Edward Samuel Owen

Edward Samuel Owen, the first son of David Owen and Jane Jones, was born in St. Asaph, Denbigh in 1858. Along with  the rest of the family he is to be found living in West Hackney in 1871. By 1881 he was living at 26 Victoria Grove, now, like his father, a printer’s compositor. His sister, Winifred Anne and the Hagger family were, by the way, then living next door at 24 Victoria Grove.

On the 8th January 1882 at St. Peter, Hackney, Edward married Maria Rosetta Bradley aged 21 of De Beauvoir Town, and daughter of the now deceased Henry Smale Bradley and Maria Robinson.

Since the death of her mother and father, Maria Rosetta had been living with her grandmother, Elizabeth Hounsell and other members of her family at 52 Southgate Road and working as a machinist. Sadly, for Maria Rosetta, her husband was to prove no longer-lived than her parents. He died in 1887, leaving her with two young children to look after. Edward and Maria Rosetta had been married for just five years.

A rather sad and bedraggled 52 Southgate Road, today.

Maria Rosetta might at this point have contemplated taking the children to their Welsh grandparents. However, David Owen and Jane Jones, living at 35 Stoke Newington Road had (in the 1891 census) a very full house since by a twist of fate, Winifred Anne’s husband had died the same year as Edward, and Winifred had taken the Hagger children to live with their grandparents.

Instead Maria Rosetta found her way to 35 Oakley Road, just off the Southgate Road, where the houses were at least large, there to take up residence with Frederick George Robinson, and her younger brother William Bradley (Frederick George really did seem to have a serial attraction for the Bradley family).

In 1898, Maria Rosetta married again, this time to John J. Hislop (1848-1929). Maria had by then come into full possession of the 52 Southgate Road house, which was convenient at least for Mr Hislop, a widow who had two elder children from a previous marriage. He worked from home as a bootmaker, and there used to be a family photo of him sporting a beard down to his navel. In case anyone has any doubts about how the Owen children felt about him, somebody had carefully pencilled in underneath the photo, the descriptive label of ‘The Bearded Bugger’.

 Maria Rosetta continued to work as a shirtmaker, and passed her skills as a seamstress on to her daughter, who is also recorded as a shirtmaker in the 1911 Southgate Road census. It is worth noting at this point that all these trades were carried on from home, John Hislop working up his boots, and his wife and step-daughter their shirts. For the family economy to sustain itself, they needed not only to be skilled at their trade, but be business-minded. The products had to be sold, after all, and the accounts kept. In those days, work provided its own educational syllabus. Family funds would also be supplemented by the children. In 1911, Maria’s son, Edward Owen was still living at home whilst working as a metal worker, for a firm specializing in lamps and stoves. It can be more or less taken for granted that Edward would be paying for his keep, particularly with the ‘bearded bugger’ in close proximity.