Helen Maria Bateman

  Notes:

Had birth as 1847, but precise date from Ann G-P research. This also gave exact marriage date.

1851 Census (age 4) living at 6 Islington Green, St Mary's Islington, London with parents, sister 1 visitor (George Gibbs, 24, Booksellers Assitant), 1 pupil (Philip Jones, 17) and 2 servants.

1861 Census (age 14) living at 32 Compton Terrace, Islington, London with father, mother and siblings.

1871 census (age 24) living in Islington with parents and siblings.

1881 Census; can't find her or husband. Try looking for childrens births.

1901 Census; can't find her, Wendy did find husband.

Wendy found her probate entry: Helen Maria Prichard of Peckham House, Peckham (wife of Edward Ellison Prichard) died 28 May 1920 Effects £446 13s 5d. On googling discovered Peckham House was a 'Licensed Premises' and in fact a private 'Lunatic Asylum'.

Author of ; "Friends and foes in the Transkei: an Englishwoman's experiences during the Cape Frontier War of 1877-8" (available on Google books), some excerpts;
"On the 13th May 1876, I arrived with my husband at Table Bay, Cape of Good Hope ; accompanied by our only child, a little boy two years and a half old. A few weeks later my husband received instructions from Government to proceed at once to the Umtata - a remote district about one hundred miles beyond the eastern frontier"
and
"...... my husband is a civil engineer in the Government service, and that his appointment (at that time) was that of Inspector of Roads for the Transkei - a large district about a hundred miles in length ..... At the time my husband entered upon his duties, this Transkei district was in a most unsettled state; and as he was engaged in boundary work between hostile tribes, Government thought it expedient to provide him with an escort of mounted police"
and
"A dreary vista of years unmarked by any change, and of days passed in one monotonous round of never-ending duty, rose before me, while at a glance I seemed to recall the happy years spent in my father's home ; the ever varying society gathered at almost every meal about his generous table ; the gay and loving family circle, full of youth and animation ; the beautiful mother, with her aristocratic air and charming manner, and the father, whose wit and spirits never flagged ; all these rose before me. Why had I been given this love of music, this passion for everything refined and beautiful, only to be tortured by a living death in this dreary desert, where I could never look on the face of any who had loved me in childhood, or hear so much as the song of a bird ? " !!!!!

Helen married Edward Ellison Prichard on 14 Oct 1871 in Islington, London. (Edward Ellison Prichard was born ~1848 and died on 16 Jun 1882 in Sea Point, Cape Town, South Africa.)