...till death do us part.

Season 5, episode 12. 1893 to 1894.  I’m so sorry to break your hearts, but mine is broken too. In 1894, after a protracted chest infection, Fred started coughing up blood + with horror, he + Janie would have realised that they were staring tuberculosis in the face. 

Transcript

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[Intro]
Welcome back to My Love Letter Time Machine, Hi, I’m Ingrid Birchell Hughes, and I’ve been serialising the love letters of my great great Grandparents, Fred Shepherd and Janie Warburton. Travel 140 years back in time with me now where we take a look at Victorian history through their eyes and today us a very sad time, as we come to the last year that Janie and Fred were together, we find out how Fred departed this world, and discover how much he was loved by his family and friends.

[…till death do us part]
Last time we got to enjoy the snapshot of Janie and Fred’s happy life by the seaside in Redcar. It sounded so romantic and lovely - so I’m quite bewildered, that sometime in 1893 they moved again back to Middlesbrough. They set up home in Grosvenor Terrace, just off Linthorpe Road, a wide tree lined street that ran northwards alongside Albert Park into the centre of Middlesbrough. Had commuting proved irksome to Fred and he wanted to be closer to work? Were the winters in Redcar just a bit too rough to deal with that close to the sea? I’m wracking my brains to work out what could have made them give up their dream of wanting to live in Redcar? The only thing I can think of was that Janie fell pregnant again, and that they felt the house in Redcar may have been too small for six kids - maybe the house in Middlesbrough was so nice it made the move back into town worth it.

Whatever the reason, they settled back in Middlesborough while they waited for their next child to be born. Just a couple of weeks before the baby was due, Fred got the news that his mother Ann had died. We can’t know if this was after being ill for a time or if it was sudden. At the time Ann was still living in the same street that she had been for the last 20 years but due to the renaming and renumbering of Freedom Hill to Basford Street in Darnall, I can’t tell if Ann was still renting the original property to her grandson or if she had moved several doors down the street. The 1891 census describes her as the head of the household even though her son-in-law John Merrill is living there along with his wife, her daughter — Louisa — and their daughter Emily. 

I’ve not been able to get hold of Ann’s death certificate, all I have his her memorial card, it reads:

“Ann Shepherd, who departed this life May 10th 1893, aged 78 years, entered at Christ Church Attercliffe, May 14th.”

It must have been a very emotional time for Fred, to lose his mother, and then not 12 days later his and Janie’s latest child was born. A daughter, on the 22nd and they named her May after the month.

That’s the last of the information I have for 1893, so let’s jump to the New Year. 

Fred and Janie kicked 1894 off by attending a charity ball for the North Riding Infirmary and Cottage Hospital, which was held in the Town Hall on Wednesday 24th January. The tickets were 21 shillings for a couple, 15 shillings for single Gentlemen and 10 shillings for single ladies. It was a significant event in the local area - even beyond Middlesborough — and special return trains  were put on at 2am for Redcar Marske and Saltburn

The write up in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough - Thursday 25 January 1894 is as follows:
"The Middlesbrough Charity Ball was a success. No effort had been spared by the committee and secretaries to make it so. Everything was done in a handsome, orderly, and elegant way. The fixture has attained a fair degree of popularity. When, however, the object for which it is held — namely, to raise funds for the North Riding Infirmary, the Cottage Hospital, and the Nurses' Horne — is taken into consideration, there would seem to lie almost infinite probabilities for such a reunion in the future. May it go on and prosper ! "

The proceeds for the ball were written up a month later:

 Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough - Saturday 24 February 1894 
“The Middlesbrough Charity Ball — At a meeting of the Committee held last night the Hon. Secretaries (Messrs Gjers and Bruce) submitted the balance-sheet, which showed the net proceeds of the late charity ball to be £61 Is. — lt was ordered, on the motion of the Chairman (Mr J. V. Cooper), seconded by Mr W. J. Watson, that the same be adopted. — The Chairman moved, and Captain Macfarlane seconded, that the division be as follows: — North Riding Infirmary, £27 ; North Ormesby Cottage Hospital, £27 ; Nurses' Home, £6 ; leaving a balance of £1 to be carried forward to next year. — The Chairman paid a high tribute to the energy and businesslike manner in which the hon. secretaries had discharged their duties, and moved a vote of thanks to them for their efficient services, which was carried by acclamation. — It was decided to hold the ball earlier next time.”

Obviously the infirmary and hospital had better income streams than just the contributions from a Charity Ball, as £27 wasn’t going to go all that far. But it’s interesting to see that in a world before universal health care, the responsibility of funding hospitals fell on the generosity and direct actions of the community. 

