RootsChat.Com
General => The Common Room => Topic started by: Aulus on Wednesday 27 March 13 17:00 GMT (UK)
-
Hello everyone,
I just came across this about my great x4 grandfather in the Bury & Norwich Post of 22 January 1823 (thanks to findmypast & the British Library for digitising all these newspapers).
On Saturday night last, as Mr. Guest, of Fornham, was returning home on foot just where the road branches off to Barton, two men with crape over their faces rushed upon him, dragged him up the road, and one holding a pistol to his head, demanded his money. He gave them all the silver he had; but they told him they knew he had a pocket-book, and he was compelled to give it up, with 81l. 9s. in it, the principal part of which he had taken at the Bank of Messrs. Oakes that afternoon. With this they went off, threatening to shoot him if he stirred or looked after them. After some time Mr. Guest proceeded to Fornham, and gave the alarm, when an immediate search was commenced; but no trace of the villains could be discovered. Mr. Guest, when he came out of the Bank, observed two ill looking fellows standing on the opposite side of the street.- The pocket-book was found next morning at a short distance from the spot.
I presume a pocket book in this context is a sort of wallet? But "book" suggests more than just a wallet.
Anyone know what crape is? Does it just mean that like cartoon robbers they had handkerchiefs over their faces?
I've tried googling, but apparently pocketbook is a sort of e-reader, so there's too much modern noise in Google's results ...
Heaven knows what he was doing carrying £81 in 1823 - it sounds a heck of a lot of money then (and more than I'd ever normally carry even today! ;D). Though he was a churchwarden at Fornham St Martin and on the Board of Guardians of the Poor. A few years later he was in the Fleet Prison in London (the debtors' prison) engaging in a correspondence with the parish of Fornham St Martin, which still exists at the Bury St Edmunds Records Office, about money he allegedly owed them. I wonder if this robbery might have been the initial cause of his later troubles.
Though there's a part of me likes the idea of him as a scoundrel and, if this was on a TV drama today, it'd sound like a put up job to me. ;)
-
Pocket Book; A pocket-sized folding case for holding banknotes, papers, etc.; a wallet. O.E.D.
Stan
-
Crape; A thin transparent gauze-like fabric, plain woven, without any twill, of highly twisted raw silk or other staple, and mechanically embossed, so as to have a crisped or minutely wrinkled surface. OED
Stan
-
In those days bank notes were large pieces of paper not neat ones like todays... so need for something bigger than a wallet. I suggest that the 81 is really £8 with an 'L' sign being used in a transcription for the £ sign and then again it being copied again as a '1'.
-
Its interesting to read the history of paper money, it seems that in 1823 the normal currency was gold coins, it seems that paper money issued by a local bank was a signed note made out for the sum asked for, and not really usable except to take to another bank.
so what was his intention I wonder, since the thieves would not be able to use the paper money
-
In those days bank notes were large pieces of paper not neat ones like todays... so need for something bigger than a wallet. I suggest that the 81 is really £8 with an 'L' sign being used in a transcription for the £ sign and then again it being copied again as a '1'.
The sum is £81 9sh i.e. 81l 9s
Stan
-
That was a lot of money in those days!
-
According to http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency/ In 1820, £81 9s 0d would have the same spending worth of 2005's £3,414.38
Stan
-
But it you use that link to convert backwards £3414.38 it would get you two years wages for a skilled craftsman ?? which must be near £50,000 in 2005. :-\ :-\ :-\ :-\ :-\ :-\ :-\
-
US TV programs ofter refer to pocket book for a wallet
-
US TV programs ofter refer to pocket book for a wallet
I have a friend from the US who always calls her purse her 'pocket book' while her handbag is her purse :-\
-
Thanks for all your replies, everyone.
As Stan says, the newspaper does indeed say £81 (eighty one) 9 shillings.
It could be a typo as annieoburns suggests, but the only reason to think that is, I'd have thought, that it was a huge sum of money.
Interesting point about whether it would have been paper money or coin.
He's a fascinating chap who seems to have had quite a colourful life. One of the ones at the top of my list of ancestors I'd like to have a talk with when they invent time travel.