Life story researched and written by John Bark
Born in Upper Norwood, Surrey, Frances was the ninth of Henrietta Ellen DALLEY and William TURQUAND’s eleven children. Her father was a stockbroker who became an “Official Assignee in the Court of Bankruptcy”. The family’s Huguenot ancestry is outlined in the life story of her accountant brother William TURQUAND. Two years after her father died in 1849 Frances married at Eversholt, near Woburn Park, Bedfordshire aged 24.[1] She was ten years younger than her merchant husband, John James MATTHEY. He too was of immigrant stock: his grandfather Simon was from the French-speaking west of Switzerland.[2]
Flashback: News from Naples
On the 3rd December 1805 Simon MATTHEY’s 17 year-old son Alphonso reported that 15,000 Russian and 6,000 British troops had arrived to defend the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily against Napoleon Bonaparte.[3] The Russians, he wrote to his brother in the City, were “amazing fine troops indeed” but in the event the Neopolitan court fled with the British to the Island of Sicily. Alphonso did likewise and in 1816 his wife Maria NEWMAN gave birth to John in the Sicilian port city of Messina.[4] This is why the most intimate view we have of Frances is contained in a letter from Sicily.
Letter from Messina
Frances was not happy. Writing in October 1852 to Fanny Longsdon she confided: “I have been suffering so much since my confinement first from most painful eruptions on the face & hands …” On the bright side, she was now free of pain for the first time in three months. Catherine, her first child was now “… a well strong & lively child… she is already quite an amusing plaything, laughing whenever you speak to her.” She recommended motherhood “How glad I shall be to hear that you are blessed with such a treasure.” The hot, humid and thundery weather was also getting to her: “How this can be called a beautiful climate I cannot understand. I hope I can get used to it in time.” [5]
Merchants on the Mersey
Frances would soon enjoy a cooler climate. In 1853 John and Frances settled in Catharine street, a wealthy thoroughfare on the edge of Liverpool city centre. Their family grew quickly: Constance, Frances (Fanny) and Charles Alphonso were all christened at nearby St Bride’s Church. John was now in partnership with James Whitworth as “Commission merchants, shipping and insurance agents” [6]
After three to four years in Catharine Street, Frances and John moved out to leafy Woburn Hill. Here she had Ellen, Laura and Arthur, so by 1861 Frances, now 34 years old, had seven small children (with another on the way). Fortunately she had a nurse, cook and housemaid to cope with the workload.[7]
Fortunes of War
Edith was born at 95 Marylebone Rd, London in December 1861. In the same month, John appeared as Company Secretary in newspaper notices offering shares in the Venezuela Cotton Company Ltd.[8] The plan was to acquire and “gradually cultivate” a 236,000 acre estate funded by 40,000 shares at £5 each.[9] They hoped to exploit a vast (83%) hole in cotton supply created by the ongoing American Civil War.
Disaster
The family moved again. 1 Newstead Villas was on the north side of Northumberland Park, an avenue in Tottenham among farmland and horticultural nurseries.
Following the share offering, we hear no more of the Venezuela Cotton Co, nor of John’s business activities in 1862. This silence may have been at least partly health-related, because in November 1862 he showed signs of TB.
If the pall cast by consumption was not enough, the family received two terrible blows in February 1863. Little Edith fell sick and died with hydrocephalus. Nine days later John’s 41 year-old brother Frederick killed himself at his mansion in Kensington.[10]
When TB claimed John the following month, Frances at 39 was now a doubly-bereaved widow with seven children all under eleven.
The Edge of Ruin
How to provide for her family? Unfortunately, according to Frances, John’s business had been losing money and her health was “such as to preclude her from following any occupation and to entail her a considerable annual expense for medical attendance.”[11]
Fortunately John had insured his life with policies worth £2196 12s 11d. The money was entrusted to Frances’s brother William and John’s cousin Charles Matthey to provide investment income. She later claimed it was £70 a year.[12] Unfortunately, in the opinion of contemporary money-saving experts, a middle-class family needed at least £100-£150 excluding insurance and education for a comfortable lifestyle.[13]
Who will help the fatherless child?
The education of seven young children must have been among the greatest anxieties of Frances’s life.
There is no evidence about Constance and Catherine, but their younger sisters Laura and Ellen certainly attended a small girls’ school in Islington in 1871.[14] Fanny, the remaining sister, was educated at the British Orphan Asylum in Slough, an institution for “the offspring of persons who were respectable in life.”[15] As with similar charities 10 year-old Fanny had to stand for election by its subscribers. The results appeared on the 10th January 1865 in The Morning Post. Four girls were elected from 12 candidates. Fanny topped the poll with 712 votes.[16]
Blue Coat Boys
Charles and Arthur were both at Christ’s Hospital, Newgate.[17] The first ‘Blue Coat’ school, Christ’s Hospital was founded by Edward VI in 1552. The school provided free education, board and distinctive blue and yellow uniforms to children of families in need. But by the time Frances put Charles forward for admission, few pupils came from poor backgrounds. Frances was among 25% of parents with £50 – £100. [18]
A widow in Reading
Frances moved to Reading between 1865 and 1868.[19] Her first address was 12 Grove (Milman) Road in the hamlet of Whitley. The 1871 census recorded that she shared her home with 17 year-old Constance and one servant. Her three unmarried sisters were 15-20 minutes’ walk away on Redlands Road where they had moved with their late mother some years before. Whatever the details of her personal finances, Frances managed to make a number of donations to Christ Church and its associated charities while she lived in Milman Road.
