Snowy. Tim Harris

      CHAPTER 1

       1862 Birth and Before

      Frederick Rolfe was born in Pentney, a poor rural parish deep in the heart of the Norfolk countryside, on 28 February 1862. He was the only child of John and Elizabeth Rolfe. Beside the entry in the Pentney Parish Records showing he was baptised on 18 March 1862 are the words, ‘Brought into Church the 6^th April 1862’, so it would seem likely that he had been baptised at home. Perhaps this meant he was a sickly child and thought unlikely to survive. Mortality rates for infants in West Norfolk were 143 in 1,000 at the time, so this was a common occurrence.

      Both of Fred’s parents had been married before. His mother had already lost two children in infancy during her first marriage. After her husband’s death she was reduced to living as a pauper with her surviving daughter, Maria aged 7. Being classified a pauper meant that she and Maria depended on the parish for support. The Relieving Officer from the Workhouse decided she could survive in the community with an allowance – an option much favoured by the Board of Guardians for the Poor House because it was cheaper than taking the destitute in as inmates. It was a grim existence. George Ewart Evans (1909–88), who travelled East Anglia recording oral histories, wrote of a conversation with James Seeley about his impoverished childhood in Norfolk. Although Seeley recalls a time later in the nineteenth century, he tells of the tough time had by those reliant on handouts.

      James Seeley was the eldest of five and aged about 9 when his father died. His mother would turn her hand to anything to earn money, including taking in washing, to keep her children, he recalled. Every morning before school, the older children had to pump sufficient water for their mother to do the day’s laundry. The children all took bread and jam to school to eat at dinnertime, but to supplement this, they would scramble into the fields to steal a turnip or swede. This, they would nibble on raw as they walked the mile and a half to school. Sheep were sometimes fed locust beans, which the children also stole, thinking them a great treat.

      Despite her hard work, Mrs Seeley was still forced to turn to the parish for help. The Board of Guardians allowed her 3/6d a week (an agricultural labourer earned about 12/- a week at that time). The Board said she was fit and able, so she could work to support her family. To make sure she did not keep her three eldest children away from school to work, each Saturday morning they had to present their school attendance record to the Relieving Officer to prove they had been at school all week. James remembered that they were always hungry, but that was normal – everyone who was part of a large family struggled to find enough to eat and sometimes there was nothing to eat at all.

      Elizabeth may have been able to raise a little extra cash using the skills picked up from her mother. Later, Fred devoted a whole chapter of I Walked by Night to the witchcraft, cures and hedgerow remedies that he heard his grandmother talking about.

      My old Granny was a bit of a quack Doctor, and the People used to come to her with all there ills. She was a mid Wife beside, and one to help with the layen out of Boddies. She told me all the Charms and such like that I know . . .

      Then there was a charm for anyone trubbled with bleeding from the nose. They should get a skein of silk, and get nine Maids each to tie a knot in the skein, and then the sufferer must wear it round his neck. That was a shure cure for Nose bleed. The cure for Head acke was to get the skin of the Viper and sew it in to the lining of the hat. . .

      Born in Pentney, Elizabeth was baptised on 24 June 1827, the third of the eight children born to Thomas and Ursula Shafto (sometimes recorded on documents as Shaftoe). In 1792, Thomas was born in Castle Acre, Norfolk, while Ursula Barrett was born in Setchey, Norfolk, in 1804. They married in Pentney church on 18 November 1821.

      Only one of their children appears to have died young. Baptismal records show that at least four of Elizabeth’s siblings married in Pentney and lived locally. Between them, they had a large number of children, but Fred never mentions his aunts, uncles and cousins in I Walked by Night.

      The 26-year-old Elizabeth married her first husband, George Powley of West Bilney, Norfolk, at Pentney church on 20 November 1853. He was 24 and his trade was listed as husbandman. They had three children, two of whom died young. Maria was born before their marriage, on 4 October 1853, and registered as Maria Shaftoe. However, following her baptism in Pentney church, on 1 February 1854, she was named Maria Powley, for by then Elizabeth and George had married. Hannah was baptised at Pentney on 27 June 1855. At 7 weeks old she died, having had ‘debility’ from birth. Robert was born in 1856 and died shortly after his birth. He was buried at Pentney church on 29 August 1856.

      After just seven years of marriage, George died of pneumonia in Pentney aged 31. His death certificate records that he suffered for nine days and endured pulmonary apoplexy for an hour before he died. Elizabeth was present at his death on 27 September 1860. He was then listed as an agricultural labourer.

      Workhouse records do not reveal whether Elizabeth was ever admitted, or appealed for out relief while George was alive. If he was too ill to support them, she may have done so. Many men struggled on, trying to keep their families long after they were far too ill to do so.

      Research into the Powley family proved difficult. Their names appeared in Church records, but no name could be found in secular documents. Common sense led to the belief that they would have remained in the area, but research into the surrounding villages and workhouses shed no light on the whereabouts of Elizabeth and her daughter after George’s death. However, the 1861 census revealed that living next to John Rolfe was a widowed pauper, Elizabeth Stacey, and her 7-year-old daughter Maria, whose details exactly matched those of Elizabeth and Maria Powley.

      Further investigation revealed Elizabeth’s first husband was born in 1829 to a Miss Mary Powley and christened George Powley. In 1831, Mary married John Stacey. Thereafter George was known as George Stacey (sometimes Stacy), although the Church did not recognise the change in name. John and Mary Stacey went on to have seven more children and lived at Magpie Cottages, West Bilney.

      When George came to marry Elizabeth, he had to marry her in the name he was christened with (Powley), but they called themselves Mr and Mrs Stacey. This was confirmed by the discovery of a birth certificate for their daughter Hannah, who was entered into the baptismal register as Hannah Powley, although her birth certificate is in the name of Stacy. The dates match and the mother is listed as Elizabeth Stacey, formerly Shaftoe. Three years before George and Elizabeth married, they were witnesses at Elizabeth’s brother James’s marriage to Eliza Warren, signing the register George Stacy and Elizabeth Shafto. This leads to the assumption that they were courting for some years and Maria was George’s daughter, although his name does not appear on her birth certificate.