Catherine Thomas Moulsworth Oliver Fradd 1857

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 26^th September 1877

Elizabeth was aged 11 born about 1882 and John Henry Fradd was aged 9 born 9^th 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 6^th 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 9^th 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 17^th December 1937 aged 60.