#52 Ancestors 2020 Week 10 Strong Woman

#52 Ancestors 2020


Week 10 Strong Woman

Elizabeth White (nee Stanford) 

In family history there are always questions that have no answers.  For me, one of those questions is addressed to my great grandmother, Elizabeth Stanford.

Why did your parents withhold permission for you to marry Robert White, even when you were clearly pregnant?

Robert White has been the subject of several previous posts (see #52 Ancestors 2019 – “I’d Like to Meet” and “Rich man”.)  It’s difficult to understand what Charles and Susan, Elizabeth’s parents, could have had against him.  He was a hard worker, he wasn’t the wrong religion, his family and theirs came from the same part of town and the same kind of background.  Robert and Elizabeth had known each other since childhood.

And yet the marriage took place quietly on 19 June,1888, the day after Elizabeth turned 21 and no longer needed her parent’s permission to marry.  She was 6 months pregnant.

The first of their children was Ellen (Nellie) born in September of 1888.  Over the next 15 years, six more children were born.  My grandmother Alice was the second, born in 1890.  She was undoubtedly a strong woman, so I thought I should have a closer look at her mother, to see if she had been Alice’s role model.

Elizabeth Stanford was the second of 15 children, born to Charles and Susan Stanford in 1867.  Her father was born in Kempsey, NSW, the oldest child of English immigrant parents.  Susan came to NSW as a child – her parents were also assisted immigrants from Suffolk in England.  Charles was a small farmer and a timber getter, first at Casino and then at South Lismore, where Elizabeth was born.  She spent her entire life in this area.

As the oldest girl in a large family, Elizabeth would have carried some of the responsibility of child care and house work.  We know nothing about her education, but I assume she had only basic primary schooling until the age of 12, and then left to help at home.  At the time of her marriage, she had three siblings under 5, and one of her little sisters had recently died.  (Her mother went on to have three more children who were roughly the same ages as Elizabeth's first three - Nellie, Alice and Violet).

Robert spent most of his adult life involved in his community.  He was a passionate supporter of the Manchester Unity Friendly Society and an Alderman of Lismore Council.  He was President of the Lismore Show Society and the Horticultural Society.  The Northern Star (Lismore’s newspaper) has pages of references to him over 40 years from 1890 until his death in 1932. 

There are almost no references to Elizabeth as a separate person, yet she managed to raise seven children and have her own outside activities.  She too was involved in the Manchester Unity, and was one of the first women to be initiated as a member.  She was also a member of the Red Cross and was made a Life Member of this organisation, of the Lismore Hospital, for which she was a tireless worker and of South Lismore Public School, which was attended by all her children and many of her grandchildren.

From many postcards I now have, it seems that Robert spent a lot of time away from home, particularly when he was NSW Grand Master of the M.U.I.O.O.F.(1912-13)  Elizabeth would have been left with the children and the running of the household many times.  I have only one postcard from her to Alice, so she managed to go at least once to Sydney with her husband.  It must have been written before 1911, the year Alice was married, as she has been left in charge of the younger ones.

St Andrews Cathedral Sydney

Elizabeth's card to Alice

Elizabeth lived for 25 years after Robert’s death.  She was clearly very involved in the lives of her children and grandchildren, most of whom lived within walking distance of the family home. From Dad, I had the impression that her advice and approval were important to all of them.  Nellie’s daughter Annie lived with her when she first left school and went to work as a florist, and other members of the family apparently came and went.  She died in 1957, just before her 90^th birthday.