Barefoot
on the
Cobbles
a Devon tragedy
by
Janet Few
Blue Poppy Publishing
© Janet Few 2018
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, by
any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise, without the prior approval
of the publisher and author.
Published by Blue Poppy Publishing 2018
info@bluepoppypublishing.co.uk
To Martha and Rebecca
who taught me all I know about being a mother
The Folk you will Meet as you Wander down the Cobbles and Beyond
For those who would like to download and print the list of characters, the appropriate file can be found at https://thehistoryinterpreter.wordpress.com/barefoot-on-the-cobbles-a-devon-novel/cast-list/
A Family Touched by Tragedy
Polly - a desperate mother
Albert - her husband, a fisherman
Daisy - their eldest daughter
Leonard, Bertie, Violet, Mark, Nelson, Lily and Rosie - their other children
In Court
Mr Lefroy - solicitor for the defence
Richard Ottley - a jaded reporter
Mr Brown - the coroner
Mr Cruse - foreman of the coroner’s jury
Mr Duncan, Mr Cock and Mr Fulford - magistrates
Mr Carnegie - presiding over Bideford county sessions
Mr Warlow - appearing for the Director of Public Prosecutions
Superintendent Shutler
Police Sergeant Ashby
In Bucks Mills
William - Albert’s father
Mary ‘Mrs William’ - Albert’s mother
Fred - Albert’s brother
‘Crumplefoot Tommy’
Aunt Ellen ‘Mrs Tommy’ - his wife and Albert’s aunt
Eadie - their daughter, Albert’s adopted sister and cousin
Sammy, Evie, Peg, Alice, Dol and Gilbert - their other children
Captain James ‘King of Bucks’ and his wife - Albert and Eadie’s grandparents
Aunt Matilda - a deluded soul, Albert’s aunt
Aunt Agnes, Aunt Lizzie and Uncle John - Albert’s other aunts and uncle
Walter - Eadie’s husband
Captain Joe - a householder
‘Takey’ - a fish merchant
‘Johnnie Adelaide’ - a neighbour
‘Daft Bob’
George - Albert’s cousin and Ada’s intended
In Peppercombe
Richard Wakely - Polly’s father
Eliza Wakely née Found - Polly’s mother
Arthur - Polly’s brother
Lydia, Jane, Ada and Ethel - Polly’s sisters
Mrs Pine-Coffin - Lady of Portledge Manor, Polly’s employer
Winifred - her daughter
In Bideford
Susan Prance née Found - Polly’s aunt
Joe Prance - a fishmonger and grocer, Polly’s uncle
Minnie and Athaliah – their daughters, Polly’s cousins
May - another daughter, recently died in Wales
Willie and Hilda - May’s children, lately arrived in Bideford
Mr Hopson - an ironmonger
Frank Holwill - an ironmonger’s assistant, Athaliah’s suitor
Mrs Newman - a superior dressmaker
Mrs Emily Powell - a struggling gentlewoman
Captain Thomas Powell - her profligate husband
Frances, Rosamund, William and Margaret - their children
Florence Powell - another daughter, much mourned
Reverend Roberts
Reverend Page
The Misses Ley - schoolmistresses
Mr Tardrew - a creditor
Temperance Lloyd - a supposed witch
Philip Waters - an Appledore boatbuilder
At Clovelly Court
Mrs Hamlyn - Lady of the Manor
Mr Frederick Hamlyn - her husband
Mr Caird - her agent
Hon. Betty Manners - heiress to the Court
Herbert Henry Asquith - the Prime Minister
Mrs Asquith - his wife
Hon. Arthur Asquith - their son
Lord Northcote - a guest
Lord Hugh Cecil - another guest
Lord Cromer - another guest
Clovelly Villagers
Granny Smale aka Granny Pengilly - a tea-shop owner
Captain William Pengilly - her first husband
Harry Smale - her second husband
Annie Stoneman - her granddaughter
Ben and Mabel Stoneman - Annie’s parents
Susan, Hettie, Norman and Fanny - their children, Annie’s siblings
Mrs Emma Stanbury - Polly’s neighbour, a witness for the prosecution
