Nancy Wiseman (newfamilytree @t rogers.com) of Holland Landing, Ontario, Canada) writes: My great grandfather, William George Fortnum, was born March 6 or 8, 1858 in Aldenham, Hertfordshire, England.  I have been able to confirm, although not the exact date, through census records from 1871, 1881, 1891 & 1901 and from his Military Record.

He was in the Military (Royal Artillery #17252) from November 8, 1876 through November 25, 1895. Although his Military Records have him residing in Devon after his discharge, he is back in Hertfordshire with his family in 1901.

I have had some research done through HALS.  From this I know that his wife Margaret Catherine LeCouter, was admitted to Hill End Hospital on October 16, 1901 suffering from "mania".  She died April 23, 1923 and it is believed that she was at Hill End for this entire time.

The five youngest children, including my grandfather, were admitted to the Watford Union Workhouse, May 16, 1903.  At this time documentation showed "Mother in asylum, Father in prison."  The children spent the next several years at the Workhouse before immigrating to Canada in 1907 & 1912.  Various entries from 1903-1905 show "address of father unknown" or "father deserted".

I have him listed as, died before 1917 in Aldenham, from a family tree done by a relative, but have not been able to find out where this information came from.  I speculate that since his oldest son died in 1917 it may have been known at this time that he was not living and this information has been passed on through family, but that is just a guess.

As my father understood that my grandfather came to Canada as on orphan, I would very much like to get additional information on my great grandfather, but I have not been able to find him on any historical records past the 1901 census. Where, why, how long was he in prison?  I understand this is actually three questions, but I hope that one source that I am missing will answer one or if I am really lucky, all of these questions.

I look forward to hearing back from you for some idea I may be missing.

Let us review the critical period  in date order.

1st April 1901 - William was with his family in Aldenham on census night - shown as a general labourer.

1901? - There may have been difficulties in managing the household (perhaps William had been in prison before for a short time leaving his wife to look after the children with no income) which lead to ...

16th October 1901 - wife admitted to Hill End Hospital - William and children are presumably still living in Aldenham, the oldest children being able to help look after the younger ones when their father was at work. As a general labourer William may well have had difficulty in supporting the family on his own, especially as the youngest would have been only two.

1903? - William arrested and held in prison. Children would almost certainly not be able to continue to live in family home without support for long.  This raises the question as to whether there were any close relatives living in the area who could take them in (both in terms of accommodation and financially) on a temporary basis. If not there would have been a crisis situation.

 16th May 1903. Children admitted to Workhouse. This would presumably have happened quite quickly after the arrest (perhaps initially on a temporary basis) unless they were looked after by close relatives.

1903-1905 - Father recorded as "address of father unknown" or "father deserted". The Workhouse would have wanted to transfer the responsibility for the children back to the father as soon as possible after he came out of prison. If he was still in prison I am sure they would have recorded this. So perhaps he had been released from prison in the second half of 1903 but failed to return to the Watford area to "claim" his children. By 1905 the workhouse knew he was definitely out of prison and he had therefore deserted the children. It may even be that if he returned to the area he could have been arrested. Under these circumstances, by 1905 he may well have been living anywhere but the Watford area (where he might be recognised and arrested), and possibly using an assumed name.

The key question is therefore "Why was he in prison?"

The most likely situation is that William committed a comparatively minor offence - such as stealing chickens to feed the family - and was sentenced in the local magistrates court to a short sentence (perhaps one or two months). If this is what happened there would probably be a report (possibly quite short) in the Watford Observer or the Herts Advertiser weekly newspapers (perhaps both) in about May 1903 and William would have been held in St Albans Prison (see Prison Records). There may be relevant court records at HALS.

If he committed an offence outside Hertfordshire the records for his offence and imprisonment would be in the area where the offence was committed, and it is not clear which prison would have held him. It is unlikely to be a major offence such as murder or highway robbery which would have lead to a longer sentence (or hanging) as this is incompatible with "address of father unknown", etc, in 1903/5.

This raises the question of whether he was dead by 1917. It may well be that the family treated him as dead in 1917 if they had no news of him after 1903 and they did not want to record that he had been in prison. If, when he came out of prison, he did not return home, and was afraid of being arrested for neglect of his children, he may have "covered his tracks" in a way which could make it virtually impossible to identify his subsequent death. He obviously couldn't contact his children while they were still at the Workhouse, and once they had gone to Canada it would have been harder as presumably he would need to contact the Workhouse to get a forwarding address.

