Family Hero
Tony Higgs’ great great grandmother spent much of her life striving to keep her extended family out of the workhouse. Adam Rees tells her story
Tony Higgs celebrates his great great grandmother’s struggle to save her family from the workhouse
As we go back through the generations, we inevitably uncover family members who lived in challenging times. Whether working the land or earning a living in the towns and cities of the Industrial Revolution, life for many consisted of scraping together enough to survive day to day.
Rather than a single act of achievement, it is this will to endure and care for her family that so impressed Tony Higgs when he learned about the life of his resilient great great grandmother, Emma Overton.
Born in Birmingham in 1825 during a time of industrial hardship, Emma’s life would change forever when she met Job Faulkner in 1847, who was 12 years older than Emma and already had five children in tow (she accepted them as her own).
Given the grim, fragile nature of life in the mid-19th century, it should come as no surprise that only one of these children lived to see adulthood, while two of the eight children Emma had with Job would die. However, Job’s crimes meant that he could not supply the support she so badly needed.
“There’s no good hiding from the fact that he made some poor decisions,” says Tony, reflecting on Job’s lawbreaking. “It may have been character weaknesses, but he was a bit of a lad.”
Having previously assaulted a bailiff and been fined, putting a £3 dent in the family’s meagre budget, Job was apprehended in 1856 for stealing tools in Buckland, Gloucestershire. He was subsequently found guilty and imprisoned in Gloucester Gaol, leaving his pregnant wife at home in Birmingham to somehow keep the family afloat.
“Some people would argue that stealing was just his way of trying
‘Job’s crimes meant that he could not supply the support Emma so badly needed’
to put food on the table, but it was a reckless way of dealing with the problem – and unfortunately it always seemed to go wrong.”
An unintended benefit of Job’s imprisonment is the paper trail he generated, which has allowed Tony to find out more about the extraordinary resilience of Emma who did everything in her power to keep her large family out of the dreaded workhouse.
“It’s almost a good thing when an ancestor has broken the law, because then there’s information about them. But seeing Job’s records made me say to myself, ‘Hold on, there’s a wife who’s been left behind having to take on the responsibilities after his errors of character.’ When I found out that Emma was taking Poor Law payments and avoiding the workhouse, which you’d expect to be an inevitable outcome in that situation, I realised she was really something special.”
However, with no breadwinner around, and far-from-generous Poor Law payments, Emma had to take in lodgers to make ends meet, including her brother, Job’s eldest son and his wife.
Even when Job was released from prison times were still tough, particularly when dementia meant that he was no longer able to work. So by 1881 Emma was herself employed in Birmingham’s button industry.
Sadly, the time came when Emma was unable to support herself or her family any more. Job’s mental deterioration made the workhouse the only option for him, but their daughter Alice paid Emma back for her long efforts to save her and her siblings from the workhouse, and took her in.
Nevertheless, up until her final days Emma looked out for Job, and Tony believes that this steadfast loyalty saw her finally succumb following a lifetime of hardship. Emma died after a visit to her husband in 1895.
“When Job was in the workhouse Emma was still visiting him, even though she lived 20 miles away and wasn’t very well herself. And sadly, it seems that her ongoing commitment to her husband cost her her life.”