Mrs Hannah Davies - her daughter
Stanley Davies - Mrs Davies’ son
Mr Edward Laurence Collins - an outsider
Mrs Amelia Collins - his wife
Alice, Mary and Bella - Daisy’s friends
Mr Tuke - a gardener
Mrs Tuke - his wife
Abraham Tuke - their son, a reluctant soldier
Mrs Jones - a lodging house keeper
Eli - a carrier and a relative of Albert
Samuel Harris
Mrs Harris
Oscar Abbott
Mrs Abbott
Sid Abbott
Tom Pengilly - coxswain of the lifeboat
Will Harding
Rose Harding - his wife
Billy Harding - his son
Frank Badcock
Merelda Badcock - his wife
Wilf Badcock - his son
Richard Foley
Jack Foley
Mrs Foley
Mrs Bushell
Steve Headon
Dick Cruse
Captain Charlie Bate
Tommy Bate - his son
Catherine Bate - Tommy’s wife
Captain Jim Jenn
Captain Jenn senior
Mr Moss - publican of the Red Lion
Tom Finch - gardener and organist
Will Oke - an unfortunate elderly man
Mrs Oke - his wife
Reverend Simkin
Miss Lott and Miss Hazard - schoolmistresses
Mr Ellis - a shopkeeper
George Reilly - a photographer
Postman Branch
Mrs Howard - a postmistress
Encountered in Clovelly
Vera Wentworth, Jessie Kenney, Elsie Howey and ‘Mrs Pond’ - women with a purpose
Dr Crew, Dr Kay, Dr Toye and Dr Ackland
Thomas Sanders - the relieving officer
Mr Dennis - a magistrate
Frank Ifield - a singer
On the Western Front
Major Shilland
Corporal Squance
In Torquay
Mr Gilley - her husband
Laura Kate Cornelius - a former servant with social aspirations
Percy Cornelius - her husband, a butcher
Kathleen Cornelius - their daughter
Mr Meyers - Mrs Cornelius’ father
Francis Meyers ‘Mr Francis’ - Mrs Cornelius’ brother
Owen Meyers - another brother, a fallen soldier
Mrs Alice Meyers - Owen’s widow
Mrs Miller - impoverished gentry
Agatha Miller - her daughter, a dispenser
Winnie Hamm - a servant, Daisy’s friend
Louisa Taylor -
superintendent nurse at Newton Abbot workhouse
Dr Cook
Eugene O’Brien and Mary Pickford - film stars
Charlie Chaplin - a comic genius
Prologue
January 1919
The magistrate was saying something. Polly, with throat tightening and heat rising, struggled to focus. He repeated his question but she was transfixed, unable to answer. Images and incidents from the past kaleidoscoped before her eyes. She saw her childhood home in the secluded Devon valley, her courtship with Alb, her firstborn being put into her arms. Her daughter, Daisy, skipping barefoot down the Clovelly cobblestones, living, loving, laughing. Daisy, bone thin and dying. Daisy, whose passing had somehow, in a way that Polly couldn’t comprehend, led to her being here in this crowded, claustrophobic courtroom, with every eye upon her. She must compose herself, pay attention, escape from this nightmare. All she wanted to do was dream of the past, both good and bad times but somehow more certain, safer, predictable. Times before everything began to spiral terrifyingly out of control.
Mr Lefroy, the solicitor, had assured her that she wouldn’t hang; this was a manslaughter charge not murder. Nonetheless, phantom gallows haunted Polly’s restless nights. Even when she calmed and the hangman’s noose receded, there was still prison. Prison meant Holloway. Polly’s hazy and fragmented impression of Holloway was gleaned from the terror-ridden stories of suffragettes’ force-feeding, that the pre-war newspapers had revelled in. Or would they say she was mad? Echoes of insanity had touched her in the past. There were barely acknowledged tales of people she knew who had been locked away. When compared to the prospect of prison, the asylum at Exminster was somehow more familiar but no less formidable.
