Our
interrogation of the sophisticated search engine of the British Newspaper
Library, referred to here and here has uncovered details of a number of strange
deaths and the inquests following them of residents of Claremont Road in the
first five decades of the street’s existence.
We will be
featuring them over three posts, relating to suicides, accidents and this, the
first article on unusual deaths of young people. There is a small amount of
overlap between the categories, but duplication will be kept to a minimum.
1881 Constance
Susan Hand: “Poisoned, while of unsound mind”, aged 16
Constance
Susan Hand was born in Field Road, Forest Gate, in 1861, the daughter of John,
a bricklayer, and Lucy.
In the
early months of 1881, she took on a job as a nursemaid to the Berry family of
56 Claremont Road. The household comprised Charles Berry, a general shipping
agent, his wife, sister-in-law, and one son. In addition to Constance, the
family had another live-in domestic servant.
 |
| 56 Claremont Road, today |
Constance
was dead, aged 16, by the end of March. Her story is a tragedy.
The inquest
at the British Lion pub in West Ham Lane was extensively reported. On
the day of her death, she went with a child she was caring for to see her
mother, and asked to borrow 6d (2.5p).
By about 3
p.m., she went to Charles Dyer’s chemist shop on Odessa Road, bought a packet
of Batter’s Vermin Powder with the money, and signed the Poisons’ Register.
When asked, she told Dyer that it was to treat an infestation of rats at her
employers’ home.
 |
| Chelmsford Chronicle 1 April 1881 |
According
to Mrs Berry, when she arrived, “She went into the nursery. She then went up
into her bedroom” and took the arsenic that killed her.
A little
later: “Mrs Berry went into the nursery and observed that her eyes were very
bright and swollen. A little later she found that (Constance) had been vomiting
… she said that she had internal gathering and had been spitting blood … in a
very short time the poor girl became convulsed and reportedly called for God to
help her and asked to see the Rev R Ross, the clergyman of the Parish (Emanuel).”
Constance’s
mother was called for, and “after being in great agony for an hour, the girl
died at six o’clock”. A post-mortem was conducted by Dr Evans and samples of
bodily fluids were collected and sent to the London Hospital in Whitechapel for
examination.
Dr Charles
Arnott Tidy, professor of chemistry at the hospital, analysed the samples and
concluded: “I have no doubt that death was due to arsenic poisoning. There was
enough arsenic in (the samples) to kill eight or ten people.”
The inquest
attempted to understand the circumstances surrounding the death before pronouncing
the cause of death.
Constance’s
mother and Mrs Berry both testified that she seemed to be a cheerful girl. A
friend and fellow domestic servant said that a boyfriend had called off an
engagement about two weeks previously.
The friend
said she didn’t think this was a factor, as Constance seemed quite cheered at
the event: “She said that she was glad and it seemed to have no influence on
her spirits”.
Mr Berry,
her employer, made a very telling – in more ways than one – statement. He said
he “... had never spoken an unkind word to the dead; in fact, he had never
spoken scarcely half a dozen words to her. She had been in their employ only
about two months, but believed she was suffering from religious mania.”
Mrs Berry
returned to the witness box and perhaps inadvertently gave an explanation for
the suicide: “Mrs Berry said the deceased knew she had missed some things and
that she had said she might have to send the deceased away”.
Could this
be that Contance knew the sack was looming, and couldn’t face the prospect?
Although it
was clear that she had killed herself, at the conclusion of the inquest the
coroner posed the jury with a dilemma: “If it was done by the hand of the
deceased herself, it would have been their duty to return a verdict of felo
de se, which would deprive the relatives of a Christian burial”. The Latin
phrase was used to imply sanity at the time of suicide.
In the
event, the jury “found that the deceased had poisoned herself while of unsound
mind.” This verdict, that she was non compos mentis at the time of the
suicide, would have enabled her to have a burial in a Christian graveyard.
Sources: Eastern
Post 2 and 9 April, Chelmsford Chronicle 1 and 8 April 1881, Essex
Newsman 2 and 9 April 1881. Find My Past
1885 Herbert
Wilson Folkard: “Accidental death”, aged 11
Just four
years later, another youngster from four doors down the road was killed in a
railway accident.
In early
May, Herbert Wilson Folkard, aged 11 from 48 Claremont Road was on his way home
with his friend and near-neighbour Edward Frank Larter, after playing cricket
in Victoria Park, when the accident happened. Herbert’s brother, Ernest
William, a draper, was a witness at the inquest.
 |
| 48 Claremont Road, today |
The Folkard
boys were brothers of Ellen Elizabeth Folkard, of the same address, who for
some years was principal of the Claremont Ladies Academy (see here).
Herbert’s
friend, Edward, lived at number 49, son of Rous Larter, a schoolmaster, with
his four siblings and two domestic servants.
At noon
they were on the platform of Stratford station waiting for a train to Forest Gate.
A train from Fenchurch Street rolled in and was about to depart when Folkard
started to close some still-open carriage doors. As he did this, the train
moved on, he slipped and fell between the train and the platform.
 |
| Essex Times, 9 May 1885 |
Although
the train braked sharply, it was too late: one wheel had passed over his body
and a second was resting upon it. “It was found the boy was quite dead”.
The jury
returned a verdict of accidental death.
