Catherine Thomas Moulsworth Oliver Fradd was born
on 11 Feb 1857 in Penzance, Cornwall, England to John Oliver Fradd and
Catherine Thomas Boall who married and raised 6 children in Penzance. Catherine
was employed as a Laundress in 1881. She
died on 01 Dec 1895 in Cardiff, Glamorgan, Wales. She was also called
Kate.
The Wales census of 5th April 1891 recorded
Catherine's 3 children as inmates in the Poor Law Industrial School (Ely) for
Orphaned Children. Catherine has no known husband and I have been unable to
locate her marriage record.
At the time
of the census, John Herbert Fradd was aged 13 born 26th September
1877
Elizabeth was
aged 11 born about 1882 and John Henry Fradd was aged 9 born 9th
April 1886.
From 1862 to 1903, the union operated an industrial
school for pauper and orphaned children at Ely, a mile and a half to the west of
the Cowbridge Road workhouse where they were given training that would help
make them employable in later life.
For the girls this would include laundry work,
housework and needlework, while the boys would learn trades such as carpentry,
tailoring and shoemaking. Towards the end of the nineteenth century, there was
a change in the policy and most children were accommodated in 'Scattered
Homes', in different parts of the union, each under the care of a foster
mother. It is also clear that the system was often corrupt and the records
recount instances of family breakdown, poverty, greed, violence and neglect of
the poor.
The schools were closed in 1903 and the buildings
converted and extended to provide additional workhouse accommodation for
adults, especially the aged, infirm and 'mental defectives’ until 1948. A row
of children's cottage homes, known as the Ely Homes or the Headquarters Homes,
was erected at the south of the site.
The next Wales census in 1901 recorded John Henry
Fradd as a 14 year old Coal Hewer, boarding in Rhondda which at one time
contained 53 working collieries, in an area only 16 miles long. It was the most
intensely mined area in the world and probably one of the most densely
populated.
A coal hewer is the actual
coal-digger. Whether the seam be so thin that he can hardly creep into it on
hands and knees, or whether it be thick enough for him to stand upright, he is
the responsible workman who loosens the coal from the bed. The 1911 census
shows John Henry as a Coal Miner. He married Elizabeth Ann Jones in 1914 and
had at least one son. John Henry Fradd died in Hay, Breconshire, Wales on the 6th
May 1959 aged 73.
Elizabeth was recorded as a servant in 1901
and also lived to the age of 73 after marrying Albert Edward Early on the 9th
June in Neath, St Thomas, Glamorganshire, Wales. She died in Jun 1955 also in Neath, Glamorganshire,
Wales
In 1903 John Herbert Fradd married Susannah May
Morgan in Newport Monmouthshire, England and was recorded as an
Ironworker with 2 sons in the 1911 Wales census; living in Newport,
Monmouthshire, Wales. In 1923 Kelly’s Directory John Herbert was listed as a
Baker. He died in Newport, Monmouthshire, Wales on the 17th December
1937 aged 60.