Polly knew she must concentrate, breathe slowly, think about what she should say. Mr Lefroy had explained that all she needed to do was to keep calm and tell the truth, so difficult in this alien environment with all these well-to-do folk looking on. Faces. Faces whirled and blurred in front of her. There was Alb, shuffling in his chair and running his finger round the restrictive collar that she had helped him to fasten only this morning. He looked lost and bewildered, barely recognisable without his beloved trilby hat. Faces of the villagers, reproachful and remote. Mr Collins, her accuser, cold and self-possessed. Mrs Stanbury, gossiping neighbour, once a friend maybe but now here as a witness for the prosecution. Then, overlaying all of these, the vision of Daisy. Daisy looking like a young lady in her new hat, proudly setting off for her first job beyond the security of the village. Daisy fighting, screaming, twisting her head away from the spoon that held the broth that might save her. Daisy dying.
Was it really her fault, as they were saying? Polly wondered. Could she have done any more? She was a mother; mothers should protect their children. She had tried, she really had, struggled in vain to shield them all from harm. The enormity of her many failures consumed her. There was Bertie, not quite the full shilling, Violet and her troubles, the worry over Leonard while he’d been away at sea during the war. Nelson, poor little Nelson and now, Daisy. If she and Albert were sent to prison, what would happen to young Mark and her two little flowers, Lily and Rosie, hardly more than babies in her eyes? Violet was scarcely old enough to look after them all. Would the children be allowed to stay in the cottage? There would be nothing but the workhouse, forbidding and final, a fortress of despair.
***
At the back of the courtroom, in the seats reserved for the press, sat Richard Ottley. He had been expecting it to be merely another day in court; yet more hours of listening to melodramatic tales of insignificant people’s lives. His forty years as a journalist had exposed him to tragedy, to violence and to despair. He’d seen defendants who were angry, who were terrified, who were blatantly lying. It was all one to him. Empathy was long-buried, part of his nature no more. He was there to record, to report, to remain impartial and aloof. There was something though about this case, these defendants, these witnesses, that had caught his jaded attention.
The evidence unfolded, the confident tones of officials interspersed with the hesitant whispers of those for whom court was an intimidating experience. Ottley found himself uncharacteristically caught up in the events and emotions that were being laid before him. He looked at the magistrates, the counsel, the prosecutors. His gaze swung from the accusers to the accused. How had they all been drawn inexorably, inevitably, to this day, to this courtroom, into this horrific situation? Were there clues in what had gone before, harbingers of this dreadful moment? What events, what actions, what hurts in the tangled web of their pasts had brought them, inescapably, to this appalling instant?
1
Summer 1890
In the little fishing hamlet of Bucks Mills, the street sloped steeply down to the square. On the step of Captain Joe’s substantial house sat a weeping child, dishevelled and dirty, her tears tracked by the grubby smears on her sun-stained cheeks. A young fisherman was walking towards her, on his way up from the shore. As Albert approached, the girl’s hand scrubbed across the bottom of her nose and she sniffed heartily. The other hand failed to push her dark hair from her eyes. Her faded ribbon had long since ceased to perform its duty.
‘Why tears maid?’ asked Albert, moved by the plight of one of Crumplefoot Tommy’s ever-increasing brood.
‘Me da fetched me one.’ The tone was philosophical but she scarcely stifled a rising sob. ‘He said I woke the bebby but I niver.’
The child’s statement was broken by a sharp intake of breath and a hiccup as another sob surfaced. At twenty seven, Albert was well aware of females, in a way that was circumscribed by his god-fearing, chapel-going upbringing but girls of this age rarely crossed his horizon. He was uncertain how to still the distressing sounds that were emanating from this scrawny specimen. He extended his hand, dirt engrained and calloused from rowing. The child regarded it suspiciously. Albert judiciously wiped the offending hand on the back of his trousers and proffered it again, pulling her to her feet. Albert knew the child was one of his assorted collection of cousins, this one a daughter of his Aunt Ellen but to be truthful, there were so many of them that he was never quite sure which was which.