Not long after this, despite the weather improving with the Spring, Fred came down with a chest infection. As the months went on instead of recovering, Fred got sicker. How long did he struggle with it before it dawned on everyone that this was serious? At some point the poor guy started coughing up blood and with horror, he and Janie would have realised that they were staring tuberculosis in the face.

From what I can gather from several letters (which I will share with you in shortly) no one really grasped just how sick Fred was. His deterioration seems to have been unexpected and rapid. At some point in the month of May, just after he’d turned 35 on the 16th, and just before his youngest daughter’s first birthday, their family doctor must have explained that the end was near and that Fred should get his affairs in order. The last thing Fred committed to writing was his Will and we still have it. It’s on a large piece of stiff velum and is ruled in red lines with large hand calligraphed black letters. It reads:

“This is the last Will and Testament of me, Fred Shepherd, of 5 Grosvenor Terrace, Middlesbrough in the county of York, Commercial Clerk. I appoint my dear Wife Jane Warburton Shepherd Executrix of this my Will. I devise and bequeath all my real and personal estate and effects whatever and whosoever unto my said wife Jane Warburton Shepherd absolutely and herby revoking all former wills I declare this to be my last Will by witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand this twenty first day of May one thousand eight hundred and ninety four. Fred Shepherd signed present at the same time who at his request and in his presence and the presence of each other have hereunto subscribed our names as witnesses R Scotson, relieving officer Middlesbrough, R Russel, from Broker Middlesbrough.”

As Fred suffered, Janie, no doubt in utter disbelief, must have taken sometime to write to various family members to explain what was happening. In Janie and Fred’s hour of need it was Fred’s older sister Louisa, who dropped everything, got on a train from Sheffield and came to be with them in Fred’s last days. 

The day after the Will was drawn up was little May’s 1st birthday and I wonder what tension there was around it. Fred and the older children would have wanted to mark it, perhaps a small cake and candles was procured to appease them, all the while a sense unreallness permeating the situation. I hope they got to have this last family moment before Fred became entirely bedridden.

Fred lasted out another week, a week to say your good-byes after hoping for a lifetime. A week to have snatched moments with young children who wouldn’t really have understood what was going on, Louisa perhaps, trying her best to keep them out of the way most of the time, while Janie nursed Fred. A week of watching a man who had seemed to be in the prime of his life wasting away and struggling to breathe. 

I hope the end was peaceful but I can’t know for sure can I. Our Fred died on the 28th of May 1894. He was 35 years old. 

I got Fred’s death certificate through the post about a month ago. It was a strange moment opening it. My heart was in my mouth as I slit the envelope open. I’d always suspected that Fred had died of Tuberculosis but I’d never known for sure, and even though he’s been gone 129 years, I’ve been living his and Janie’s lives intensely through this podcast nearly every week for 2 years. And now I was holding his death certificate. And there it was Twenty eighth of May 1894, Frederick Shepherd, Male, 35 years, Occupation, An Accountant, Cause of death: Phithis 3 months. Phithis is another name for tuberculosis. 

It was Louisa, Fred’s sister, who took the lonely walk the next day to the town hall to register her brother’s death and the certificate records her as having been present at the death. 

The days between a death and funeral are a foreign landscape. When my step-dad, John, died earlier this year, as we were planning his funeral I found myself writing the following:

 “These are the days of grief and dressing gowns, of chocolate for breakfast because who cares right now, of paperwork and tears, of memories that make you laugh and cry snottily the same time. Of guilt that you didn't share enough and gratitude you got to share at all. These are the days of "I don't care what sandwiches we have at the wake ffs!" and "Will granny eat Turkey and Cranberry?"  These are the days when we speak our feelings and hug those of us left so tightly and all the time thinking "how can you not be here anymore?"

I wonder what Janie’s between-days were like. As well as continuing to take care of the kids she had the business of arranging Fred’s funeral. She placed an announcement in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough - Wednesday 30 May 1894 which read:

“Fred Shepherd, aged 35 (late of the North Eastern Steel Works) of 5 Grosvenor Terrace, Will be interred on Thursday. cortege leaving above address at 3 o'clock. Friends please accept this (the only) intimation.”

Judging from a tailors invoice I have, it looks as if Janie went to get measured for her funeral clothes on 30th of May and returned the morning of funeral to pick them up. She spent £1 18/ and 9 pence on a crepe black dress and 14 shillings and 6 pence on a ‘widow’s bonnet’. 

We’ve still got all the bills for Fred’s funeral. At some point Janie gathered them all together and fastened them in a corner with a dress making pin. It would be easier for me to read them if I took the pin out, but, and I know it sounds weird, I can’t bear to remove the pin that I know her hands pressed into the paper.

