*Please be aware that the contents of this post includes historic information that may be distressing to read related to the Anson, Moody, Bowles, Anderson and Neighbour families.*
Jane Ann Moody was born to agricultural labourer William and wife Jane of St Peter's Street, Great Marlow in 1856. We have chosen to feature her as she represents a tale of survival. Life for the men and women of the working class Victorian Marlow was often extremely tough and the reality of the existence of those on the lowest income bracket can be shocking to read to modern Marlow residents long separated from this period. We will tell Jane's story honestly but also fairly. She did not conform to the moral standards of the day and as such was always going to be looked down upon by some in authority. We want to flesh out some the official details of her life so her struggles can be put into context.
By the time she was 15 years old Jane had moved to Dean Street with her parents and siblings, a densely populated working class area of town. It was about this time that the young girl met the teenage William "Billy" Bowles, grandson of the then landlady of the Cherry Tree pub also in Dean Street. He worked as a hawker. William's grandfather Thomas Bowles had died under tragic circumstances when still young - you can read more about it and the Cherry Tree here. He was therefore from a family that knew hardship. But it was also one that had came back from disaster, thanks to the strength and determination of his grandmother Emma. William and Jane began to court each other openly - their young age and relative lack of supervision was commented on later but they remained together for something like 7 years. Their relationship was by all accounts tempestuous at times, driven by mutual jealousy. They began to fight both verbally and physically. When Jane was 18 she took out a summons on William for assaulting her but the case was settled out of court.
A Poor Diet Leads To Tragedy
If Jane and William had to deal with gossip about their relationship before, it was going to get a lot harder after 1876 when Jane fell pregnant. At the time of the baby's birth, the couple had not married which was another black mark against them in the eyes of society. This infant would sadly not live beyond a few months. An inquest was held at the Duke Of Cambridge, and the doctor described the child's emaciated condition. But the coroner's jury was quick and specific to state that they cleared Jane of any charge of neglect. She had made a mistake it was said, and had weaned the child when it was just a few days old, feeding the little one on cornflour and sugar paste with milk. Surgeon Shone who completed the post mortem said such a diet was nutritionally insufficient and the child had never thrived and therefore died of natural causes hastened by malnourishment. It should be noted that very early weaning of children was not at all uncommon in this period. Some of the papers made much of the fact that the bereaved mother was called into the court room and given a "severe reprimand" as to regards her future conduct. (Moral that is, not as regards to infant care). But let's also look at what the more sympathetic sources had to say. They stated that Jane was at this point living in lodgings with one of her sisters, and both girls had gone to work all day every day. As an unmarried women Jane could not simply become a stay at home mother and still support her child, nor could she take the baby to work with her. She needed to have the baby fed while she was away, and while the cornflour and sugar mix seems to us a strange feed, it was in fact a standard feeding mixture of the time for babies old enough to be truly weaned. The surgeon stated that the diet should have been primarily milk based and Jane's error was in the thinking the balance should be different. What's more the initial decision to "dry nurse" or wean the child was made because of Jane's poor physical state of health immediately after the birth.
Two years later, Jane was pregnant again and William Bowles was the acknowledged father of this boy, known as William Moody. He paid a weekly sum for maintenance, as ordered by a court. The couple still did not marry however, which further blackened her reputation.
