William Privett, was born into an average, working class family in 1835[1]. His father, another William, was an agricultural labourer[2] and his mother had no listed profession, but it’s likely, as so many other women did, that she took in laundry for her neighbours. William had five siblings, Jane, Elizabeth, Henry, Edward, and Charles. They lived in the Hampshire area for the entirety of their lives, across various parts of county, not moving above, or much below, their status of the “industrious poor”.
William, as the eldest child, would have felt the pressure to help support his father’s growing brood as quickly as possible. In an age where children were farmed out to service or apprenticeships before they hit their teens, it’s probable he started working with his father, digging ditches, fixing fences, any labour to increase their meagre income before he had turned 12.
By the time, William turned 20 he had perhaps grown sick of the endless drudgery. Perhaps the death of his grandfather at only 51 had soured him. Perhaps insalubrious companions persuaded him… Whatever the cause, our young man divested Daniel Stockman of his Silver pocket watch in October of 1855[3]. He was caught and sent to prison remarkably quickly: there he would stay and rot for 4 years.
William spent time in Millbank first, then Portland, and finally he was transported to Woking, as prisoner number 3, to eke out the last few months of his penal servitude helping to build the invalid wings of the prison[4]. Privett was released at the end of his sentence in October 1859, no license granted to this poor convict, this was quite unusual for a non-violent crime. He returned home to Hampshire.
William did fairly well for himself for a time, he became a fitter, a skill no doubt acquired in the jail. In addition, he met a woman, Eliza Jane Stripe, and they became incredibly close, incredibly quickly, as within 3 months of his return, eighteen-year-old Eliza found herself pregnant[5].
William did the right thing by her, although if this was by choice or coercion, we’ll never know. But in May of 1860 the pair married in Portsea and awaited the coming of their first child. A son, William who arrived in October of 1860.
He survived just 3 months.
The pair may have taken this as the norm, such was the infant mortality of the time, or they may have been devastated by the loss of their child. Certainly, after marrying because of the pregnancy the loss of his life must have been in the very least, galling. William and Eliza continued on for another 2 and half years before she fell pregnant again[6].
Just a month before Eliza was due to deliver, disaster struck the Privett family again. William’s mother Elizabeth, aged just 55, died[7]. It’s impossible to tell how they handled this tragedy, but as William Senior never remarried after the loss of his Elizabeth, I like to believe that theirs was a happy marriage and that the loss of it would have been felt for many years.
William and Eliza went on to have a daughter, a girl they named Jane. Jane would later become a seamstress, she would die aged 27, a spinster buried in unconsecrated ground.
But William never knew this as in 1866, at the grand old age
of thirty one, he died: leaving his 3 year old daughter in the care of his 24
year old widow.
[1] ‘1851 England Census’ (Ancestry.co.uk, 2019) <https://www.ancestry.co.uk/interactive/8860/HAMHO107_1669_1669-0161/5943375?backurl=https://www.ancestry.co.uk/family-tree/person/tree/35855863/person/28670971309/facts/citation/145268589229/edit/record> accessed 28 July 2019.
[2] ‘1841 England Census’ (Ancestry.co.uk, 2019) <https://www.ancestry.co.uk/interactive/8978/HAMHO107_389_391-0151/4976049> accessed 28 July 2019.
[3] Salisbury and Winchester Journal, ‘Hampshire Quarter Sessions’ (1855) <https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000361/18551020/025/0004> accessed 28 July 2019.
[4] Search.findmypast.co.uk. (2019). Woking Prison log 1. [online] Available at:
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[5] Ancestry.co.uk. (2019). Civil Death Index q1 1861. [online] Available at:
[Accessed 20 Aug. 2019].No Title
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[6] ‘Hampshire, Portsmouth,Burials – Register Of Burials In The Burial Ground For The Parish Of Portsea Pg 144’ (Search.findmypast.co.uk, 2019) <https://search.findmypast.co.uk/record?id=S2%2FGBPRS%2FPORTSMOUTH%2F105363418%2F00145&parentid=GBPRS%2FPORTSMOUTH%2FCEMETERY%2F00102716> accessed 28 July 2019.
[7] Ancestry.co.uk. (2019). Civil Registration Death Index 1863 q1. [online] Available at:
[Accessed 20 Aug. 2019].No Title
No Description