Janie arranged for Fred to be buried in a ‘best pitch pine coffin’ the cost of which along with the attendance fee from the undertakers came to £5. The hearse was £1 and 8 shillings, the burial plot was a £1 and the clergy fee 3 shillings and 9 pence. 

On the morning of the funeral Janie would have received the following two letters: One from Jinny and another from Fred’s nephew -Authur William - you know, the grandson who had been charging his own grandmother rent. However in his letter he does sound genuinely sad, it’s written on special mourning stationery. Both the paper and the envelope are marked with a black corner.

“Darnall Road, Darnall Sheffield
Wednesday 30th May 1894

“My Dear Janie,

I thank you for your letter of yesterday’s date my wife wrote to me to Manchester and I learned of the sad news this morning. To say that I am aggrieved is but feebly expressing my feelings and I shall never cease to rebuke myself for not having visited him, but I did not dream that he was so ill. Words to you of sympathy must seem poor and cold in your great loss, but I do offer you my deepest condolences in your sorrow.

Your husband was the best fellow in all our family and it is no exaggeration on my part to say that I looked upon him as a brother and my chief regret will ever be that I had not the opportunities of late years to show the affections that I bore him. I regret that I cannot come to pay my last tribute to his memory tomorrow, owing to the funeral of my wife's brother – an old fellow clerk of Fred’s – By the same post this morning I learned of both deaths, and I feel unable to properly express the grief I feel and the sympathy I should like to offer to you.

Love to your boys and yourself I am yours very sincerely Arthur. W. Shepherd.”

Jinnie’s letter is written on her work’s paper from the City Hospitals’ Department where Jinny worked as the  matron:

“City Hospital,
Winter Street,
Sheffield
30th May 1894

My very dear Jeannie, to say I am deeply grieved is only to faintly carry to your mind how much I feel Freds death […] dear boy, it is hard he should have been cut off in the prime of his youth like this, kiss his dear face for me once again, I shall never forget how he stood and waved goodbye to me at the dining room window. I have sent a wreath by tonight’s post. Put it on his dear self from me in loving memory.

I shall not be able to get over, will come for the day a little later, I shall spend Thursday afternoon quietly, and carry my mind and spirit to you and yours at your sad ceremony yours most lovingly Jinny.”

The funeral service for Fred at the church would have been packed as the many friends, work colleagues and aquaintances from Fred’s social organisations came to pay their respects and say their farewells. Afterwards Fred was laid to rest in Linthorpe Cemetery, not far from Albert Park, just a few steps away from the family home. 

Louisa must have stayed for a few more days as her and Fred’s other sister Lucy, send a letter addressed to both her and Janie. I don’t think Lucy can have been very comfortable writing, and I lost sense a couple of times. There’s also a suggestion that some family member may have emigrated as there is mention of a bush fire and I can only imagine this must be in reference to living in Australia. 

“Chippingham St
June 2nd, 1894

My Dear Sisters,

It is with deepest sympathy I send […] these few lines to you but I hope God will spare you your health.  Dear Janie I know what your feelings are I only wish that I could have come and kissed his dear face once more, my heart was with you all the time […] I was not, but, thank God we have got a turn for the better I thought we was going to have to send you News from here. I let Charles go out a little [..] on Wednesday morning and he [became ill] in the afternoon I thought that he would have died. With care I think he will pull through. Dear Janie and Louisa I wish that I could come […] and comfort you in your sore trouble but call on the Lord and he will [comfort] you for God always plucks the fairest flowers the first. Dear Louisa I have not seen Heather Walter or Arthur I thought that they would have seen John and have told him he as not seen either of them. We have had a another letter from Alf and they are all very well but nearly burned up, they have had a bushfire and he says it is the first and he hopes that it will be the last, he says that it is something fearful.

Well I think that is all and I remain your loving sister to both, Lucy.

And we have another letter from Jinny:

“City Hospital,
Winter Street,
Sheffield
10th June 1894

“My Dear Janie, I was so glad to get your letter and to know you had some friends to help and advise you. Keep your heart up dear old girl, you WILL get on somehow if you try. What a very good thing the boys are, the eldest they will soonest be able to work for you. It is hard to see why troubles like yours are for ‘good’ but we are taught to believe that are, still it is difficult. 

I cannot believe I shall never see dear old Fred again. My eyes fill with tears when I think of him, he was always fond of his old cousin. 

I should like to be able to talk to you and to make you know how much I feel for you.

I hope [little] May and Agnes are better. Kiss them all for me and give my kindest regards to Louisa and Johnnie. Love and a kiss for you,
yours ever
Jinny.”

