Five more daughters, five more stories

In my previous post, I traced the life stories of the two eldest daughters of Thomas Crayden Swift, and described their emigration to Iowa to build new lives in the United States. In this post, I tell the stories of the five younger daughters.

In the 1861 census, four of these five daughters - aged from 22 through to 11 - are listed as living at home with their parents, Thomas Crayden and Ann Swift, together with their older brother, William, and older sister, Elizabeth. (Sarah Sands Swift is somewhere else it seems).

The young women must have formed a close relationship because, as will be seen below, some of the sisters end up living under the same roof again at various points in their later lives. 

As the Victorian daughters of a man of at least some local standing - the local butcher, registrar, and post office agent - their father's plans for their futures may well have revolved around arrangements for their marriages. The stories below show, however, that one of the daughters at least had less 'conventional' plans in mind ...

1) Ann Stroud Swift - an 'upwardly mobile' Swift

The oldest of these five remaining daughters, Ann Stroud Swift, was born in 1839, at Eastchurch on the Isle of Sheppey, and lived there until her marriage to John Edmunds in 1867.

John Edmunds was the same age as Ann, the son of a Clapham 'coachman'. It's not clear from the records exactly how Ann and John had been introduced although his childhood addresses - Streatham and Paddington - are also places where some of the Crayden Swifts can also be traced around this time.

His 1851 address, 24 Bathurst Mews, Paddington, is an understandable street for his coachman father to have lived in - a mews full of stables for horses - although perhaps a more sought after address today than it would have been back then.

Bathurst Mews from Google Maps

In the 1861 census, John has left home and is working as a shop assistant - but living at an upmarket address - 3, Suffolk Street, close to Haymarket, in the household of a "wine merchant and tea dealer". However, after their marriage in 1867, the 1871 census shows John living with Ann, and their young daughter Eleanor, in Fitzrovia, as part of the household of Ann's older brother, butcher Samuel Crayden Swift. Also living at the address, 95 Bolsover Street, are nephew Edward and sister Sarah Sands Swift:

The Edmunds living at 95 Bolsover Street in the 1871 census

In the 1871 census (above), John Edmunds had been listed just as a "grocer". In fact, the 1874 baptism records for their second son, Arthur, listed John's trade only as a "joiner". However, in the 1881 census for their new address on Pentonville Road, his trade is now listed as "drysalter". That's apparently an occupation that could involve working with quite a range of products - including dyes and glues as well as food additives. Helpfully, the baptism record for their short-lived daughter Annie Graves (wrongly listed as 'Alice' in the register) describes his profession more precisely as "baking powder and sauce manufacturer":

By 1891, the family are now living in a well-to-do property in Barnsbury Park, Islington. John Edmunds is listed as a "manufacturing drysalter". This son of a coachman was clearly now doing rather well for himself. 

The Edmunds' address - 18 Barnsbury Park, Islington

This time it's the youngest sister, Susannah, who is also part of the household - and apparently also working for the business - as a "Superintendent, Manufacturing Drysalter". Mary Swift, Samuel Crayden Swift's widow, is also living with them. I wonder if any of the inheritance that had been left to Mary after her husband's death in 1877 had helped to provide John Edmunds with some of the capital he needed to grow his business?

The Edmunds living at 18 Barnsbury Park in the 1891 census

As another indication of their acquired wealth, their eldest son Crayden Edmunds is listed at a different address in the 1891 census - that of Christ's Hospital - the public school then based in Newgate Street in the City of London.

Crayden Edmunds listed as an 18 year old scholar

Crayden's later 'alumni records' for St. John's College Cambridge say "son of Joseph, manufacturing dry-salter, of London [and Ann Stroud Swift]. b. June 5, 1872, in Marylebone, London. School, Christ's Hospital. B.A. 1894; M.A. 1898. Secretary to the Calcutta Auxiliary of the British and Foreign Bible Society, 1895-1900; Assistant in Editorial Dept., London, 1900-11. Died Apr. 7, 1911, at N. Finchley. He married Annie Smart in Fort Bengal in India in 1896". This is the record of life that is a long way removed from his family roots! 

When Crayden's father and Ann's husband, Joseph, died in 1908, he left £1196 to their two sons - about £170,000 in today's values - to Crayden - described above - and Arthur, described as a "master in surgery" - a rather more refined version of the trade than the butchers trade carried out by most of his uncles! 