The Leytonstone
Express and Independent also covered the story and accompanied it with a
less than sympathetic editorial:
“There are
few more common sights on the railway platform than the schoolboy who
constitutes himself an amateur porter, and delegates the slamming of the door
with even greater vigour than does his prototype, the bona fide one, to the
annoyance of the public and at their own eminent peril.”
There was
little sympathy for Folkard in their conclusion, but an urge for attention by
the railway companies:
“This sad occurrence
should surely teach the boys the folly of indulging in their dangerous practice,
and should make the officials more energetic in putting a stop to it.”
Sources: Essex
Times, 8 May and Leytonstone Express and Independent, 9 May.Find
My Past
1889 Vincent
Martin Young: “Death from accidental suffocation”, aged 8
In late
August 1889, an inquest was held at the Rising Sun pub (still standing) into the death of eight-year-old Vincent Martin Young of 103
Claremont Road. He was the son of a mercantile clerk.
 |
| 103 Claremont Road, today |
Vincent had
been playing with three friends on a Saturday earlier in the month in a
“ballast hole” (a pit filled with water) on Romford Road. They were jumping
into the hole.
It started
raining and ten minutes later the friends heard the sand in the part of the
hole Vincent was in begin to slide. They looked for him, couldn’t see him, but
didn’t tell anyone of the event and left the scene.
Alfred
Birnscomb, a clerk from Hampton Road, went to the Young household about eight
o’clock that night and heard that Vincent had not been home since noon. He made
enquiries, and finding that there had been a slip of earth at the ballast hole,
went to the police station (round the corner) and—with some friends—borrowed
spades.
 |
| Barking, East Ham and Ilford Advertiser 31 August 1889 |
A search
was made, and after about an hour and a half, Vincent’s body was found. “He was
quite dead”. There were about 18 inches of sand upon him. The jury returned a
verdict of “Death by accidental suffocation”.
At the
conclusion of the inquest, the Rev Cowan, father of one of Vincent’s friends,
said that “Mr Corbet was the owner of the property: four deaths had occurred at
that place, and he thought it was too bad that with Mr Corbet’s immense wealth,
the property was not fenced in. Boys would naturally go to such a place, when
nobody was there, to play.”
 |
| Archibald Cameron Corbett - developer of Woodgrange estate |
A rider was
added to the verdict requesting “the coroner to write to the property owner and
ask him to fence around a certain portion of the property on the north side. “
It seems
shocking that the hole had been unattended, despite it having caused three
previous deaths. Such negligence would today result in a charge of manslaughter.
Despite the
slight misspelling of his name, it seems highly probable that the person who
owned “the ballast hole” was, in fact, Archibald Cameron Corbett, the developer
of the Woodgrange estate. He could certainly have fitted the description of
being of “immense wealth”. The hole probably existed due to construction work
on the Romford Road part of the estate.
Sources:
Essex News 31 Aug, Barking, East Ham Independent 31 Aug
1900 Frederick
Ambrose Ball: “Accidental death”, aged 9
Nine-year-old
Frederick Ambrose Ball, lived with his auctioneer father George, mother Louise
and seven siblings at 44 Claremont Road in 1900. He was described as: “always
of a cheerful disposition, but was perpetually in mischief”.
 |
| 44 Claremont Road, today |
On a
Saturday morning, at the end of July he was “told to go up in the bathroom and
wash his face”.
According
to the West Ham and South Essex Mail (4 August):
"Nothing being heard from him for some time, his
sister forced the door of the bathroom which had the catch up and was horrified
to find her brother hanging from the side of the bath with a towel wound
several times round his neck. Medical aid was at once summoned, but life was
found to be extinct."
Dr Cannon,
of 94 Woodgrange Road told the inquest that:
"He was called to see the deceased at about a
quarter to one. And found him quite dead. … He was under the impression that
the boy was playing with the towel and slipped. He must have become insensible
and unable to help himself."
The jury
reached a verdict of “accidental death”.
A few
things emerging from the incident seem strange to the modern reader. Firstly,
the police do not seem to have been called to a highly unusual, and seemingly
implausible incident (the police station was just around the corner). Second,
the only non-family member to be a witness was a doctor.
 |
| Eastern Counties Times, 4 Aug 1900 |
Third,
perhaps the relationship between the boy and the family member who found him.
The boy
Frederick was born in 1891, after the census in April, when the family lived in
Ramsay Road, Wanstead. His “mother”, Louise Lee Ball would have been 38 at the
time. His “sister” Louise Jane would have been 14/15.
By the 1901
census, Frederick had died, and the family had moved to Claremont Road. Seven
siblings lived in the house; six of them were assigned occupations in the census, but Louise
Jane, Frederick’s designated sister and the oldest, was not.
Could
Louise Jane Ball have given birth to Frederick at age 14/15 and led the child
and society to believe that his “mother” was, in fact, his grandmother, the
38-year-old Louise Lee Ball?
Louise Jane
married Charles Arthur Thomson, a dock clerk, in 1908 and was living in Ilford
by the 1911 census. Her parents and three siblings were still living at 44
Claremont Road.
Sources: Essex
Newsman 4 August 1900, Eastern Counties’ Times 4 August 1900 and West
Ham and South Essex Mail 4 August 1900. Find My Past