The secret
In April 1874 William Turquand, Vice-President of the Institute of Accountants, confessed to his sister that he had kept the truth about her finances to himself.
Frances’s income was not derived from the insurance money. William and Charles Matthey had agreed to invest most of John’s insurance payout in the Mid-Wales Railway Company.[20] This decision might have been queried by those with bitter memories of the Railway Mania bubble of the 1840s, and as with so many railway projects, things went wrong.
By 1874 each £10 share was worth only £3.[21] Only one dividend had ever been paid and for nearly a decade, her income had come out of William’s pocket. As this was often more than she would have ever received from dividends, he thought it only right he use the shares to partly reimburse himself.
There is no record of their conversation or correspondence at the time but it may have gone like this:
Frances: “Why did you not tell me?”
William: “I did not think it necessary. I did not want to distress you.”
Frances: “I want my money back. With interest.”
William: “Very well, but I will not pay the whole amount. Charles must pay half.”[22]
William argued that as joint trustee Charles was also liable for the consequences.[23] Charles disagreed.[24] So Frances took her case to the Court of Chancery.
The Judgement
Fortunately Frances was spared the interminable grief for which Chancery was infamous: the court decreed on 17th July 1875 that there had been a breach of trust. The defendants were to pay the court £2196 12s 11d to be invested in Indian Government Securities. Some of these would be sold off to cover Frances’s legal costs. Dividends on the residual would go to her for the rest of her life. [25]
Wedding bells
Frances’s financial troubles probably also eased as her daughters got older. At least three earned an income as governesses. Laura and Ellen managed to achieve respectability and some degree of security by getting married.
Ellen’s groom in 1889 was 22-year-old Henry Caversham Simonds, almost ten years her junior. He was a great-grandson of the founder of brewers H & G Simonds.[26]
It is interesting to speculate how some of Ellen’s relatives viewed the match. Henry was clearly a young man with great prospects. On the other hand, her aunts Rosa, Louisa and Henrietta were active supporters of the Temperance movement.
No such reservations would apply when Laura, at 32, married Rev Samuel Howard Baker, the popular curate of Holy Trinity Church, Oxford Road.
Different for boys
Frances’s sons took up careers overseas. Both went to British Guiana, Charles as a sugar engineer and Arthur as a medical officer. Charles later worked in St Lucia, Brazil, Russia and Scotland, while his brother remained in British Guiana, where he married Florence Rosalind Blythe, daughter of a Lieut. Col. in the Royal Sussex Regiment.
Russell Rise
In 1890-1891 Frances moved to Russell Rise, Russell Street. It had 12+ rooms and a higher rate-able value than her previous house, which suggests Frances now felt more comfortable in her finances.[27]
Russell Rise (54 Russell Street) 2023
Joy and sadness
Frances was in her mid-sixties in May 1893 when Laura and Samuel had her first grandchild. But it was also another 12-month period of three family deaths: Constance, aged 40, sister Rosa aged 70 and William three months later. He requested a simple funeral and was brought by train to Reading where he was buried in the same family plot as Rosa and his mother. From his estate worth £45,319 he left Frances and her daughters £3000 plus a residual of the estate’s value in trust.[28]
A Good and True Tory?
Before Constance died, we can see Frances at various public events. We also get a hint of her political leanings. In 1885, Mrs and the Misses Matthey were “on the platform” at “the largest political meeting ever held in Reading” for the new Conservative candidate Charles T Murdoch.[29] In 1892 she was probably among the “distinguished guests” at the annual festival of the Reading Habitation of the Primrose League and one of 500 “good and true” Conservative activists entertained by Murdoch (now Reading’s sole MP) at his residence near Wokingham.[30]
Into the new century
Frances was 74 years old when the 1901 census came round. She was now a member of the congregation at All Saints Church, just off the Bath Road in Downshire Square.[31]
Frances’s married daughters Laura and Ellen now faced very different fortunes. In 1903 Laura had her fourth and final child at the age of 44 in Gough Road, Edgbaston. Samuel was now curate of St James, a large French Gothic church on Elvetham Road.[32]
Ellen’s marriage fell apart.
He gave way to drink
Frances was 81 when Ellen arrived at Russell Rise one morning in February 1908 with a bruised head. It was the result, she said, of a drunken late-night attack by her husband.[33] Three months later Ellen obtained a separation agreement which required Henry to support her with £700 a year.[34] The agreement did not last. After 19 months, Henry invoked a clause that allowed him to stop payments if he did not have enough money.[35]
Ellen wanted a divorce on grounds of cruelty and adultery. Henry denied both.[36] Legal teams assembled and Frances was ordered by the court to be examined as a witness for her daughter.
