The Life and Loves of my Great Great Grandfather

A talk for the Stamford Local History Society on 4th Dec 2025 by Trish Auciello

This is my great great grandfather’s death certificate, he died in Spalding in January 1912 of bronchitis. There are three problems with this certificate:

That’s not his name, that’s not his age, and that’s not his wife

George was born in Barholm in 1844 as George Bunning Peake, the son of John and Susannah. John was an agricultural labourer and George followed in his footsteps.

George married Margaret Hyde in January 1868 in Uffington Church, when he was 24 and she was 28.

Margaret was born in Stamford in 1840 and had a tough childhood. Her father, John, was a stonemason, a skilled occupation, but they lived in Protection Place, just off Scotgate, known as a notorious slum. There were five children and Margaret’s mother, also Margaret, died aged 32 of tuberculosis when Margaret was four. John’s mother, another Margaret, moved in with them but she died in 1851, and John died in 1861.

In 1861, Margaret was in service with an ironmonger in St. John’s Street, and in 1865, she had a son, called William.

In March1866, Margaret obtained an affiliation order against William Harrison for child support of 1s 6d per week, worth about £15 today. He is described as a former employee of Mr Daffurn, did he lose his job because he had fathered a child outside of marriage?

If life was tough for Margaret growing up, it did not improve after her marriage. Her daughter, Betsey, was born in July 1868, so Margaret was pregnant when she married George. They moved into Stamford and were living in Brittain’s Court, another slum area off Scotgate in February 1870.

George appeared in court on 7th February 1870, accused of breaking into his mother’s house in Barholm and stealing various articles, some of which he pawned in Stamford. I’ve not found any follow up to this story, perhaps his mother decided not to press charges. However, just 3 weeks later….

George pleaded guilty to stealing a manure fork, value 1s 6d, and pawning it in Stamford. I don’t think the pawn broker was too fussy.

His solicitor stated that George hadn’t been able to find work all winter and the family was in a fearful state of poverty. Margaret was described as being near her confinement, but didn’t want to enter the workhouse in case they lost their current home. George was sentenced to seven days in prison and Margaret was advised she could seek out-relief for a week.

The sad postscript to this story is that there’s no record of a live birth to Margaret, perhaps those months of deprivation took their toll and the baby was stillborn. Margaret was pregnant again in the summer of 1870.

George was charged with fraud in Market Deeping and committed to trial at the sessions. His crime was obtaining an pair of trousers and boots by deception, it would probably only merit a fine today, but in 1870 it meant he spent the next two months in prison awaiting trial.

George pleaded guilty at his trial, and was sentenced to a further month in prison with hard labour.

George served his time in prison here. The gatehouse is still standing and can be rented as a holiday home for around £2,000 a week in peak season.

If Margaret hadn’t wanted to enter the workhouse earlier in 1870, it was inevitable when George went to prison.

In the 1871 census, Margaret is in Stamford workhouse, with  William, Betsey, and her son George junior, aged just 3 weeks. In the same census, George is working on a farm at Deeping St. Nicholas and claiming to be single.

In August 1872, Margaret was a witness at an inquest into the sudden death of her neighbour from apoplexy. They were living on Rock Road, so it’s safe to assume George has returned to the family and indeed he started working for Hayes Coachbuilders around this time. 

Margaret’s son William died in 1874 aged 9, after being ill for a year with tubercular peritonitis. 

In 1881, the family was still in Rock Road, somewhere on the left of this photo but long since demolished. The family now consisted of George and Margaret, Betsey, George junior, my future great grandmother, Mary Ann, bon in 1875, and twin girls, Margaret and Martha Jane, born in 1879. They also had a lodger, Thomas Dexter, who worked at Hayes.

So had life settled down? After all, George had been in stable employment for nearly 10 years, they had been living in the same house for around the same time, a lodger provided extra income – unfortunately not. 

In August 1883, George and another man were found guilty of stealing five trusses of clover, the property of Hayes and Son, his employers for the past ten years. If a truss of clover is the same size as hay, they weighed at least 60 pounds each, not something you could easily hide. Folkingham had closed by now, George may have served his three month sentence in Sleaford. Why did he do it? Was he still struggling to support a growing family, or was it just stupidity?

George left his family, and Stamford, sometime between his 1883 prison term and the 1891 census. In 1891, Margaret was living in Corporation Buildings, on Scotgate. She is sharing three rooms with Betsey, George junior, the twins, her widowed brother John, their lodger from Rock Road, Thomas, and another lodger Elizabeth Andrews aged one.

Elizabeth’s mother was unmarried and left Stamford soon after her daughter’s birth, leaving her with Margaret to look after.

Margaret’s brother John remarried in 1892, but the sleeping arrangements would still have been interesting as Betsey and Thomas married in 1893.

