christopher duclos mallindine + sophia hall
Christopher was born in Shoreditch on 30 October 1794 to William Mallindine and Frances Kelsee. He was baptised at the local parish church dedicated to St Leonard, the patron saint of prisoners and women in labour, on 10 December. The name Duclos does not appear anywhere else in the family line but it is possible he was named in honour of a family friend or perhaps one of his godparents. Unfortunately, the baptism record does not contain the name of godparents or witnesses so the origin of the name is impossible to confirm.
He grew up in the area around St Matthew in Bethnal Green at a time when work was scarce, wages were low and most families struggled to support themselves. Health, housing and sanitary conditions were poor and many families moved frequently due to evictions or to avoid the rent collector. There is no specific information on Christopher’s childhood or early adulthood as he next appears in the public records at the age of 39 when he married Sophia Hall on 25 November 1833 at St Dunstan in Stepney. Sophia was born on Skinner Street, on 3 July 1804 to George Hall, a chair maker, and his wife Ann and she was also baptised at St Leonard in Shoreditch.
On 17 April 1839, their daughter Elizabeth was born at 4 Pear Tree Court in Shoreditch but no corresponding baptism record has been found even though their house was almost directly across the High Street from the church of St Leonard. Christopher worked as a Weaver, a trade he likely learned from his father, and it was Sophia who registered their daughter’s birth — and signed the register with her mark as she was unable to read or write.
Christopher and Sophia next appear in the 1841 Census where they were recorded as living at 4 Crown Court off Quaker Street in Whitechapel and their household also included seven children between the ages of 2 and 15. Ages in the 1841 census were usually rounded down to the nearest 5 years but even with the imprecise ages, it is clear that several of their children were born before they married. Both Christopher and Sophia were listed as single (bachelor and spinster) on their marriage certificate so it does not appear that the children were from a previous marriage. Six of the children were born before Civil Registration was introduced in England on 1 July 1837 and the only other possible record of birth would be a baptism record but no records have been found for any of the children under Mallindine or Hall.
Relationships such as wife, son, or daughter were not included in this census so it is not known if Christopher was the father or representing himself as the father. The eldest child listed in the household was Charles followed by Ann who were both listed as 15 years of age. Mary was ten years old and the next three siblings — Thomas, Maria and Eliza — were recorded as five years of age while the youngest, Elizabeth, was two. On 12 November 1842, their son William George was born at the family home on Crown Court. Christopher was supporting his large family by working as a Silk Weaver but it must have been a struggle as the weaving industry was in serious decline due to the importation of cheap silks from the Far East and the wages for the little work that was available were very low.
Casual Ward’ by Luke Fildes
On 22 July 1844, fifty year old Christopher died of fever at their home on Phoenix Street and he was buried in the church yard at St Matthew, Bethnal Green one week later. Without Christopher’s wages, the family’s situation became so desperate that Sophia was forced to apply for parish relief two weeks after his death. The Poor Law record notes that Sophia and her children were living at 4 Wood Yard off Phoenix Street and that four of the children were illegitimate and four were lawful. The children and their ages were listed in the application record: Charles was 20 years old (born about 1822), Ann 18 years (born about 1824), Mary Ann 15 years (born about 1829), Thomas 13 years (born about 1831), Maria 12 years (born about 1832), Eliza 7 years (born about 1837), Elizabeth 4 years and William 20 months.
The division between the legitimate and illegitimate children lines up with their marriage in 1833 but there is no confirmation in the Poor Law record as to whether Christopher was the father of all the children or just the four lawful ones. It may not have mattered to the parish guardians who approved relief payments as the law in force at the time dictated that any child born out of wedlock was illegitimate and remained so even if the parents later married. It wasn’t until the Legitimacy Act of 1926 was passed that a child’s birth was legitimized following its parents’ marriage.
Sophia had to prove that she was eligible to claim relief and this was usually done by providing evidence of long term residence in the parish. The record notes that Christopher’s brother swore an oath that Sophia was born in the parish and it also notes that he was now ‘in the house’ which presumably means he was living with the family or they with him. The brother’s name is not listed but Christopher had three brothers, James, William and Isaac, who were all living in the area at the time.
The record is somewhat unclear as to whether any relief was paid and the only additional note of explanation is ‘first order cancelled, four children born out of wedlock’ which seems to indicate that her request was refused because of what the Guardians considered to be immoral behaviour. In some cases relief was paid but only based on the number of legitimate children so Sophia may have received relief for her and four of her children but this was likely not enough to support a family of 9. An entry in the side column notes that a second order was received on 20 September so Sophia must have returned and applied for relief the following month. It is not known how the family survived the years following Christopher’s death but the older children may have been able to find work or perhaps they survived on parish relief and assistance from family but the difficult times were not over as little William George died on 1 May 1846, only six months before his fourth birthday.
