Charlotte Inkpen Steven’s Story
The family historian takes the words from dry documents, old family letters and stories, trying to weave a garment around each family member. Some like delicate lace, for others a strong cloth is formed. This is my grandmother’s story.
Charlotte Inkpen STEVENS was born in Sturminster Newton in 1871. She had two younger sisters, Honor and Anna Inkpen Stevens. INKPEN was their mother’s maiden name.
Charlotte’s family left Hammoon, Dorset for Fivehead, Somerset and in 1892 she married Charles James DERRICK. The marriage certificate states they married in the Independent Chapel, Langport. Her father was then the landlord of the Foxhound Inn, Fivehead. Perhaps this is where they met.
They struggled to raise a family, but several children did not survive beyond infancy and Charles himself died young.
Family folklore relates that Charles James Derrick, as in a letter from Aunt Nell ROLPH to my mother “. . . poor unfortunate was in a lunatic asylum . . .” . How he got there remained a mystery for a long time.
We find Charlotte Inkpen Derrick in 1901 as a widow with one son, working at home in Fivehead as a ‘shirt machinist’. Henry James CHOWN was a sewing machine mechanic who lost his wife Sophia during a botched and painful childbirth in 1902. They met as he cycled around the villages servicing home-workers sewing machines.
One reason for their marriage is perhaps understandable. At 40 Henry had six children (eldest 15) and needed someone to bring them up while he carried on working. Charlotte then 30 was struggling to earn a living and feed her son. Marrying in 1903, they went on to raise a ‘second’ family. An ordinary working class story in Victorian and Edwardian England.
Family history is often about accidental discovery and meetings. My brother-in-law, Alan WRIGHT was informed by someone visiting his family history website that a contact was asking for information about the Chown family and details of Charlotte Inkpen Stevens. This enquiry was from Australia by a descendant of a hitherto unknown daughter of Charlotte’s.
Scurrying back to the 1891 census, there she was; “Gertrude” granddaughter of Jane and John Stevens. We had completely overlooked the significance of the entry.
Charlotte had borne a child in 1890 when she was 19, father unknown, who was subsequently brought up by her grandparents. Gertrude Stevens later went into service and married Alfred HODDINOTT.
The revelation set us off to Hammoon. We looked inside the church, by kind permission of a churchwarden, taking a picture of the font.
We told her our story showing a picture of Gertrude and Jane outside their home. She suggested we visit a nearby farmhouse which had similar windows without success. After a picnic outside the church we encountered two more ladies who advised us to call on the village historian Jacqui WRAGG. She was unable to help us but was intrigued, encouraging us, offering various village documents and further contacts.
On our return home Jacqui emailed us about another contact researching the Stevens family, using names from a bible her mother received from a bookshop.
The Australian cousin, descendant of Gertrude, is also in touch with a Stevens family member in this country who also hopes to inherit a family bible. We are not sure whether these two bibles are the same one. Typical, you wait for ages for a bible, and then two come along.
So there it is, Charlotte’s first child thrived and married. With one of her children marrying and emigrating to Queensland Australia.
This part of the story has not ended yet. Are we chasing two bibles? We have new family branches in Australia and England. Looking for the location of the picture of Jane and Gertrude, but have yet to meet our new UK cousin(s).
Back to Charles James Derrick, he was born and raised in Fivehead but in 1891 he is on the census as a soldier, a patient in military hospital.
Leaving the army he joined his father returned to his previous job as a teazle worker, as shown on the various birth and death certificates of his children.
His death certificate showed he had died aged 36 in the local asylum, ‘Cotford’ Bishops Lydeard, Taunton. The entry gave the cause of death as general paralysis of the insane. How can you die of insanity?
An internet search revealed that general paralysis of the insane is nearly always caused by syphilis. In The 1844 Report of the Metropolitan Commissioners in Lunacy;
“. . General paralysis of the Insane seldom occurs in females, but mostly in men, and is the result almost uniformly of a debauched and intemperate life. . . ”.
If the disease goes untreated, symptoms disappear, laying hidden, slowly invading the body. Once the nervous system is crippled the mental and physical decline is rapid.
So pictures of the Chown family matriarch dressed in black, and an early photo with Henry masked many tragic events in their lives. How much did Henry know, how did Charlotte escape contracting the disease? Like most families’ secrets they carried them to the grave.
Between them Henry and Charlotte raised a family of sixteen. Six from Henry’s first marriage, the single survivor from Charlotte’s first marriage and nine more from their union.
Gertrude has not been counted until now. Sadly, it has been suggested that there was little warmth between mother and daughter. We hope that a new family affection will be established as her descendants reclaim the UK family.
Henry died at the outbreak of the Second World War having served in The Great War. His medals are still in the family, in New Zealand, held and displayed by his grandson Leonard. All Henry’s army records were destroyed by WW II bombing.
During the Second World War Charlotte billeted over 150 servicemen at her home in Alma Street, Taunton. She died in 1949.
The name Inkpen has been carried by the Chown daughters down two more generations.
Sources: 1851, 1861,1871,1881 and 1901 censuses. Birth, Marriage and Death certificates, my friends Google, Wikipedia and many other documents.
I would also like to acknowledge the help and support for this essay that I received from many people far and wide. Some named others not, your input made the difference.