Every tragedy falls into two parts: complication and unravelling...By complication I mean all that extends from the beginning of that action to the part which marks the turning point to good or bad fortune. The unravelling is that which extends from the beginning of the change to the end.
Aristotle
My 4x great grandfather John Cooledge stole a little food and was transported to Australia as a convict, leaving a family behind. He died in Tasmania, in Hobart Hospital. His wife and family were placed into Buntingford Workhouse and only two children of that whole family survived that experience. It was shocking to read the workhouse records. So this post has some meaning for me.
William was a descendant of John Ginn (see my post of 25th July 2014 ). His further ancestors will be dealt with in later posts. He was an agricultural labourer.
19th cent labourers - I love the guy with the top hat
William married Hannah Surridge at Sacombe in 1826, Hannah came from Bennington. Sacombe was and is a quiet rural village, not a place where there would be much happening or with plenty of work opportunities. The couple were poor.
Now sometimes I know something without knowing I know something. And so it is here. I had actually uploaded this post when "the penny dropped" that I knew more.
Hannah was born to Thomas and Ann at Benington in 1806. The couple had indeed married that year, Thomas Surridge being a widower. But Tom did not come from Benington, he came from Sacombe Green, his father being Wiliam Surridge (a labourer who owned a few bits of land) and who died in 1810 leaving a will.
And Thomas Surridge had the wherewithal to buy a copyhold cottage at Sacombe Green in 1816 (DE/AS/2389 Herts Archives) see extract which sale was finalised to him in 1819. He was variously described as a Labourer/Carpenter.
Now I am a property lawyer- deeds are what I do. And I have turned up those deeds. Tom Surridge converted this one house into two cottages before 1820. And I know that William Ginn and Hannah were tenants of one of these cottages. I also know that there are two farm cottages at Sacombe Green which are historic and listed buildings (for planning purposes) and their listing description says that this one house was converted into two cottages circa 1800 (the house has elements going back to the late 1600s). I am certain that this is all one. So we can see the house, cottages below.
William and Hannah had had two children when in 1829 they applied under the Poor Laws to move to Cheshunt, a small town on the London Road where there would have been plenty of opportunities. The rules were that if the destination parish Overseers of the Poor thought that the family would be a burden on the parish and claim poor relief (paid for by the local taxpayers) then they could turn the couple away and send them back to Sacombe. This is what happened. (Settlement Records Herts Archives). I have always thought that if the family had been allowed to settle in Cheshunt their story would have been very different.
William and Hannah continued to have children and we move forward to 1841.
Now 1841 was a significant year for several reasons, some trivial, some not.
For a start - it was the year that Britain saw its first Christmas Tree - a German tradition brought into England by Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's consort. It was erected at Windsor Castle.
Queen Victoria had a lovely Christmas that year, writing in her journal on Christmas Eve 1841
Christmas, I always look upon as a most dear happy time, also for Albert, who enjoyed it naturally still more in his happy home, which mine, certainly, as a child, was not. It is a pleasure to have this blessed festival associated with one’s happiest days. The very smell of the Christmas Trees of pleasant memories. To think, we have already 2 Children now, & one who already enjoys the sight, — it seems like a dream.
And a fine time would have been had by all of the aristocracy, gentry and the factory owners who took the riches of what was at the time the richest and most powerful nation in the world. But the nation had crippling inequality, the wealthy few exploited the impoverished masses just as the slave owners had once exploited the slaves. The poor could barely feed themselves in the good times, and these were not good times- 1841 was notable for another thing - it was a year in a decade which came to be known as "The Hungry Forties"
Thirdly, in Spring 1841 Thomas Surridge, now nearly seventy. sold the two cottages for nearly twice what he paid for them. William Ginn was said to be in possession of one of them. See extracts below (DE/AS/2390). If Bill Ginn were only paying a nominal rent to his father in law, this could have crippled him financially.
And also in 1841- Hertfordshire saw the creation of its first professional police force - the Hertfordshire Constabulary. The Metropolitan Police (one of the first professional police forces in the world) had been created in London in 1829. It replaced an archaic system. But the freedom loving British would not tolerate an armed force wearing the uniform of army red (the "Peterloo Massacre" of 1819 was fresh in the public mind) as that might induce riots. So our police were to be the unarmed "boys in blue". It is clear that Hertfordshire recruited some men from "the Met".
So we come to Saturday, 18th December 1841 - quite literally, the week before Christmas. Bill Ginn would have had little work this time of the year but obviously decided that his six children would have a full belly that Christmas. As a consequence he and Hannah were not to have the "dream" Christmas of Queen Victoria, but rather a surreal nightmare that would change their lives forever. I knew the outcome years ago - but in 2007 turned up the whole sorry tale (full papers survive QSR 66) at Herts Archives.
Thomas Mardell was a local farmer in Sacombe. He was also (for many years) one of the Overseers of the Poor, ie in charge of parish poor relief, which I am sure had brought him into contact with the Ginns. There was probably no love lost.
Thomas Mardell had 141 sheep in a field near Sacombe that Saturday, except his shepherd counted and noted that there were only 140.
Mardell was to say that he and the shepherd were able to track Bill and the sheep, but this seems unlikely and I suspect that somebody snitched. Whatever the truth, Mardell and the shepherd approached the privy of Bill's cottage on Sacombe Green and noticed "ground fresh moved" and blood. Mardell withdrew and the shepherd went to fetch the Hertfordshire Constabulary.