He gave up trying to recall the correct name and asked, ‘Which of Tommy’s maids be you then?’
The child seemed unperturbed by her anonymity.
‘Eadie,’ chirped the mite, already brightening at an exchange that was not accompanied by blows.
She was obviously expecting something of Albert now but he wasn’t sure what the appropriate course of action would be.
After a moment’s thought, he came to a decision, ‘You come along with me maid. ’Tis Friday and ma will be frying fresh caught pollock for dinner.’
Trustingly, Eadie looked up to where Albert loomed over her and she gripped his hand tighter, her fingers barely reaching round his palm. Together, they began the walk up the road towards Albert’s home. Resolutely, Eadie tried to match her stride to his, determination on her narrow face. She stumbled occasionally but was smiling now. A few villagers looked askance at the roughened fisherman, hand in hand with his incongruous companion. Daft Bob, who lived with his aunt at the Coffin Arms, waved and grinned amiably. He was harmless enough but Eadie was wary.
The pervading scent of fried fish reached them as they approached the bend in the road and turned towards the path that led to Rose Cottage, near the top of the street. Albert had struggled to keep the conversation going on their walk up the hill but Eadie was clearly impressed that an adult was talking to her at all.
Emboldened by interaction that was a sharp contrast to the indifference she encountered at home, Eadie said, ‘Da says there be too many maids in our house and we ain’t no use nor ornament.’ The statement was laden with stoicism.
The cottage that they were approaching was quiet; could there be houses where there weren’t too many children? wondered Eadie. There were five girls in Ivy Cottage, where Eadie lived, the stairs leading directly on to the bedroom that she shared with h
er sisters. The new baby slept with their parents in the room beyond. Her older brother, now sixteen, had a palliasse downstairs when he was home from sea. A world where there could be solitude and silence was foreign to Eadie.
Curious and with the candour of childhood, Eadie asked, ‘Do you have too many girls in this house?’
Albert’s mother, Mary, came to the door in time to hear Eadie’s question.
A wistful expression crossed her face, ‘No,’ she said, ‘No girls. Just Alb here and his brother Fred, both full grown now and their da and me.’
Unlike most of her neighbours, Mary did not struggle to fit many children into three or four rooms. She had had only the two sons; two sons and many disappointments. Secretly, she’d longed for a daughter. A daughter could be a companion, they could sew together, bake together and a daughter would be a comfort as she and William tumbled into the strictures of old age.
At chapel, the minister said, ‘Thou shalt not covet’ and Mary was not by nature prone to envy. It did seem unjust though, that Tommy’s wife had presented him with so many girls, girls who appeared to be an unwelcome encumbrance, whilst she had such a yearning for a daughter. She was too old now of course, past childbearing these five years gone. Past those days of expectation and joy, days that ended in heartrending sadness, as yet another pregnancy faltered when she had hardly had time to begin to hope. She remembered that Eadie’s mother was newly delivered of a boy. Mary was conscious that Mrs Tommy had had that mental trouble not long after Eadie’s birth; mental trouble that had meant she’d spent months in Exminster asylum. Having children sometimes turned the brain. She hoped it wasn’t happening to her sister-in-law again.
‘How’s your ma and the new chile?’ she asked.
‘Not too special,’ Eadie was eyeing the spitting frying pan, to which Mary now turned. ‘Ma says ’tis harder to get back to work after lyin’ in now she’s older. Evie and Peg can do plenty but ’tis hard for Alice and me to carry the buckets from the well or manage the heavy cook pot. I can turn the mangle though,’ she said with pride. ‘And mind Dol and jiggle the bebby’s cradle when he cries. He’s sweet. ’Twill be harder when school starts next week as we will have to do our chores before we go but ma says she will be glad to get us out from under her feet and just be left with Dol and bebby Gilbert to do for.’