In April 1881, Elizabeth Cox, aged 64, was a shopkeeper at Hill End. 

Birth

Elizabeth was born at Hardington in about 1816. She was the daughter of Richard Bartlett and his wife, Sarah.

First marriage

On 5 October 1841, Elizabeth married Daniel Mitchell at Hardington. He was a farm labourer from Melbury Bubb who had moved to Hardington by June 1841.

Her first husband’s crimes

In March 1843, Daniel was imprisoned for eight months for stealing a bull calf belonging to Robert Smith. Daniel probably found it impossible to get work on his release, which explains why, on 19 December 1843, he and Elizabeth were the subject of a removal order to Daniel’s home parish of Melbury Bubb.

The couple probably returned to Hardington soon after because, on 6 March 1844, he and an older man named John Bartlett were committed for trial at the Assizes for stealing four bushels of oats from John Paul at Pendomer Hill. At the Assizes a few weeks later, Bartlett was sentenced to seven months with hard labour but Daniel was given a sentence of transportation for seven years because it was his second offence.

This harsh sentence meant that Elizabeth would never see her husband again.

Quasi widowhood

After Daniel had been absent for nearly six years, Elizabeth became pregnant by an unknown man. Her son, William, was born towards the end of 1850 and baptised at Hardington church on 9 February 1851. The baptism register describes Elizabeth as a spinster.

In March 1851, she was a house servant living with her young son at Hardington Moor in the household of her uncle, Edward Bartlett, and her aunt, Elizabeth Foot.

On Edward Bartlett’s death in 1854, Elizabeth inherited his weaving looms, a dresser and £5.[1]

In April 1861, she was a canvas weaver living with her son in North Lane in the household of her aunt Elizabeth Foot. This aunt died in 1865.

In December 1867, she applied for the position of matron to the Yeovil almshouses, but she was unsuccessful because she was above the specified maximum age of fifty.[2]

Second marriage

In 1869, Elizabeth married a widower named Thomas Gill Cox, whose wife, Joanna, died four years earlier.

The 1871 census recorded Thomas Gill Cox as an agricultural labourer and Elizabeth as an agricultural labourer’s wife.

Thomas died intestate on 19 April 1878, leaving a personal estate valued at under £200. Elizabeth administered his estate.

Shopkeeper

The 1881 census recorded Elizabeth as a shopkeeper. She may have started her shop after her husband’s death or continued the shop he ran with his first wife.

Elizabeth continued running the shop until about 1891. A 1889 trade directory lists her as a shopkeeper.

Her sister’s suicide

After her husband’s death, her sister, Mary Smith, and her sister’s husband, James Smith, lived with her.

On 1 November 1887, Mary Smith drowned herself in the river near Bridge Close Farm.[3]

After Mary’s death, her husband moved to Devon.

Later life

In April 1891, Elizabeth was at 15 Tyler Street, Roath, Cardiff, in the household of her son, William Mitchell. He was a carpenter who had lived in Cardiff with his wife and children since the early 1870s. Elizabeth may have been only visiting because she died in the Yeovil area in 1900, aged 84.

References

[1] The will of Edward Cox, dated 26 September 1854, proved at Wells on 6 November 1854.

[2] Western Gazette, 6 December 1867, p.7.

[3] Western Gazette, 4 November 1887, p.8.