Phoenix Street and Vine Place
in Bethnal Green
c. 1860
In 1851, Sophia was still living at 4 Wood Yard along with her four youngest daughters: Mary Ann, Maria, Eliza and Elizabeth. She was working as a Button Knitter along with daughter Mary while the three younger ones worked as Box Makers. They most likely worked at home and were paid by the piece.
Nineteen year old Thomas appears in the census at 4 Vine Place in the parish of Christ Church where he is listed as a servant and Glass Scopler or Cutter in the household of Alexander Bass and his wife Ann. Lockie’s Topography of London, published in 1810, placed Vine Place at the north end of Vine Street near Little Pearl Street which was just south of Quaker and Phoenix Streets where Sophia lived with her daughters. Phoenix Street disappeared when the East London Railway, now the East London Line, was built in 1869 but Quaker Street remains today although many of the buildings from the Mallindine’s time have been demolished.
Alexander Bass was also working as a Glass Cutter and records show that he married Ann Hall at St Philip’s Church in Bethnal Green on 23 May 1847. Ann was 22 years old and living at 4 Sclater Street when she married and the register also lists her father as Thomas Hall, a Weaver. No matching birth record for Ann Hall has been found nor is there any record of a marriage between Thomas Hall and a woman named Sophia so it is entirely possible that Ann was in fact the illegitimate daughter of Sophia Hall. If she was, it does indicate that Christopher was not her father as she was still using the Hall name; listing her father as Thomas Hall may have been an attempt to hide her illegitimacy from the authorities and possibly from her husband to be. This family relationship would also explain why Thomas was living with her but not why he was using the Mallindine name rather than Hall.
Later that year, on 26 September, Sophia married Thomas Manakey at St Philip in Bethnal Green with her daughter Mary Ann and Richard Warner standing as witnesses. He was also a widower and at the time of his marriage, he lived at 4 Friars Mount and worked as a Carman. Thomas was born on 3 September 1800 at Corbet’s Court in Spitalfields to James Manakey, a Dyer, and his wife Ann and he was baptised at Christ Church one month later. In 1841, Thomas was living with his wife Elizabeth on James Street in Bethnal Green and he later appears at 5 Great Pearl Street in the 1851 Electoral Register which was several streets away from Sophia’s lodgings on Phoenix Street. But his marriage to Sophia was shortlived as she died just before her 51st birthday in Whitechapel in the spring of 1855.
There is no record of her eldest son Charles although there is a possible death record for a Charles Mallindine who died in the Whitechapel Workhouse on 18 April 1849. He was 24 years old at the time and the cause of death was listed as debility which was often used to describe a state of weakness or infirmity when the underlying cause of death was not known.
Mary Ann married William Wheeler at St Philip in Bethnal Green on 1 May 1855 and they went on to have five children. Unfortunately, life for her sister Ann did not get any easier after her marriage. On 19 May 1857, her husband Alexander applied for parish relief and told the Guardians that his wife was insane and they had no family to help them. He outlined his apprenticeship and work as a Glass Cutter but stated that the works that provided him with employment had been cancelled and he had not been able to find other work. In the 19th century, terms like insanity were used to describe a wide variety of behavioural disorders from depression and anxiety to more serious mental illnesses such as psychosis but as Ann was still at home rather than in a local asylum, her condition was probably a nervous disorder rather than something more serious.
The following year Ann died in Bethnal Green and was buried at Victoria Park Cemetery on 18 March. The burial register also contains an entry for ‘Child’ Bass who died four hours after birth and was buried on 6 March; there is a corresponding birth and death registered in March 1858 for a ‘Male’ Bass. It may be a concidence but it could be that Ann died following childbirth.
Alexander continued to struggle and on 4 February 1869, he was admitted to the Stepney Workhouse for several weeks but by 1871, he was living in a common lodging house in Nichols Row. These lodgings were one of the lowest types of accommodation available and offered the poorest residents a place to sleep for a nightly fee but the following year, Alexander was once again forced to apply for admission to the workhouse and this time, the reason was not destitution or infirmity but imbecility. It appears that the years had taken their toll on him and he died the following year.
There is no record of Sophia’s daughter Maria beyond 1851 but her three remaining children all married — Thomas married Elizabeth Evans on 24 May 1858, Eliza married Joseph Arno on 17 August 1858, and Elizabeth married William Lovett on 5 April 1860.
In the summer of 1868, Sophia’s second husband, Thomas Manakey, died in Whitechapel.