The letter Janie wrote, that this is in response to, must have contained Janie’s expressions of floundering and that she’s been casting about for what to do next. In terms of financial support, Janie had a couple of sources of money that came to her in the next months. The probate of the will says Fred’s estate was worth £368 5 shillings and 4 pence. It’s been stamped by the Scottish Widow’s Insurance Fund so I wonder if the life insurance policy Fred had taken out with them was considered part of that estate. The Scottish Widows’ appear to have sent Janie a check for £224 and 11 pence at the end of June. 

I’ve also got here a document headed ‘List of Subscriptions received in aid of the Widow and Children of the late Mr. Fred Shepherd’. There follows an extraordinary list of people and organisations who have all contributed. There are 122 names listed all told, from companies such as the United States Metallic Packing Company Ltd, and Darlington Forge, and Bearpark Coal and Coke company contributing as much as £10 each, to humble individuals, perhaps men who knew Fred at the Steel Works, like ‘Theo Philips’ and ‘Alf Rix’ offering up a couple of shillings. The whole thing was organised by a committee of five men including a W. A. Scott who is recorded also in the list as raising £2 2 from simply ‘friends’. The total they raised came to £187 and 11 shillings.  A staggering amount when you consider that the charity ball Fred and Janie went to at the beginning of the year brought in £61. When I look at this effort and the number of names, both professional and private, I can hardly grasp the level of regard Fred must have enjoyed. Fred meant a great deal to a lot of people, and how kind of them to try and help the family he left behind.

This means Janie had at least £300 to lean on over the coming year. It wasn’t going to last forever obviously and money was always going to be an issue, but at least in the first year of trying to make sense of a life without Fred, she had a brief window of financial security in which to come to terms with what had happened.   Of course she also had six children to care for too, May was still a babe in arms, Edith was 3, Agnes 6, Arthur 8, Alfred 10 and the eldest Fredrick, who at 11 years old no doubt would now have been experiencing the emotional pressure that came with repeated comments that he was ‘the man of the house’ now. And given that he would be leaving school in less than 2 years time, that pressure was real - he’d have been expected to get a job to help support his mother and his siblings. Poor little mite. 

I’m remembering a conversation that Fred had with his friend Fred Johnson way back where he expressed his fears about leaving Janie to fend for herself, even before they were married. It’s heartening to see that he’d taken out life insurance to help protect her, but however much Janie would have tried to reassure him as he neared his end, I’m certain Fred would have hated to know that he’d not yet been able to give his family full security. 

So here we are, at the end of Fred’s story, I can’t quite fathom it. I know I’m going to think that Fred was special because he was my great great grandfather but I think from the belief that people like Janie, and his company bosses had in him, and from the reactions of those that loved him when he died, I have to conclude he was a bit of a bright spark. Someone you liked having around. Someone you could rely on to get a job done. He was more than a bit talented on the football field, and he had a beautiful singing voice. He was seriously intelligent, had a ready wit, but also a soulfulness that I deeply recognise and I’m more than convinced he passed that particular quality down to me. It’s the part of our Fred I relate to the most. Being inclined to wistful moments looking at the landscape not noticing that the tide is about to cut you off. He died 73 years before I was born, there’s no way our paths could have crossed, but I feel I know him so well. Like a strange parasocial relationship stretched over history. We’ve been following him for two years during this podcast and I can’t quite believe my time with him like this is over. It will never be this intense again and I am bereft. 

While we may be at the end of our Fred’s story, we are not at the end of Janie’s. There’s another story here, a different one, about how a 34 year old woman, with six young children had to learn to survive. How she slowly came to realise that she had to leave Middlesbrough and the home she made with Fred, and forge a new path. I want to tell you that story, 

Janie would eventually decide to go back to Sheffield, and there she made a new life. It was there that she put down the foundations and built a family. A family where she raised her kids, and where her kids raised my grandmother and my mum. So I invite you to rejoin me, as this podcast evolves, for a new journey where we discover the history of the early 20th C and the 2nd World War though the eyes of Fred and Janie’s next generations. I’ll be back next time with more details and a Q&A. If you would like send me questions, comments, or your thoughts about how Fred and Janie’s story has effected you, I would love to hear from you so so much! I always appreciate the messages you send. You can reach me on my social media at instagram my love letter time machine all one word, on twitter at 1ngi and you can write to me at my love letter time machine at gmail dot com.

[outro]
Thank you so much for listening to My Love Letter Time Machine.  If you’ve enjoyed the podcast, and want to send me a tip - you can - head to ko-fi.com mylovelettertime machine and buy me a coffee, it helps pay for hosting and music and newspaper archive subscriptions. That’s k o dash f i dot com slash my love letter time machine. This podcast was written and produced by me and the theme music is Delicate Waltz by Neil Cross.

Until next time, take care.
© Ingrid Birchell Hughes 2023