"That Abominable Den" St Peter's Court

St Peter's Court was a small, impoverished court off St Peter's Street, Great Marlow. It was an address with a very bad reputation. 

The first reference to it I find is in 1848 but it was clearly not newly laid out at that time. There were 19 homes in the court which between them were home to at least 85 people. (A second report gives the numbers of people there as 88 adults and 35 children in 19 cottages. Cottages as a description is undoubtedly optimistic given that some are later called hovels)

The Court was right by the river and both sewage from the town was which emptied into the River Thames and the Court's own poorly built cesspool contaminated the wells providing drinking water for the people who lived there. The single privy serving all the homes was persistently overflowing. The whole court was described as "charged with the most offensive effluvia".   At times the resident families literally walked through sewage to get to their tiny homes. Cholera and persistent low fevers plagued them. During the 1849 cholera epidemic in Marlow 3 people in the court died and 8 more became ill. An emergency meeting in the Town Hall saw it organised that the families were removed for the time being to the Old Workhouse in Munday Dean Lane. This had been let to someone who at first refused to allow the parish to take back any of the space but relented. The St Peter's Court houses were to be disinfected. Some may have been demolished as a direct response to the cholera- that plan was mooted at the time and certainly the 19 houses of 1849 had become only 5 in number by 1871. 

In the early 1860s the single cesspit that all the residents shared was replaced by a new one. But still just the one.

In 1867 the Reading Mercury referred to "St Peter's Court" as "that notorious court". The case it was reporting was of James Spark(e)s, convicted of assaulting fellow resident Sarah Stacey. Few other court cases seem to involve the people of the Court. But wretched poverty went hand in hand with a presumption of bad character in the popular imagination of the day.

I found five households in the Court on the 1871 census. There were two households headed by a James Sparks so it isn't possible to be sure which one was the James of the assault case. One James Sparks was a labourer aged 46. He lived with his wife Maria who was a 53 year old laundress and their children George aged 21, James aged 18, Thomas aged 15 and Martha aged 12. Martha was a scholar, her brothers all labourers.

The second head of household James Sparks was aged 60 and a coal porter. He lived with his 50 year old wife Sarah, 21 year old son William a spinner of something I couldn't decipher, 18 year old labouring son Henry, 14 year old labouring son James and 7 year old scholar daughter Mary.

Sarah Stacey was not still in St Peter's Court in 1871 though there was a Stacey family headed by 29 year old bricklayer William and his 24 year old laundress wife Elizabeth (née Sadler, married Marlow 1864). The only named victim of the 1849 cholera epidemic in the Court which I could find was a  Stacey- William aged 40. William was described as a person of "most moderate and temperate habits"  and previously in good health. He left a pregnant wife and 6 children, who had no choice but to go to the workhouse. 

The other families in the Court in 1871 were the Illsley family headed by James a 57 year old labourer and Elizabeth his 68 year old wife and the Grove family headed by Thomas a 40 year old labourer and Mary his 35 year old wife [Elizabeth Illsley was nee Grove]. On the 1861 census Thomas is more specific and calls himself a wharf labourer. He lived then with Mary in "St Peter's Street". It is possible this was actually St Peter's Court not being given a separate address by the census enumerator. The elder Sparks couple are also censused as living in St Peter's Street 1861. Remember that the Court was already occupied in 1848. Someone had to be living there in 1861.

Thomas Grove was fined for being drunk one evening in St Peter's Street in 1874. He was aghast at the charge insisting he had been more drunk plenty of times when out with "swells" on the river than he had been that evening. This suggests that he was one of the many Marlow men who earned money by taking well-off tourists out on the river and guiding them to the best fishing spots. The fact that his co-accused in the drunkenness incident was William one of the Shaw family, boat proprietors and fishermen, of Marlow supports that. Both men were unusually confident in Court, challenging the witnesses against them when they spoke. Still the charge was a minor one. Nothing to make the Court seem a terrible "den". Thomas had nearly two decades previously spent a month in jail for stealing filbert nuts from a tree belonging to the vicar but this does not relate to his time at St Peter's Court.

James Illsley had a conviction for stealing in his younger days but again not when living at St Peter's Court. His daughter Sarah, a needlewoman, in 1873 and described as of "St Peter's Street" was a witness against Isabella Quelch who had stolen various articles from the well off Morgan family of that street. One of the articles was some calico which Isabella gave to Sarah to work up. For more on this case see this post. There was no blame or suspicion attached to Sarah. 

The poor quality buildings of the Court were seen as an eyesore and embarrassment for the town.

In 1875 it was announced that the Court was to be demolished and more salubrious housing put in place of it. The Bucks Herald reporting this said that everyone would be glad such "an abominable den" would be swept away (the people set to lose the only home which they could afford presumably not included).

The Illsleys moved out to St Peter's Street at first. The cottage they rented there was in 1877 stated as being unfit for human habitation because it was in an insanitary state and in need of substantial repairs. The landlord William Crook blamed the Illsleys for the insanitary condition of the cottage and said he had removed them and was going to do the structural repairs necessary for safety. The Illsleys were camped outside their former home, presumably hoping to be able to go back in once repairs were done or simply having nowhere else to go. It was then in the middle of winter. By 1881 they were in Dean Street where we can only hope they had at last the decent home they deserved. 

The Staceys ended up apparently in Turville and the younger Sparks couple went to Oxford Road. The Groves lived later in Oxford Road too and Station Road, where Mary died in 1892.

Researched and written by Charlotte Day with additional research by Kathryn Day. 

Related Posts:

Poverty in Victoria and Edwardian Marlow here

To find all mentions of your ancestor here, use the A-Z Person index in the top drop down menu. For other posts about general Marlow history including other poverty and medical related posts, see the General Marlow History section also in the top drop down menu.  

©Marlow Ancestors. You are welcome to use my research for family or local history purposes with credit to this blog.

Census information always  remains Crown Copyright.

Sources:

The Third Report Of The Commisioners Appointed To Inquire Into The Best Means Of Preventing The Pollution Of Rivers [Royal Commission] 1866. Published by G.E Eyre and W Spottiswoode.

Censuses my transcription from microfilm.

Newspapers, available British Library:

Bucks Herald 11 August 1849, 30th October 1875 and 27th January 1877.

Bucks Chronicle 6 Nov 1848

Reading Mercury 22nd June 1867 and 12th September 1857.

Parish registers, my old transcription.