Chertsey house records

[boscoe]

Quite an interesting story. Thanks. Makes me wonder if the sandy area was among the last spots in England to surface in the glacial retreat period.

[boscoe]

Little Nell: I interested to know if you can explain just a bit more what you mean by
"having been removed from Reading" in reply 14.
Do you think Ann was found somewhere unable to care for herself? And, why didn't she go to a Reading or nearby workhouse? [I understand the thinking before our age: if she came from "there," she's going back to "there," so we don't have to pay for her.] To me, "there" would be Aldermaston, but I suppose they used Chertsey as her last residence.
Life has changed so much, hasn't it.

[Little Nell]

When people fell on hard times in the 19th century, it was up to the parish where they lived to help provide relief.  But they had to have settlement in that parish.  This is all to do with the Poor Laws (useful explainer on TNA site here: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/1834-poor-law/).

If people did not have legal settlement in the parish where they had fallen on hard times, they were removed (sent back) to their last place of legal settlement.  It was not necessarily where they were born.  I have an instance where a widow with a large family was threatened with removal from a town to a village where she had never set foot.  Her husband had lived there as a child, but had moved away and married a long way from there.  She took her place of settlement from her deceased husband.  The family never got sent back - the parish officials argued about it so much and probably spent more in legal fees than if they had given her a helping hand!

Nell