The Slave Trade Bites Back?

The next adventure of Charles Robinson has already been mentioned earlier in this tale, and comes, as we know, in two different versions. The first, as reported to the London courts in 1865, was that on his return from France, Charles could find no trace of his wife, Mary Weston, and from then on presumed her dead, a presumption that the presiding judge apparently found rather reasonable.

The second version - from Blackwood, reports that Charles found that Mary in his absence had acquired ‘three dark children’, - ‘whereupon he left her, and never more heard of her’. 

Or to put it another way, he decided that it would be entirely fitting to treat her as if she were dead and to act accordingly. Having endured five years of confinement in France, to then discover that his wife had lost little time in entering a new relationship that broke new boundaries in contemporary attitudes to race, culture and colour – well, let’s just say it can have done nothing for his general temper and mood. Thus it was that the slave trade took a gentle but none too pleasant revenge on Charles, for there must be every chance that Mary Weston had taken up with one of the recently freed slaves from the West India Dock trade. 

Map of Shadwell with Farmer Street at the top right. St. George in the East at the top was the birthplace of Harriett Wombwell. George Wombwell junior’s first marriage took place at the New Gravel Pit Meeting House, Paradise Fields, close to to New Gravel Lane (running parallel to Farmer Street)