(This kind of thing happens. A distant cousin of mine was "widowed" on a family holiday to the sea side circa 1900 - her husband being assumed to have drowned in the sea. This was the family tradition on my side of the family and is shown as such on a family tree I produced in about 1980. It later transpired that the husband had gone AWOL and was living in Australia. See also What did your ancestor call themselves.)

BTW. I note from the 1901 census that his wife was born in Canada and wonder if there was any family contacts with her side of the family when the children went there. After all, even if William was lying low in the UK under an assumed name, he could possibly contact his wife's family (assuming that he wasn't being blamed by her relatives for her being in Hill End Hospital). On the other hand he might not have been able to read and write so contact would have been difficult. (Did he sign his name on his marriage certificate?)

Nancy responded: Thank you for your very prompt reply.  You certainly gave me an insight I had not considered. It had not occurred to me that the Workhouse would be looking for my Great-Grandfather to claim his family when he was released from prison, or that it would be an offence not to claim them.  That could very easily explain why he never showed up on documentation after that.

Yes, my Great-Grandfather met my Great-Grandmother during his Military career when stationed in Halifax. To my knowledge the children never made contact with their Grandparents once in Canada, as they ended up in Ontario and would not have had the means even if they were aware they had family here.  I'm sure my Great-Grandfather was literate because an early census shows him as a teacher and also because of some courses he took while in the Military.  His Military Record also shows a number of offences and I understand he had a bad temper, so I'm sure this explains a lot.  My Grandfather did have family in the area.  He was transferred to Barnardo's before being sent to Canada and there were an number of entries from the Barnardo's Records that showed an Aunt checking up on him, but nothing about his parents.  I had forgot to mention that part because I did not think it was relevant to the time period I was enquiring about.

I will continue my quest for finding the story because I believe it will be quite interesting if I can uncover more details. I have already come a long way, since although my father knew about Barnardo's, he did not know of the years my Grandfather spent in the Workhouse.  It is interesting how family stories are told in such a way as to keep some things secret.

You say your Great-grandfather had a bad temper - and that might well explain why your mother ended up in an asylum. Unfortunately the Hill End patient records have not survived for that period, but when the long stay mental hospitals were being closed throughout the country in the 1980s and 1990s patients were assessed for their ability to return to life in the community. Some real horror stories were found. A few elderly women were identified who had spent much of their life in an asylum, apparently for little better reason than that they had disgraced their family by becoming pregnant and the family had got a doctor to certify them because their behaviour was unacceptable.

Your comment on the military records support the possibility that William Fortnum's temper was a factor of domestic life. I am sure that a hundred years ago there were still plenty of husbands who believed the old saying "A wife, a dog, and a walnut tree, the more you beat them the better they be." It is quite possible that a highly stressed wife might snap under unreasonable physical or verbal domestic violence. And who would be blamed for her resulting behaviour ...

I am sure that there would have been doctors who would certify a wife because her husband said she had "gone mad" and had, for example, hit him with a rolling pin. Any devoted mother who wanted to shield her children from her husband's temper and ended up in an asylum - with the children left in the bullying husband's care - may well have became so disturbed that she could not be released from the asylum.

April, 2008

Kitty Catalano (kit527cat @t sbcglobal.net) from Michigan, writes: I found all of this information to be very insightful as I have been doing research as well on the family. I am the great granddaughter of Violet Rachel (Bevens) Fortnum whom is the Daughter of William and Margaret. I had never heard these stories at all from my Great Grandmother possibly I was too young. However it has occurred to me that being as my Great grandmother was the youngest of the 7 children and born July of 1900 as documented on her death certificate. This would have made her only 1year 3 months at the time Margaret went to Hill End. A thought is she could likely have had postpartum depression. I also noticed that William was released from the military the day after their 6th child Jane was born in 1895. I wonder how often he was able to help with the care of the children during the time he was in the service. I would be interested in any copies you may have that have supported all of your findings as it may also be helpful for my searches as well.

I am glad this information has been useful, and it may well be that because of her age your great grandmother had very little understanding of the situation that led to her going into the workhouse - and because of the way the workhouses and the asylums were viewed at the time she might never have wanted to say much about that time of her life. I am forwarding your request to Nancy, who found the original documentation. In addition it may be she has found out more about William's spell in prison from records which I believe would be in the National Archives.

There are web pages for Aldenham, The Cemetery at Hill End Hospital, The Long Stay Hospitals in the St Albans area, Watford Union

If you can add to the information given above tell me.

April 2008		Page created and updated
August 2010		Further upadates