The court hearing took place on Thursday 28th( July 1910 at the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand.[37] Ellen was granted Decree Nisi with costs.[38] Decree Absolute came into force on the 6nd February 1911 and Henry was ordered to pay maintenance.[39]
Last years
Two months after Ellen’s Decree Absolute, the 1911 census found Frances at Russell Rise with Catherine and her 39 year-old housekeeper Sarah Anne Elderfield. Frances carried on as usual with charitable donations.[40]
In February 1914 Frances made her regular contribution of 2/6 to the Women’s Branch of the SPG and gave the same to the Sunday School Treat Fund in March. These were probably the last of her charitable givings. Following a stroke on 12th March 1914 Frances died at Russell Rise.
Last rites
The funeral service was held at All Saints church on 17th March. She was buried in the same grave in the Old Cemetery as her daughter Constance Emma. The local newspapers said she had a reputation for kindness among the people of the All Saints district.[41]
Sources
The main resources I used in writing this life story were:
Ancestry.com, Findmypast, The Genealogist and The British Newspaper Archive via Berkshire Family History Society (BFHS) at Reading Central Library and the Library, Sonning Common.
Local Studies section of Reading Central Library
University of Reading Library
The Royal Berkshire Archives
The National Archives, Kew
From home: The Internet Archive, FreeBMD.org, GRO, FamilySearch.org, ProbateSearch.org. Jstor.org Wikipedia and Google.com
References
[1] Census, 1851
[2] Petition for Freedom of City of London by John Matthey 17/10/1816
[3] Matthey, A.F. Holograph letter from Matthey to his brother John Matthey, dated from Naples, 3 Dec 1805 National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London ref AGC/24/15
[4] Annual Army List, 1855
[5] Correspondence Frances Matthey at Messina to Mrs Longsdon Derbyshire Record Office ref D3580 C/774
[6] For example Slater’s Directory of Glos, Herefs, Mon, Shrops & Wales 1859
[7] Census 1861
[8] London Evening Standard 3rd December 1861 p 1
[9] Caledonian Mercury 6th November 1861 p2
[10] Morning Herald (London) 23rd February 1863 p3
[11] E-mail from Christ’s Hospital Museum (Clifford Jones) dated 10/11/2022 quoting from transcriptions of applications by Frances Matthey for Arthur and Charles Matthey
[12] Cause No 1874 MI66 Matthey v Matthey National Archives ref C 16/952/M166 Bill of Complaint to Lord Chancellor
[13] “Private Women, Public Needs: Middle-Class Widows in Victorian England” C Curran in Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies, vol. 25, no. 2, 1993, pp. 219; A Manual of Domestic Economy JH Walsh 1874 pp 4-5
[14] Census 1871
[15] E-mail from Christ’s Hospital op. cit.
[16] Morning Post 10 January 1865 p 1
[17] Census 1871; E-mail from Christ’s Hospital op. cit.
[18] Schools inquiry commission Minutes of Evidence Vol IV 1864 p 859
[19] E-mail from Christ’s Hospital op. cit. Her address in the 1864 application was in Tottenham, in 1868, 12 Grove Road
[20] Ibid Answer of Charles Matthey p3 para 10 Answer of William Turquand p3 para 9
[21] Ibid Bill of Complaint para 9
[22] Op. cit. Cause No 1874 MI66 Answer of William Turquand
[23] Ibid para 17
[24] Op. cit. Cause No 1874 MI66 Answer of Charles Matthey paras. 18-19
[25] Cause No 1874 MI66 Matthey v Matthey National Archives ref C33/1255 Motion for Decree
[26] https://simondsfamily.me.uk/family/property/caversham-court/ https://simondsfamily.me.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Simonds-Family-Tree-%C2%A9lr.pdf [accessed 17/07/2024]
[27] Royal Berkshire Archives ref R/FR2/54 General district rates, Abbey, Battle, Castle, Church, East, Katesgrove, Minster, Redlands, Victoria and West Wards 1901-02
[28] Will of William Turquand 30th April 1894, resworn December 1894
[29] Berkshire Chronicle 24th October 1885 p8
[30] Reading Standard 29th April 1892 p 8 and 2nd September 1892 p 5
[31] Frances made a donation to the vestry fund in 1896
[32] Crockford’s Clerical Directory
[33] Petition of Ellen Simonds 10th May 1910
[34] ibid
[35] ibid
[36] ibid
[37] Simonds v Simonds Court Minutes
[38] Simonds v Simonds Decree Nisi 28th July 1910
[39] Simonds v Simonds Decree Absolute 6th February 1911; The Times 7th February 1911 p3
[40] St Mary’s Parish Magazine
[41] Reading Observer 21st March 1914 p 2, Reading Standard 21st March 1914 p10
Division 61, Row C, Plot 11