Susan LAWRENCE nee WRIGHT

Before carrying on with researching James LAWRENCE, I realised that I needed to tidy up my research on his wife, Susan.

I had eventually found she'd ended up in Friern Barnet Asylum but I realised the other day that I hadn't updated Family Historian with the census entries I'd found for her! In fact, I hadn't downloaded and saved them to my computer which was a bit naughty, especially as I recall having to be a bit 'creative' to find her in the first place.

So, to recap, Susan WRIGHT married James LAWRENCE on 26 June 1831 in All Hallows Church, Tottenham, Middlesex. She's on the Census in Tottenham in 1841 aged 30. She's on the Census in Tottenham in 1851 aged 40 and she gives her place of birth as Silver Hill, Hertfordshire. She's with her husband, James, and her four eldest children: William, aged 10; Jane, aged 8; Joseph, aged 3 and Eliza, aged 7m. The only other child born to them wasn't born until later in 1851. This child was John whose birth was registered in the December quarter of 1851. He wasn't baptised until 14 January 1855.

On the 1861 Census, James with the five children are living in Tottenham and he says he's married, aged 54 years and born in 'Silver Hill, Not Known' but Susan is not with them.

I tried everything I could to find her! I wondered whether she might have been with her parents and mistakenly ended up with her parents' surname. I wondered whether she was living with another man and perhaps had taken his surname! So I did all sorts of searches over a long period of time but couldn't find her. Then, as a bit of a last chance, I tried initials! I then found an 'S.L.' in the Colney Hatch Asylum in Friern Barnet, Middlesex. This woman is listed as being a married, 49 years old Charwoman born in Herts but parish unknown.

I was then able to find that Ancestry have the UK Lunacy Patients Admission Register for 1846 - 1912. In that, I found an admission entry for Susan LAWRANCE on 13 May 1859 into the Colney Hatch Asylum and that gave the added detail that her date of death was 25 Feb 1887.

This was quite difficult to take in! In 1859, her youngest child was only just over 7 years old, with the other children being William (18), Jane (16), Joseph (12), Eliza (10). I wonder if the job of looking after the home and younger children fell on Jane's young shoulders? Jane did get married 9 years later in 1868, by when John, the youngest, was 17.

But to get back to finding out more about Susan, for the Censuses in 1871 and 1881, there are only initials and no place of birth. However, the entries do say that she's married and a Charwoman so that is consistent. For both the 1871 and 1881 Censuses, the entries do also classify her as 'Lunatic', although the 1861 Census doesn't say this.

I did also identify her death and now have the death certificate. She did, indeed, die on 25 Feb 1887. The details as to her death are very detailed which make me wonder whether there was a post-mortum? The cause of death is given as: 'Decay with abscess of glands of the neck. Fluid in pericardium. Heart soft and dilated. Liver hobnailed. Kidneys congested. Spleen enlarged.' The final piece of information that helps to confirm it as being the correct person is that the occupation is written as 'Charwoman of Edmonton Union' which was indeed the Poor Law Union she would have belonged to.

There is a possibility that there 'might' be records for her in the Asylum at Kew but I haven't yet been able to even think about going anywhere near London, thanks to the Covid 19 pandemic :(

The details of these different Census entries and documents are as follows:

 England; Lunacy Patients Admission Registers; Class: MH 94; Piece: 17

 Census 1861: Ref: Class: RG 9; Piece: 790; Folio: 83; Page: 20; GSU roll: 542701

 

 Census 1871: Ref: Class: RG10; Piece: 1334; Folio: 146; Page: 17; GSU roll: 828277

 

Census 1881: Ref: Class: RG11; Piece: 1373; Folio: 130; Page: 22; GSU roll: 1341334

 

Death Certificate: 25 Feb 1887

 

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