in Great Ellingham, William Harvey in Cley (Norfolk) and Martha Lincoln in Deopham.
Notes from an Almanac dated 1859 owned by the Edwards family
Courtesy Jane Sayliss
The above page from an 1859 Almanac owned by the Edwards family lists the birth dates of Jeremiah and Sarah’s sons George and Ellis.
In addition, the list includes the birth and death dates for Martha Lincoln. However the two entries do not relate to the same ‘Martha Lincoln’. Whilst the Martha Lincoln with the birth date of June 2, 1849, refers to Sarah’s daughter, the death date refers to Sarah’s sister Martha Lincoln. She died in Great Ellingham in the November of 1862 at the age of 26. Martha Lincoln also died from consumption.
Bow Street, Great Ellingham
Nevertheless by 1871, Jeremiah Edwards moved his family to Bow Street, Great Ellingham.
The census of that year finds 47 year old Jeremiah with his 37 year old wife Sarah and their sons William 22, George 16 and Ellis 13. George is an apprentice shoemaker.
Ten years’ later, 26 year old shoemaker George Edwards is still living with his parents in Bow Street. However two weeks after the 1881 census, George marries local girl Louisa Rix.
Louisa
Born in 1864, Louisa Charlotte Rix was baptised in the Church of St James, Great Ellingham on the 23rd March, 1864. She was the sixth daughter of Great Ellingham farmer Thomas Rix and his wife Eliza (nèe Rix). Three years’ later, Eliza Rix gave birth to a son, Benjamin Robert. Sadly the child died the same year.
Louisa’s father Thomas Rix was some 42 years older than her mother Eliza. Accordingly it is no surprise that Louisa was only 6 years old when her father died at the age of 76 in February 1870.
Long Street
The 1871 census finds 34 year old widow Eliza Rix living in Long Street, Great Ellingham. With her are her daughters Emma Elizabeth 18, Mary Ann 16, Elizabeth Victoria 11, Anna Eliza 9 and seven year old Louisa Charlotte. Lodging with the Rix family is 28 year old labourer William Kerrison. Eliza Rix would go on to marry William Kerrison within the next two years.
Louisa’s Daughter Anna Eliza
On the 29th November, 1880, Louisa gave birth to a daughter.
The Kerrisons lived in one of the above cottages in Church Street
On the 3rd April, 1881, the national headcount finds 17 year old Louisa Rix with her four-month-old daughter Anna Eliza living with her mother Eliza and step-father, William Kerrison, in Church Street, Great Ellingham.
Marriage
However some two weeks after the census, 18 year old Louisa Charlotte Rix marries 26 year old bootmaker George William Edwards. The marriage took place on the 16th April, 1881, at St James’s Church, where Louisa’s daughter would be baptised two weeks’ later.
Church of St James, Great Ellingham
Birth of Son
George and Louisa’s son, George William Edwards, was born in Great Ellingham in 1883. Both his birth registration and his baptism entry of 13th July, 1884, refer to him as ‘William George Edwards’.
George Snr becomes Unwell
George and Louisa together with children Anna Eliza and George (William George) likely began their married life in Great Ellingham.
It may not have been long after the marriage that boot and shoemaker George Edwards became unwell. In an undated letter which I believe George wrote to his parents (Jeremiah and Sarah) whilst he and Louisa were living in Great Ellingham, George describes how unwell he has been.
Extracts from an undated letter believed to have been written by George Edwards to his parents, Jeremiah & Sarah Edwards
Courtesy Jane Sayliss
George begins his letter:
My dear Mother and Father
I write these few lines to you hoping they will meet you both quite well as it leaves me very sadly at present. I have been very bad since I see you. I have not been out since Tuesday week till to day. About half an hour the wind hold so sharp and cold my cough have troubled me more this last 3 days than it hast ever done …
George goes on to say
“...the doctors came and examined me all over on Tuesday. I ask him wither there was any danger he said no he said all he want to do is to stop my cough then he said I should get better and then put me onto some strengthning medicine …”
It also seems that George and Louisa’s son George is also unwell, as George mentions that “the boy have had a bad cold”.
He signs off the letter “from your Son and Daughter G. L. Edwards” As it was fairly common for people to sign off missives using their initials, and we know that George was suffering from phthisis for some two years prior to his death, I have no doubt that the letter was written by George Edwards to his parents.
Louisa dies in Hingham
At some point prior to July 1887 (when Louisa died), George and Louisa (presumably with the children Anna Eliza and George William), moved to Hingham.
24 year old Louisa Charlotte Edwards died in Hingham on the 31st July 1887. The death registration describes her as the wife of George Edwards, shoemaker of Hingham. George was with his wife when she died of phthisis. The very same disease from which he was also suffering.
Back to Great Ellingham
Following his wife’s death, George and the two children came back to Great Ellingham.
George and his son went to his parents, Jeremiah and Sarah Edwards, in Bow Street. I believe that Louisa’s daughter, Anna Eliza Rix (then aged 6), went to live with her maternal grandmother Eliza Kerrison (formerly Eliza Rix) and her husband William Kerrison in Church Street.
George dies in Great Ellingham
Sadly George only survived his wife by around 8 weeks. He died at his parents’ home in Bow Street on the 25th September, 1887 aged 31.
Whilst his wife Louisa was buried in Hingham, George Edwards was buried in the churchyard of St James’s Church. Although George’s headstone mentions his parents, Jeremiah and Sarah, it does not mention his late wife Louisa.
The Two Children
Following the death of both George and Louisa Edwards, young George (who was just 4 when his parents died), continued to live with his paternal grandparents, Jeremiah and Sarah Edwards.
George William Edwards married Elizabeth Lincoln in 1904 and they lived at Tanyard Farm Cottages.
Louisa’s daughter, Anna Eliza Rix, continued to live with her maternal grandmother Eliza and her second husband, William Kerrison.
Following the death of Eliza Kerrison in 1896, Anna Eliza continued to live with her step-grandfather. Sadly, Anna Eliza Rix died in 1903 in tragic circumstances. Like her mother before her, Anna left two young children.
Sources:
Willis, Simon. (2013) ‘Tuberulosis’ How Our Ancestors Died. Pen & Sword Books Ltd., Page numbers 169 to 175
Death Certificates. Members of the Hawes family obtained from the General Record Office (GRO)
Images of Death Registrations for Robert High, Alfred Cook, George Edwards & Louisa Charlotte Edwards obtained online from GRO
Great Ellingham Parish Registers. Norfolk Record Office. PD609. Also available via FamilySearch website and Ancestry
Deopham with Hackford Parish Registers. PD485. Norfolk Record Office. Also available via www.ancestry.co.uk
Hingham Parish Registers. Norfolk Record Office. PD575. Also available via www.ancestry.co.uk
Pension family documents. Lucinda Bell-Tye
Edwards family documents. Jane Sayliss
1861 census RG9/1237/110
1871 census RG10/1841/80 & RG/1841/92
1881 census RG11/1974/96 & RG11/1974/84
1891 census RG12/1549/72 & RG12/1549/69
1901 census RG13/1867/70 & RG13/1867/72