The 1911 census shows Arthur, a 'consulting surgeon' living in Queen Anne's Street - just off Harley Street - with two servants and his sister Eleanor. She appears to have joined her other brother, Crayden, in working for the "British and Foreign Bible Society", to make more bibles available to the world ...

So , through a marriage that may have initially only been to a "grocer" or "joiner",  Ann Stroud Edmunds - née Swift - ended up becoming the wife of a successful manufacturer and with her children moving decidedly upwards through England's class structure. She died in 1906, at the age of 68, and was buried in a plot in Brompton Cemetery. Her burial was recorded as the "fifth internment" in plot 84.0 x 57.6 - alongside her daughter Annie Graves, the "fourth internment". 

But who were the first three internments? A search through the Brompton Cemetery records eventually revealed a final sad footnote - three young deaths, two very young indeed:

The first burial in the plot was John's younger sister Maria Edmunds, recorded as dying in 1876 at 95 Bolsover Street, at the age of only 24. The second and third burials turn out to be two more infant deaths to go alongside that of Annie in 1881. Both appear to have occurred when the family must have been living at another Paddington address, 38 Craven Road, London W2. Herbert died in 1878, aged 18 months, and Amelia Constance in 1879, aged just 7 months.

So, the sudden wealth created from 'dry-salter' manufacturing may have brought with it very different aspirations for their surviving children but the memory of these young deaths must have also been a reminder of the struggles that faced the majority of people, including those Swifts and Edmunds who did not end up with Ann and Joseph's wealth.

2) Sarah Sands Swift - a 'downwardly mobile' Swift ?!

The relatively few facts that can be traced on Sarah Sands Swift's life-story stand out as being different from all the other younger sisters. Instead of marriage into a comfortable London life, Sarah Sands marries a Yorkshire miner:

Born in Eastchurch, on the Isle of Sheppey, in 1841, the first time she appears as an adult in the census records is 1871 - when she is already thirty. Even then, her exact address is unclear as she is only listed as a "visitor" at her brother's home in Bolsover Street (see picture above under Ann Stroud Swift). The only hint at her possible early adult life is the occupation listed - "Governess".

Sarah Sands Swift's birth recorded in "Sheppey" in 1841.

In the 1881 census, she is one of three sisters living in her widowed father's household in Barnsdale Road, Paddington - but no longer with any profession listed. The other sisters are Susanna and Eleanor, accompanied by her husband, Richard Bennetts, and their three children:

Sarah S Swift - living in her father's household in 1881.

Sarah Sands must have decided she wanted to marry, but to marry into a different kind of life. Her 1888 marriage record shows, unlike all of her sisters' marriages, that her husband is a miner, the son of another miner, from West Gorton, Manchester. Thomas Crayden Swift, on the other hand, is listed as "gentleman"!

Sadly, there's no information to explain how the relationship came about. The marriage certificate gives Sarah's address as 24 Stonefield Street, Islington - the house where her father had died two years earlier. Had Sarah perhaps waited until after her father's death to make her own choices in life? But why West Gorton and how had she met her husband John Shaw? It's a mystery!

Followers of football history may have also spotted another detail. St.Marks (West Gorton) is none other than the name of the church football team that had recently  been formed - and was then to become Manchester City Football Club!

The age difference between wife and husband is clear on the marriage record. In fact, the gap is actually larger - because Sarah, baptised in September 1841, is already 46, not 44. That underestimation of her age is continued in later census records too. 

The 1891 census - where a married 'Sarah Shaw' from the 'Isle of Sheppey' is listed as a 'visitor' to a home in Mexborough, Yorkshire - gives her age as 40 (at least a decade out !). But, as another intriguing detail, it also describes Sarah as being "blind right eye".

The 1901 and 1911 censuses record her age (54, then 64) as being based on a birth year of 1847 - settling on a consistent six years underestimation. The couple are by then living in Wath on Deane, Yorkshire, John Shaw's town of birth. While, in 1901, John seems to have had a promotion to "Coal Mine Official", by 1911 he is simply a "Coal Miner / Hewer".