Chief Inspector Driscoll and Constable Thresher attended the scene later the same day, near dusk. It was nearly the shortest day so this would have been about 4 pm. Constable Thresher was Charles Thresher, he got my interest as the next year he indirectly features in the story of Billett King Genn of Cambridge (see below) and Charles was later to find his own life turned upside down +
The police found William near his cottage. Thresher held him fast while Driscoll searched the cottage. They found a sheep's paunch (tripe) concealed near the fire place. It was now dark and they left with William and locked the cottage up.
The police returned the next morning ie the 19th and opened up the cottage, Hannah was there. They thought that she was trying to conceal something and moving her out of the way found the head of a sheep and a sack of mutton beneath her. A butcher from Hertford was later to give evidence that all of the mutton was fresh killed and poorly butchered.
Nathaniel Surridge was the Parish Constable - ie the civilian appointed by the parish to keep the peace in the village. He was also Hannah's first cousin. He confirmed all that the police had said, and further mentioned that they had found a sheepskin in a pond near Bill's cottage.
William Ginn denied any knowledge of the sheep - but his fate was sealed.
William was put in Hertford Gaol - now long gone. His conduct there was bad - he was obviously traumatised. His trial was delayed and he was not actually tried until 14th February 1842, 180 years almost to the day before this post. He was sentenced to be transported for 10 years without possibility of return. It was his first offence ever.
He then went to the prison hulks on the Thames to await his sentence being carried out and was there for five months. The hulks were dismasted ships, many of them old warships from the Napoleonic Wars. Discipline was very strict and life was tough.
William was transported to Australia on the "Triton". It took several months and he sailed into Hobart, Tasmania on 19th December 1842, a year to the day since Driscoll and Thresher had searched the cottage that Sunday morning.
We know from the records that William was 5ft 6 ins (about average for the time amongst the poor) had dark brown hair and beard, with blue eyes.
The convict regime in Tasmania had toughened in 1841 and new arrivals were to be put in what were effectively chain gangs for the first two years after their arrival, carrying out government projects, road building and the like. He went to Westbury. Whilst acting as cook to the gang he not unsurprisingly stole some extra food and was put in solitary for six days. The convicts were paraded on what is now the Village Green, below.
There was a Probation Station at Westbury which is where William went at the end of his two years, he now being assigned out to work (not for wages of course) for the local free settlers. We know that he was assigned to a William Chitty. He was still working for Chitty in 1845 when he was disciplined for drinking in a disorderly house after hours.
Had William lived, he would have got a conditional pardon in a few years, freedom, but not to return home. This was sadly not to be as he became ill- we do not know what the problem was, and died in Westbury Hospital on 10th September 1846 - he was 45. A descendant (ironically a good number of Bill's descendants emigrated to Australia) has told me that the convict dead from the hospital were buried in unconsecrated ground near the still to be completed Anglican church in Westbury.
Back in Sacombe, Hannah was made aware that William had died- thereafter describing herself as a widow. She took in laundry to try and survive. She never remarried and lived with her daughter Mary - dying at Sacombe in 1883.
William and Hannah had six children
Mary Ann - married William Luck at Sacombe in 1855
Thomas - married Emma Ruddell at Sacombe in 1864
Sarah - married James Kirby at Sacombe in 1852
William - married Mary Bradley at Sacombe in 1867
Charles - married Eliza Parker at Sacombe in 1863
Emma - is untraced
+ Charles Thresher who held Bill Ginn that day is an interesting cove. He was born in London's west end. Yet he married Ann Ellwood at Cambridge in 1832. In 1836 he joined the Metropolitan Police. At the inception of the Hertfordshire Constabulary in 1841 he clearly transferred. His boss in Hertfordshire was a chap called Bailey, a former army man who was the "top man" at the Police Station at Stevenage. There is an article on the Cambridge Police called "Provincial Police Reform in early Victorian England" by Roger Swift that deals with the early history of what became the City of Cambridge professional police force which was set up in 1842. The new local authority were Tories (the liberals had lost the election) and they wanted an authoritarian police force. They invited applications for a Superintendent of Police (largely an administrative post) and four people were shortlisted. Three were serving police officers and all former army men, including Bailey, but one was "Mr Genn of Cambridge" this is Billett King Genn of Cambridge (see post of 10th October 2019) whose only qualification for the role (he was a Draper) were his connections - he was a member of the Garrick Club for a start. Needless to say he did not get the job - but Bailey did. And Bailey brought two serving Hertfordshire police officers with him to Cambridge in 1842 including (you guessed it) Charlie Thresher. The outsiders were not welcome in Cambridge- Bailey was a martinet who never escaped his army roots and had the Cambridge force (who were supposed to be armed with cudgels) engaging in sword drill ! The liberals in Cambridge called the Tory council's recruits the "Hertford Pets". But these "pets" prospered for a while at least, and Charles Thresher was made an Inspector of Police and Clerk to the Market (he enforced market regulations) in 1843. But Bill Ginn could have told him that life throws you "curve balls" and so it proved. For in 1849 Inspector Thresher both lost his job in the police and went bankrupt. Th sorry tale is in the "London Gazette" the "Jurist" of 1849 and 1850. It is unclear whether he lost his job and went bankrupt, or went bankrupt and accordingly lost his job. But in any event, in a time when you went to prison if you were a defaulting debtor, the former policeman was petitioning to avoid prison. And he did - because in 1847 he had remarried an Ann Moore at Granchester near Cambridge, and in 1851 we find him (Trade Directory) pulling pints as the Landlord of the "Green Man" at Granchester which pub is still there. Funny how life turns out
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