Genealogy Chat

Hello Nell, This from my mother, and until quite recently, news to me. My mother is the youngest of four, she was born when her parents were in their 40's and was brought up if you like as an only child, her brothers and sisters already married and left home. My mother mentioned that her parents', first child, a girl died from an accidental overdose of laudinum, administered by a grandparent. We think this caused some sort of family rift as my grandparents moved away from the area shortly afterwards and very rarely spoke of their family. I searched FreeBMD and found the birth and death of the little girl called Mary Ellen. Jenny

A couple of stories concerning childhood deaths . The first one told to me by my grandmother. .... A woman she knew used to give her baby Poppy-head Tea, to stop it crying. The baby later died. This was in South Wales about 1901-1903. This one from my mother ....... A neighbour lost her three children one after another during a diphtheria epidemic. this was in Dundee before or during WW1. This poor woman was never seen to smile again. Bea.

I think that special medicine was Godfrey's Cordial which was opium based and used to keep children quiet and was especially useful when food was short as a sleeping baby doesn't need to eat.

Lancashire Lou - Snap! I also had a bad dose of the post-natals 41 year ago after the birth of my first - lost my sight for one week and landed in the local psychiatric hospital for two. It was a haven of peace! I commented that there didn't seem to be many of the long-term patients one saw in earlier times and was told that one of the last of them had died the previous week. She'd gone in there fifty years earlier with the same thing I had! Thank heaven for more enlightened days! Liz

Nell My gt Grandparents were married i n 1874. My grandfather was born in 1878. His father died a couple of months later. In the 1881, the mother was working in Hitchin, and my gfather and his elder brother were boarded with separate ladies in Norwich. Have you searched for the children's names. Dave

Nell If you want a real ten-hankie weepie, then read 'Children of the Lost Empire'. It had me alternately screaming with rage and weeping buckets. One story sticking in my mind is the lad put in the Workhouse with his sick mother. When she recovered, she found that he had been sent to Canada. His Grandparents shifted Heaven and Earth to try to get him back, they wrote continually to the Barnadoes Home, who said that they had passed on the GPs letters to the lad, but that he was happy and settled and did not wish to return to England. They continued to write but eventually they were told that their grandson had passed out of their care. Meanwhile, the Grandson was suffering terrible abuse at the hands of his Canadian Employer and eventually ran away. He reurned to this Country and set about trying to trace any relatives. Dr. B said they had no records of his admission and emigration. Later, they said they had found some papers, his mother was long dead and he had been sent to Canada because his mother was 'of ill-repute'. Finally in 1985 he managed to get his case papers also a copy of his birth cert. He was devastated to find that his name had been changed by DBs. Further investigation proved that his mother had died only in 1981 and a cousin told him that his mother and grandparents had spent the best part of their lives trying to trace him. She had never given her consent to his being sent to Canada, but the Workhouse was allowed to do what it liked with you, once you were in its clutches. A disgusting chapter in British History. Marjorie

British Home Children etc: I came across this appalling practice recently and wonder whether it could explain a lot of apparently missing relatives etc. http://www.childmigrants DOTT COMM I haven't looked into it in great detail because luckily the relative in my family whose mother was brought papers to sign to send them to Australia immediately they were born point blank refused to sign them - A VERY STRONG WOMAN INDEED WHO I GREATLY ADMIRE! To think that if she hadn't put her foot down, I might not even be here today (shudder). How terrible is this though? These pictures really tugged at my heart strings. I suppose there must be good stories, but equally there seem to be some pretty bad ones too. Anyway, good luck in your quests, whoever you may be! Helen x

Hi Lou It's Yorkshire - I've already got 450 pages of the area they were in (Idle, Bradford plus neighboring areas) but I need to trawl it for their first names - pretty sure they're not on in their original names. Unless some family 'adopted' them and moved a few miles away. Debby

Debby Which county are you looking at? Lou

I've got a lot more to do with this but 1851 is harder to search at the moment. I'll get to the bottom of it eventually. Debby

Barbara They were only aged 3, 2 & 2 months on 1841 and none are with her on 1851. Nell suggested on your thread 'if you could ask your ancestor one question' that they could have married but too young perhaps - anyone any other ideas? I've checked the local workhouse unless they changed their names? Debby

Barbara I suffered from puerperal postpartum psychosis, as you describe, after the birth of my eldest. 75 years earlier and they'd have carried me off, never to be seen again! Lou

Oh No! My horrible Harriet has 3 children under 5 with her on one census and none of them on the next! I really hope that hasn't happened. Think I'll have to investigate further. Debby

Laudanum was often used as a method of killing a baby, either accidentally or on purpose. Oddly, I am reading a book at this very moment about Poisoning in the 19th century. It is a very scientific study and explains that poisoning was only really recognised at the beginning of the 19th century - before that, there were no ways of testing for poison and the symptoms of poisoning are very similar to Cholera. It gives poisoning as the first choice of murder weapon by the poor as it was freely available and cheap. In the book, it gives a photocopy of the results of a trial for poisoning. Above it is the previous trial, which was for 'Feloniously adding an entry to a Marriage Register'. Both parties got 12 months hard labour. (The poisoner was hung.) Marjorie

don't know if you already knew, but many baby's were killed by using a special medince designed to soothing teething (can't remeber the name), just to claim money

Further to the jolly info I found earlier in an article on child murders in the mid-Victorian period, here are some more facts about the cosy 19th century attitude to children: During the 19th century babies made up more than 60% of homicide victims, though they were only 3% of the population. Before regulations in 1872, up to 90% of babies placed in baby-farms died. nell

see below