The last record I have traced that shows the couple living together is a 1921 Electoral Register for Brampton Road, in nearby West Melton:

The couple listed on the 1921 Electoral Register

One last record - for the 1929 electoral register - perhaps after John's death, shows Sarah Sands as having returned to London to live with her sister Susannah in Finchley. She dies there soon after at the age of 88 - and, this time, the death registration agrees on her actual age ...

3) Frances Mary Swift - a marriage into significant wealth

Up until the 1880s, the ancestry records of Frances Mary Swift tell a story that reads similarly at first to that of her older sister, Sarah Sands - working as a Governess but still living as an unmarried woman in her father's household. But, for Frances Mary, the eventual marriage is not to a lowly coal miner but to a wealthy physician and surgeon:

Once again, Frances Mary is born in Eastchurch, Sheppey, and, once again, the census records show her living with her parents - at least up until 1871. In this census, she is living, unmarried, with them in Balham, a 25 year old Governess:

The next census record where Frances Mary Swift can be traced is in 1891, after both of her parents have died. Now she is listed as a 'visitor, living on her own means' - perhaps from some inheritance from her father (?) - in the Claremont Square home of William Henry Patmore Sheehy, a widower, listed as a physician and surgeon. But this 1891 'visitor' has, by 1892, become Mrs. Sheehy  - following a marriage registered in Lewisham. 

William's baptism record from 1852 shows that he had also been born at this address - 4 Claremont Square, Clerkenwell - in 1852, the son of another surgeon. By 1874, he was already a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons (MRCS):

The 'Medical Directory' 1875

The 1901 census, however, again records Frances - now Frances M Sheehy - as a 'visitor'. It also shows her meeting up again with her sisters - Susannah Swift and Ann Stroud Edmunds - at the Edmunds' nearby home in Barnsbury Park, Islington:

The Edmunds' household in the 1901 census

By 1911, the Sheehys are living in some style in "Montebello, Totteridge, Herts.", with a cook and two housemaids to look after their domestic needs:

Just to give you an idea of the lifestyle that comes with living in this area, a Google Search tells me that "Montebello is thought to be the largest private residence built in the London area since the war. It's owned by Mike Ashley (then) the billionaire owner of Sports Direct and Newcastle United". 

Now "since the war" shows that the modern "Montebello" can't be the same as William and Frances' home (the 1911 census says their property has "only" fourteen rooms) but, what's certainly clear is that Frances Mary Swift had married into wealth that was at a completely different end of the social scale to that of her sister Sarah Sands Swift - or, indeed, her oldest sister who had farmed on a homestead in Iowa!

When William dies in 1933, to be buried in Highgate Cemetery, the probate records show he leaves £15,896 to Arthur and Eleanor Swift Edmunds, the two surviving children of his sister-in-law Ann Stroud Edmunds - over £1.3 million today:

After her husband's death, it seems Frances Mary returned to the company of her sister, Susannah Swift, just as Sarah Sands had too. Her 1935 death is recorded as having taken place at Woodside Gardens, Finchley - Susannah's home. Francis Mary was also buried in Highgate, leaving a further £5,155 to Arthur and Eleanor Swift Edmunds. 

Different parts of Thomas Crayden Swift's family certainly ended up with differing amounts of wealth!

4) Eleanor Swift - another emigrating Swift 

The contrasting fortunes of the five sisters are once again apparent in the life story of the penultimate daughter, Eleanor. Her tale reads much more like those of the  two eldest sisters - Mary Ann and Elizabeth - of families who, perhaps under some economic limitations here in England, decide that their best option is to emigrate. However, while Mary and Elizabeth and their families headed to the United States, Eleanor and her family - the Bennetts - chose to emigrate to Australia:

The available facts for Eleanor's life story are more limited than for most of Thomas Crayden Swift's children. In short, she marries at the youngest age of any of the sisters - at the age of 24 - to Richard Bennetts, a Cornish "commercial traveller", but the Bennetts appear to have had to rely on living with other, wealthier, members of the family rather than living as their own household. By the 1890s they decide to emigrate.