Body Found In The River
In 1878, the relationship of Jane and William was going through a particularly difficult time. She had begun to see other men, at least according to rumour, but William declared he still loved her. Sadly, a young woman, Matilda Neighbour*, decided to cause a little trouble, although she may have been motivated to protect William too. In any case she went to the Cherry Tree where William was to be found and told him that Jane was with another man (a relative of hers) and that if he didn't believe her perhaps he should come and see. William left, and his grandmother told Matilda off, asking her not to come to her premises with such gossip. It seems William did see Jane walking with another man, as well as others, and according to some, a fight broke out although who was involved exactly is hard to pick out from confused accounts given later. Jane said William had threatened to kill her, struck her, and dragged her by the hair. John Neighbour, of whom William had been jealous, intervened. She said they had actually agreed to separate a few days before, but William did not want to be replaced as a sweetheart so soon. (Jane denied there was a successor to her affections and said John Neighbour was actually the sweetheart of another.) Ultimately Jane was said to be aggrieved at William acting in an possessive way as she saw it, and told him to go home as she did not want him. These words were alleged to weigh heavily on the young man. A few days later, William was found floating face down in the river near the bottom of St Peter's Street. His lifeless body was retrieved by John Clark Truss of the adjacent Two Brewers pub, where the inquest into his death was also held. Much was naturally made of the events of the days leading up to his death and the reports tend to hold Jane to blame for it, although a verdict of "found drowned" was recorded rather than suicide. One declared that Jane was a young woman of "considerable notoriety" in the neighborhood of Marlow, and that the case shone a dark light into the immoral "going ons" in the Dean Street area.
But there is another fact the newspapers skip over. Jane was living with her sister in a cottage in Dean Street that had been previously declared as unfit for human habitation. Numerous orders were made to force the owners to clean it up and provide proper sanitation, most of which were ignored. Finally some work (but not all that was required) had been done and Jane had found a home there. Would those who criticized Jane for being always out, have happily stayed in in such a premises? The neighbouring cottage was let to another woman tarred with the same brush as Jane, the "notorious" Eliza Anderson.**
What's That In Your Apron?
By 1881, Jane and her little boy were back living with her parents and numerous younger siblings elsewhere in Dean's Street - sometimes they were also living in Hatches Row, off Dean Street. The next few years were eventful for her. It started with a 10 shilling fine for stealing some rape greens (used like spring greens, a common edible of the past and only recently "rediscovered" here as a gourmet vegetable) growing in a farm field. A number of other woman were caught in the same sweep - this kind of harvest or turnip greens were a common subject of crop rustling as they were easy to gather quickly. The woman had collected them in their aprons and when challenged they claimed to be gathering primroses. This claim unfortunately fell apart when the ladies were ordered to empty their aprons! Some time after this, Jane was also amongst a group of woman caught taking mushrooms from some fields belonging to the Wethered family. In this instance she escaped a fine despite pleading guilty as the Wethereds declined to press the charges further. They had suffered a plague of mushroom thefts and so wanted to make a point without making a particular example of the women. They hoped the summons to court would act as a deterrent for others.
A little later Jane fell out with a lady, Sarah West*** of Marefield Passage, also located off Dean Street. What the two bickered over the records don't really make clear but Sarah went to court asking that Jane be bound over to keep the peace against her. Sarah said Jane would follow her up the street and swear at her and call her names, to the point Sarah was in fear of her life. However once Jane had spoke in her own defence, the case was dismissed.
In 1884 Jane was pregnant with another illegitimate child, young Nellie. It was her fifth child according to statements reported as uttered by Jane during a maintenance order hearing. This does not quite tally with the numbers of her then children given elsewhere. Regardless, she said the current babies father was William Price but she was denied a maintenance order for "lack of corroborating evidence".
Jane would go on to marry William Anson. He was usually described as a general labourer at this time.
Happily Ever After?
