Jennett HUGHES
b.c1842-d.1909
Research notes
When we started to research Jennett’s life, we had very few facts to work on:
- She was admitted to Manor asylum in August 1901 but had been in the asylum system since 1898, and was previously resident at Newington workhouse
- In 1901 she was said to be aged 58
- According to the visitors’ book, she had a husband Henry and a niece, Mrs “Gowan”.
Identification of the niece gave us the breakthrough we needed. The visitors’ book gave her address as 37 Calder Street, Addington. We found her in the 1901 census at 37 Caldew Street, and her name was not Gowan, but Gawan. She was born Emma Honor Horsfall, and had married George Gawan in 1882. Emma’s mother was Emma Arabella Hughes, sister of Jennett’s husband Henry Thomas Hughes.
The name “Jennett” caused us some confusion. This spelling of her name first appears in 1898 on the order for her to be admitted to an asylum; in workhouse records she was “Jannett”; on her marriage record she was simply Janet. For the purposes of this story we’ll refer to her as Janet.
Here is her story:
Early years
Janet was Scottish. We believe that she was born Janet Swanson in Thurso in Caithness, circa 1842/3. There were several girls of that name born in Thurso at that time and we cannot pin down her family details or her life prior to marriage with any certainty. On her marriage, she recorded her father as John Swanson, engineer; however, we have not been able to find any record of an engineer named John Swanson of the right age to have been her father.
Marriage
Janet married Henry Thomas Hughes at St Mary’s Church in Newington on 12 May 1878.
There were to be no children from the marriage.
On the marriage register, Henry’s occupation was given as “commercial traveller” but on the 1881 Census, three years later, he was a printer’s labourer. On this census record (at 54 Deacon Street in Newington), Janet is recorded as “Jane”, aged 39, born in Thurso.
We have not been able to locate Janet and Henry with any certainty in the 1891 Census.
Dementia
“Does not know month or day of week, talks in a rambling fashion, garrulous. I cannot get a sensible reply to any questions”
“Nurse Mitchell informs me she is quiet, lies in bed, talks at random, does not answer questions put to her, but continues talking nonsense”
These were the comments of the medical examiner at Newington workhouse in February 1898. He found Janet to be of unsound mind. The supposed cause of her condition was put as “Alcohol”.
She was admitted to Barming Heath Asylum in Maidstone on 9 February 1898; from there she was transferred to Bexley in March 1901. In the 1901 Census she was recorded at The Heath asylum in Dartford (age 58, born Scotland.)
In August 1901 she was moved to Manor Asylum in Epsom.
The Manor visitors’ book lists her husband Henry but there is no evidence that he actually visited. The address they had for him dates from February 1898 (20 Merrow Street). He’d certainly left that address by April 1901. The record shows that they had written to him in 1906 but the letter had been returned.
One visitor that Janet did have was her niece Emma Gawan, but her visits stopped after a while, and correspondence sent to her at the Caldew St address was returned undelivered.
Janet Hughes died on 4 July 1909, of erysipelas (a skin infection) and heart disease. She was buried at Horton on 8 July in grave 455b. She was 66 years old.