The April 1871 census shows Eleanor and Richard Bennetts both living in the home of Edward Crayden Swift, the brother who had become a butcher in Gloucester Road. It's unclear whether the couple had met separately and were now living in the same house prior to marriage or whether Richard was a lodger that got to know Eleanor while at this address:

Either way, in August 1871 the couple are married at St.Mary's in Balham - close to where Eleanor's father, Thomas Crayden Swift, was then living. The groom's father, another Richard Bennetts, also originally from Cornwall, is described as being a "photographer". Eleanor's sister, Francis Mary Swift, who is also then living with their parents (see above), is one of the witnesses:

By 1881, as shown in the census record pictured above under Sarah Sands Swift, the Bennetts have had three children - Harold Graves (b. Balham 1872), Ernest Crayden (b. Kensington 1874) and Leonard William (b. Kensington, 1877) - but they are all living, alongside sisters Sarah Sands and Susannah Swift, in Eleanor's widowed father's household in Barnsdale Road, Paddington. Rather than carrying on living with relatives, the family opts to emigrate to New South Wales.

When exactly do the Bennetts set sail for Australia? There's little in the records to help give a clear date. However, it must have been early enough for the eldest son, Harold Graves, to have had time to have become medically qualified in Australia. That's because, in 1896, a New South Wales Government Gazette includes his name as "M. Ch. Univ. Sydney" - having gained a master's degree in surgery. 

Of course, the fact that he can afford these studies suggests that the Bennetts' emigration had rather more family resources behind it - and perhaps even family surgeon's connections (?) - than the earlier ventures to Iowa.

There is also a record of a "Richard Bennetts" being the manager of a Kaiapoi Woollen Manufacturing Co. warehouse in Barrack Street, Sydney in 1890. If this is 'our' Richard, then the date is about right.

As for Eleanor, little is shown in the records beyond the fact that she died in June 1904 and is buried in Waverley Cemetery, Bronte, New South Wales. Her husband, Richard, lived on until May 1938 and is buried in the same cemetery.

5) Susannah Swift - the daughter who did not marry

Susannah, the last of Thomas Crayden Swift's fifteen children is pretty consistently listed in the census records - but always as an unmarried woman living with other relatives.

Born in 1849, the 1851 and 1861 censuses list her as living in the family home in Eastchurch on the Isle of Sheppey. While there isn't a record of her in the 1871 census, there is a photograph of Susannah from around this time, taken at one of the studios of the "London School of Photography" at 174 Regent Street, London:

The 1881 census, as we have seen above, lists Susannah living with the Bennetts and Sarah Sands Swift at her father's house in Paddington. In the 1891 census, as also pictured above, she is living in the Edmunds household - and listed as a "Superintendent" in the Drysalter Manufacturing business. She is still living with them in the 1901 census as well.

In the 1911 census, Susannah is living with her brother, retired butcher Edward Crayden Swift in Loraine Mansions, Holloway. She is listed as having "no occupation".

The 1911 census for 103 Loraine Mansions, Holloway

On his death in 1912, the probate records show Susannah is left £546 by Edward, which must have helped support her through the rest of her life. Her last years appear to have been spent in Finchley, with the 1929 electoral register (pictured above under Sarah Sands) showing her living at 2, Woodside Park Gardens, Gainsborough Road, London N12. 

Susannah's death is recorded as having been on 10 August 1933, at Woodside Park Gardens. She was also buried in Highgate Cemetery. Her probate records show her leaving over £7000 - equivalent to around £600,000 today - to Eleanor Swift Edmunds, Ann Stroud Swift's daughter. 

Like Susanna before her, Eleanor Swift Edmunds seems to have lived a privileged life as a single woman with a private income. For example, a record remains of her first-class voyage on P&O's 'Chitral' from Bombay to London - via Aden, Port Said, Malta, Marseilles, Tangier and Gibraltar, in 1937. Her address, in Circus Road Mansions, St.John's Wood, near Lord's Cricket Ground, also suggests a privileged lifestyle.

So, as one of the last surviving children of Thomas Crayden Swift, Susannah was able to live comfortably - it seems largely on the capital that had been made by her father and brother from the butchers trade - and to pass on that wealth to the next generation too.

Overall, although with fortunes certainly not evenly spread, Thomas Crayden Swift's fifteen children generally prospered at this time of urban and global expansion, moving from the marshes of the Isle of Sheppey to London and beyond. Some clearly ended up with real wealth, others - like my own immediate ancestors - just small traders making their living in Lewisham and Fulham.