Jane, her husband, and her two illegitimate children moved eventually to Primrose Lea, another fairly crowded group of houses adjacent to Dean Street (the place name remains but none of the housing). Was this the start of happier times for the troubled woman? Sadly for her children in particular, the answer is no. We have written many posts about the number of drinking establishments to be found in Marlow, and in the Dean Street/Marefield area of Marlow in particular at this time. If you had sorrows to drown, there was plenty of opportunity to do so on your doorstep. Tragically, William appears to have been an alcoholic, or at least a heavy drinker unable to hold his drink. Numerous convictions for drunk and disorderly behaviour and/or using obscene language while under the influence came his way. But William was not a happy drunk winding his way home singing merrily with a few swear words thrown in. In the words of Inspector Pearce of Marlow police, Anson became "nearly mad" when in drink. On one day in 1908 the officers were called because Anson was rolling drunk and carrying an axe. He chopped up every single piece of furniture in the couple's home. (In Church Road. In this period both of what's now part of Trinity Road and Wethered Road were called Church Road but in this case Wethered Road was meant).The next day he was drunk and armed with an axe again, this time he was apparently attempting to chop up some wooden clothes pegs and the washing. Without much success naturally. It's a miracle he didn't loose a limb! He bravely plead not guilty to behaving in a disorderly fashion on this occasion but given the witness and obvious state of his belongings, he was found guilty and fined. This was not his last conviction for something similar. A few weeks later, Jane had finally had enough. She said he had deserted her and so begged for a separation order to be made. This entitled Jane to live apart from him without legal harassment to re join the marital home. She was granted it along with a maintenance order for a weekly sum to be paid by her husband for the care of her youngest daughter Maude. Jane explained that her husband had even before this time frequently stayed away from work. She had found him at the Cherry Tree or slumped drunk on their doorstep on such occasions. He in his defence accused her of being a heavy drinker herself but I have found no convictions for any public misdemeanours on her part of this kind. At the separation order hearing, a weary policeman stated that really Anson's problems were all alcohol related and if only he could stay sober, he'd get on well. (In 1891 William Anson was described as a labourer at the Gas Works which were off Dean Street very close to the couple's home. He may have still been working there at this point.)
Afterword
Anson did not learn his lesson straight away as at least one more drunkenness related conviction followed in 1909. But let us hope he did so eventually, because as is so often the case, Jane would return to live with her husband. In 1911 both he and the couple's son Charles who lived with them were described as wood cutters. A tragically comic occupation for Anson given his form with an axe. In the 1910s the couple lived in what is now called Wethered Road. This blog deals with the pre First World War period primarily but we must finish by saying that Jane lived to the age of 83, dying in 1939.
* Matilda Neighbour age 17 was the daughter of Dean Street general dealer William Neighbour and wife Jane a needlewoman.
** The owner of the two cottages (James Meakes) wrote a defensive letter to the South Bucks Free Press after the Moody/Bowles case. He does not mention the fact his properties were in a poor state or that they had been condemned. Instead he wishes to defend himself from the charge of renting to two girls of poor repute. He says they were not in fact his tenants but their respective fathers were. He said Jane Moody's father had declared he wanted the property for a daughter of his who was soon to get married. Mr Anderson had rented the other because he declared he had a small home and large family so wanted a second cottage to put some of the children in! The landlord added that both girls had now moved out and so "all difficulty in the matter as far as I'm concerned is removed". Except of course terrible living conditions for the next tenant!
*** Sarah West's son William John Stacey features in a post here
Written and researched by Kathryn Day.
Other related posts:
All mentions of a person can be found in the A-Z person index in the top drop down menu where you will find more than 4,000 people mentioned. The same menu has options for post listings of more detailed entries relating to specific individuals and families.
More beer sellers than bakers : temperance in Marlow here
Crime and disorder in old Marlow - here and images of the police court at which Jane made her several appearances here
History of the gas works where William Anson worked: here
More on the history of some of the streets/addresses mentioned above can be found here
Every day life in old Great Marlow when Jane lived here here
SOURCES INCLUDE:
Census 1841,1851,1861,1871,1881,1891 - Transcribed from the original microfilm by Jane Pullinger and Charlotte Day
Judicial case notes for Great Marlow Petty Sessions compiled by Jane Pullinger in 1975, and used with thanks.
Maidenhead Advertiser 5 April 1876, copy from the British Library archive.
Reading Mercury 1 April 1876
Berkshire Chronicle 28 April 1883
Bucks Herald 8 November 1884.
South Bucks Standard 7 August 1908.
England and Wales Death Registration Index 1837-2007", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVHP-QKBB Jane A Anson, 1939.
South Bucks Free Press 23rd August 1878.
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