In 1891, my great grandmother was in service at 4 Barn Hill, where I like to think she had her own bedroom.

Margaret’s situation has improved by 1901, she’s now living at 22 Scotgate, the left hand half of the building in the picture. Although I imagine Thomas was paying most of the bills, Margaret was described as head of the house, also living there are Betsey and Thomas, the twins, and Elizabeth, now described as a foster daughter.

My great grandmother, Mary Ann, had married in 1895, after she had their son in 1894. George junior married in 1899.

With life improving for Margaret, let’s look at what George has been doing.

George was living in Peterborough in 1891, in the left hand corner section of this building. He is described as a bricklayer’s labourer. With him and described as his wife, is Susannah W. Peake, a laundress aged 39, and her son Alfred W. W. Peake, also a bricklayer’s labourer aged 17. This property looks more spacious than the three rooms Margaret is sharing with seven people in Stamford.

Susannah was born in Stamford in 1851 as Susannah Harrison. In 1871, she was living and working in a pub, and later that year, she married Harry Wallis, a carpenter originally from Empingham, and had their son, Alfred William, a year later.

  Harry’s enlistment?

In 1876, Harry Wallis, born in Empingham, living in Stamford enlisted in the Royal Artillery. His age is four years younger, but surely this must be Susannah’s husband. So is this chicken or egg? Did Harry enlist and Susannah say “sod this for a game of soldiers”? or did she leave and Harry went for a less extreme version of the French Foreign Legion?

After Harry’s army career, he spent the rest of his life in Leicester with at least two female housekeepers, and died in 1912 aged 63.

What is certain is that Susannah was living in Kensington, London, in 1881, with her son Alfred. She is described as the wife of Thomas Wallis, a bricklayer, born in Kilsby, Northamptonshire. I haven’t been able to find Thomas Wallis anywhere else, so I think Susannah was using her name on the census.

I don’t know whether Susannah thought Kensington would be smart and exciting, but there were four families totalling twenty five people in the same house. 

A plot worthy of EastEnders? So many questions….

Who was Thomas and how did he get together with Susannah? Stamford or London?

Why did Susannah leave London, was it with or without Thomas?

With Thomas being a bricklayer, is there any significance in George and Alfred being bricklayer’s labourers? Did they work with Thomas, perhaps locally?

It’s likely that George and Susannah knew each other from her time at the pub, did they meet again through Thomas?

If Thomas and George did work together locally, did they continue to do so after Susannah got together with George?

Although these events could have been used in EastEnders, unfortunately this is real life and I have no answers to the questions raised.

There’s no information on the 1891 census for 48 Westgate so perhaps they didn’t complete it that year.  

Margaret’s daughter Margaret married in 1905, and Martha Jane in 1908. In 1911, the remaining family are still at 22 Scotgate, but Thomas is now shown as head of the family, with Betsey and the foster daughter Elizabeth. Margaret has been relegated to the bottom of the page as mother-in-law. 

How I know that the George Wallis on the death certificate is George Bunning Peake? It’s because of the 1911 census. George and Susannah are living at 88 Winsover Road in Spalding, he is described as George Peak Wallace (Wallace and Wallis seem to have been interchangeable), aged 72, a bricklayer’s labourer from Stamford. His age is incorrect but it’s also wrong on the death certificate.

The 1911 census asks for number of years married and children born alive. Susannah says she had one child, now dead, I haven’t been able to find Alfred to confirm this. She has given her years married as 39, which is factually correct, just not to George.    

 This is where George and Susannah were living in 1911 and where George died in 1912.

George is buried in Spalding Cemetery, there’s no headstone but he’s somewhere in this area. Susannah died in 1918 of heart failure and she’s buried four graves away from George.

Margaret died in 1917 aged 76 of arthritis deformans and exhaustion. By the time of her death, she had raised six children, seen two of them die, and had nine grandchildren. Margaret’s son George junior had died in 1915 from tuberculosis of the spine. One son-in-law and her eldest grandson served in WW1 and they both survived.

Margaret is buried in Stamford cemetery, she doesn’t have a headstone either, but her grave is shown here with the arrow. The grave with the book headstone is her daughter Martha Jane and her husband Charles, the cross is her grandson Thomas who died in 1926, and the small low marker to the right is Betsey and Thomas. Her other children are all buried in the cemetery.

Conclusion

George seems to have done his best for his family in the early years of his marriage, even if crime didn’t pay – not the ones we know about anyway. I’ve tried not to be too judgemental but it’s difficult to forgive George for deserting his family.

I hope Margaret’s children were grateful that she was made of sterner stuff.

Trish Auciello

December 2025

A print version can be downloaded HERE