In message <010a01c61e43$3a895a40$6500a8c0@mercury1>, Sue Given <suegiven@vti.com.au> writes >Hi, > >Today, after many years I have finally found one of the 'missing' links. >However it has posed more questions than it has answered and I am hoping someone >on the list may have the answer - maybe Eve - I can live in hope. > >Please excuse the length of tale but it tells the story > >All the information listed below comes from Rootsweb, Ancestry, birth or death >certificate, workhouse records,so most can be backed by 'official' documents. >The only guesswork bits, family stories, are a couple of the dates around 1930 >and Ella ending up institutionalised. > >First the details, then the problem > >Susan Annie Jane Garrett born Lidlington March 1900 >Alfred Joseph Craft born Bedford Sept 1/4 1901 >Ella May Gentel born Bedford March 1/4 1905 > >Susan Annie Jane Garrett married Claude Charles Underwood on 27 November 1920 in >Luton (never divorced). My grandparents >Susan and Claude had 5 boys > >Alfred Joseph Craft married Ella May Gentel Bedford Dec 1/4 1828 >Alfred and Ella had a son Harry born Biggleswade June 1/4 1930 >Story goes that for some reason Ella ended up in a mental hospital when her >son/because her son was taken away could be something like post natal depression (maybe with some danger to the baby). They tended to punish it rather than treat it, and if she was 'put away' the child could well be transferred to the care of other relatives or foster parents > >Susan and the boys were in the Bedford workhouse in 1930 for a while > >1930/1931 Susan and Claude split, he apparently goes to London with new 'wife', >he is killed in 1939. > >1931ish Susan moves in with Alfred and changes name to Craft, A regular pattern of split and regrouping. Divorce was difficult - apart from the expense, it was a matter of finding the absconder to serve papers on him, proving the adultery - and being totally in the clear herself at the time. > they have 4 >daughters and Harry is raised with this family. He joins the RAF 7.7.1948 and >serves in Singapore. After Susan moves in her 3 youngest kids are 'moved out'. >The baby to its grandparents and the other two (age 3 and 5) are taken to Dr >Barnardo's and handed over as unwanted, one is shipped to Australia, the other >was supposed to go to Canada but was sick the day the boat left. Local authorities may have moved in to rescue 'children at risk', but maybe Alfred agreed to take on some of the responsibilities, not all. However, once children were in the workhouse, and were over four, the tie to the mother would be loosened and the Guardians would do what they thought was best for the children, whatever their mother thought or preferred. A new life in a new country was deemed to be the Best Thing for boys in this position, and there were schemes, some good, some bad, for arranging this. Barnardo's itself usually followed up and checked on the welfare of their children, as much as they were alloed to. Other charities did not - out of sight, out of mind. > >One assumes Ella May is still institutionalised. > >Now we jump to 1968. > >Susan, still with Alfred, dies in Bedford General Hospital - age 68. I have had >her death certificate for several years now, but could never figure out, nor >could dad (one of the Barnardo Boys) why she was known by a whole new christian >name. > >Death certificate says Susan Annie Craft other wise Ella May Craft - here in >lies the problem. Probably at some stage, she had been asked to produce her marriage certificate, and rather than admit to the nosey parkers that she had not got one, she produced the one for Alfred's legal marriage, saying she just had a fancy to change her name, as people did. Once the officials had the certificate, she was stuck with it. People (old ones especially) went to a lot of trouble to avoid having the neighbours and public officials know 'their private business'. Admitting to a snotty nosed young madam in Social services that she was not married would have been too much to stand, so she didn't. Just possibly, Social Services concerned would have a note of some investigations - but they are only supposed to keep papers for 50 years, and don't like digging in the dusty attics for the old ones anyway. > >I >Also, can anyone tell me what institution Ella May may have been put in and >would records exist please? By that date, a geriatric hospital (the Old Workhouse with new paintwork.) -- Eve McLaughlin Author of the McLaughlin Guides for family historians Secretary Bucks Genealogical Society