Assault and Cruelty - the perpetrator

On 31st October 1856, Martha Cotterill was found guilty of assault and cruelty towards my 3x great-grandmother, Bessie Shelley, at a magistrates's hearing in Eccleshall, Staffordshire.

© British Newspaper Archives

Martha was fined £5 which would have resulted in imprisonment if Bessie's husband, Thomas Shelley, jointly accused but acquitted on lack of evidence, paid her fine.

(If you've not read the story so far, you might like to read the previous posts on the incident,  A family secret - The Shocking Truth,  Part 1 and Part 2.)

Who was Martha Cotterill?

So who was Martha Cotterill and how did she come into Bessie's life?

Martha joined the Shelley household around 1852 as a housekeeper. According to Thomas Davis, a servant in Shelley's employ in 1856, he was told by Thomas that Martha should be considered mistress of the house.

It seems certain that the relationship between Thomas Shelley and Martha was more than just employer and employee.  What is more difficult to establish, is whether this relationship began before Martha moved in or after.

Adbaston Church
(courtesy of geograph.org.uk)

A year before Martha's arrival, the 1851 census shows Thomas and Bessie (nee Holland) living in the small hamlet of Doley, near Adbaston, with their six children - Emma (my great-great gandmother) aged 9, William 7, Mary Ann 6, Martha 5, Eliza 3 and Joannah 1 - along with Thomas's mother, 54 year old Phoebe. Thomas is a farmer of 45 acres, with one live-in servant, John Lee.

A near neighbour

Less than 5 miles away, the same census lists Martha Cotrill (sic), unmarried, aged 25, living with her father, Thomas Cotrill and mother, Jane Cotrill.  Also listed are two grand-daughters - Mary, aged 1, born in Manchester and Elizabeth, aged 3 months, born in High Offley, Staffordshire. Are these girls both Martha's daughters?

Move on ten years and Elizabeth Cottrell, born in High Offley, appears on the 1861 census, now aged 11, but this time she is a boarder in - guess where - the Shelley household, alongside "housekeeper", Martha Cottrell.

A Manchester connection

I haven't found the other girl, Mary, but the eagle-eyed of you who read the previous posts may have noticed a connection. In the newspaper report of the assault on Bessie in 1856, it was stated that Martha had gone to Manchester some months previously to have a baby. The Mary mentioned in 1851 was also born in Manchester. What was Martha's link to Manchester? Perhaps she had family there.

Following her Manchester confinement, there's no evidence to suggest Martha returned with a child. Was it adopted? Or perhaps it didn't survive. In the December quarter of the 1855 birth index, an unnamed "male" child is listed, surname Cottrill, born in Manchester who subsequently died in the same quarter. Was this Martha's baby? And was Thomas Shelley the father?

The clue's in the name

One thing is certain, however. Nine year-old Mary J "C" Shelley, who appeared on the 1871 census as Thomas's daughter, was born Mary Jane Cotterill, on 12th July 1861, mother Martha Cotterill. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the name of the father is not recorded on the birth certificate.

Sadly, however, in April 1875, Mary Jane died aged only 13 and was buried in Claverley churchyard. Unfortunately, I can find no record of her death in the registration indexes under either Cotterill or Shelley, to obtain a certificate to discover the cause of death.

Bessie's tormentor dies

It would be one year after Mary Jane's death and 20 years after the court case that Bessie would be finally set free from the woman who had usurped her role as Thomas's wife. In 1876 Martha died from heart disease and congestion of the lungs. The death certificate recorded her age as 54, though according to previous records, she would actually have been only 50.

It would be comforting to think that Bessie would go on to enjoy many more years with her family, but sadly it was not to be. Bessie herself died six months later in the most horrendous circumstances.

Read the full story here, Assault and Cruelty - the victim.

Mystery children and missing siblings

The headstone of Thomas Shelley (d.1881) and
his wife Bessey (d.1877) in Claverley churchyard.

This week I've been tracking the wayward offspring of my 3x great-grandparents Thomas and Bessey Shelley, who lived in Staffordshire and Shropshire.

Thomas and Bessey (nee Holland) married in 1840 and in the 1841 census, were living in Cheswadine, Shropshire along with Thomas's widowed mother, Phoebe.

By 1851, they're residing in Adbaston in Staffordshire and have a sizable family -

Emma, aged 9 (my great-great grandmother)
William, aged 7
Mary Ann, aged 6
Eliza, aged 5
Martha, aged 3
and Joanna, aged 1

 

Move on 10 years and the family is scattered. Emma is servant at a farm near Market Drayton, Thomas appears to be working away from home (on census night, at least) as a farm bailiff and Bessey is on her own with Eliza in Church Aston, Shropshire. I'm uncertain about William's whereabouts - it's possible he could be working as an apprentice. But I could find no census record for Martha, Joanna or Mary Ann.

It's common knowledge that childhood in Victorian England was a precarious existence so I checked the death registers and sadly, found both Joanna, who died aged 6 in 1858 and Mary Ann who died in 1860, aged 15. There's also the death of a William Shelley listed in 1859 but as there are several William Shelleys, without further information, I don't know yet if he's Thomas and Bessey's son.

But at least, Martha is alive and well, as she pops up again on the 1871 census back home with her parents in Claverley, Shropshire. Although she gives her surname as Shelley, she'd actually married Charles Dawber in 1868 and has her daughter with her (10 month old Rosa Vida Dawber) who is listed as grand-daughter to Thomas, head of the family.

Also back in the fold is Emma, along with her illegitimate son, my great-grandfather George, aged 1, and there are two new additions to the family, Mary J C, aged 9, and grand-daughter, Agnes, aged 5. But who are Agnes's parents? There's no sign of Eliza, though she may be working away from home. (An Eliza Shelley of the correct age is listed as a servant in a village called Moseley near Brewood, Staffordshire but no place of birth is recorded for her to cross reference.)

 

By 1881, Emma has left home to marry George Wenlock, leaving little George behind with her parents, presumably because Mr Wenlock is not prepared to take on a son who is not his own. But by 1881 Thomas is now a widower, as Bessey died in 1877, the year after Emma got married.

George, aged 11, and Agnes, now 15 are listed, not as grandchildren though, but as son and daughter to Thomas. And another daughter is now back in residence - Eliza - presumably returned to help look after the family following her mother's death. Mary J C, who would now be 19, does not appear. Perhaps she married, though I haven't located her yet.

As I discovered a few months ago (see blog post Out of the woodwork and on to the tree), Emma had another illegitimate son called Charles, born in 1873, who was adopted by a local family. And it transpires that she was not the only sister to have a child out of wedlock, as Agnes's birth certificate shows that her mother was the unmarried Martha Shelley. No father is recorded.

Like George Wenlock, it seems Charles Dawber was not prepared to take on another man's daughter and Martha has no option but to leave Agnes in the care of her parents when she married.

If the William listed in the death records was Thomas and Bessey's son, it would mean that Thomas and Bessey lost a child on three consecutive years. Even if it wasn't, losing Joanna and then Mary Ann, would be traumatic enough. Did their loss influence their decision to take on the illegitimate offspring of their daughters? Or did they do so simply out of a sense of duty?

I'm not yet clear as to the parentage of Mary "J C". Although she's recorded as a daughter in the 1881 census, Bessey would have been 46 when she was born. While that's perfectly feasible, I do wonder, given that the 1881 census records George and Agnes as son and daughter when we know they weren't, whether Mary J C's mother wasn't Bessey at all. And if not, who was she?

I can see I've got more digging to do before this muddle is unravelled!