Welcome to the ninth part of our series exploring the history of Icen Cottage, Fordington. In previous blogs, we have introduced you to the cottage, shown you some of the earliest documents relating to the cottage, discussed some of the problems when trying to identify the people who lived in the cottage, introduced George Cull as one of the previous owners, taken a look at the Mitford family and Arnold family in the 1830s, explored the lives of the Wickham family who lived in the cottage, looked at the Hardy connection to some of the former occupants; and explored Fordington in the 19th Century.
In this blog we return to the Lock family and William’s daughter Elizabeth who turned the cottage into a Ladies school.
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The earliest reference that we have found to the school is from a notice in the Dorset County Chronicle from 1853 announcing that the duties of Miss Lock’s school will recommence on the 20th July. The school took in boarders and day pupils. Notices in the papers state that pupils receive ‘religious and intellectual education’ and that they are instructed in ‘the elementary and higher branches and Modern Education’.
On the 1861 census Elizabeth, who is often called Eliza, is at the cottage with eight boarders aged between 9 and 15, a student teacher, a house servant and a cook. The student teacher and two of the boarders are Eliza’s niece’s Frances Ann, Mary and Jane George. The other pupils at the school appear to be the daughters of local farmers and tradesmen.
Articles in local papers record the pupils going on excursions and taking part in musical performances, including a trip in June 1867 to Frampton Park, home of the Sheridan family.
Eliza Lock was succeeded at the school by her niece Mary Lock. It is difficult to work out exactly when this happened as both ladies are referred to as Miss Lock, but it is likely to have been shortly before Eliza’s marriage to James Masters, a widower from Lymington in Bryanston on 21st June 1871.
On 17th July 1879 a notice in the Dorset County Chronicle announced that Miss Lock from the school in Icen Cottage was to retire and that she was to be succeeded by Miss Brooke.
It has been hard to discover much about Miss Brooke. She appears on the 1881 census entry for the cottage, which tells us that her first name was Mary, she was born around 1845 in Marlborough, Wiltshire and that she has a niece called Mariam Corbin who was her assistant at the school.
This information makes it likely that Miss Brooke was the Mary Jane Brooke baptised in Preshute, Wiltshire on March 13th 1838. The year of birth does not match the census record, but it is not unusual to find ages varying between documents. Her father, William, was a turnpike road surveyor and her mother’s name was Ann. Her older sister Sarah Ann Brooke married a Charles Manship Corben and it is their daughter who is at the school in the 1881 census.
It has proved very challenging to discover much else about Mary. Her common name and the discrepancy in her age makes it difficult to find her in censuses. A clue about this may be found by looking at the boarders at the school in 1881.
Unlike in the 1861 and 1871 censuses, when the pupils were nearly all from Dorset, the birthplaces of the pupils in 1881 vary, with 3 girls having been born in Scotland and 2 sisters having been born in India.
We wondered why families in Scotland, who we could not find had any links to the South of England, would send their daughters to Dorset for schooling so we decided to look in the 1871 census for Scotland and found a Mary Jane Brooke, born in England around 1842, living with the Scott family of Newton House, Cromarty and with the occupation of governess. Could the Scottish pupils have known Miss Brooke from her time as a governess in Scotland. We may never know for sure, but it seems unlikely to be a coincidence.
Around 1883 the school moved from Icen Cottage to Southfield, Dorchester and the cottage returned to being a family home. Our next blog in this series will look at the family who moved in, the Porters.
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If you’ve missed the earlier blogs in this series, you can view them here:
An Introduction to Icen Cottage
Icen Cottage – The Earliest Documents
Icen Cottage – The Masters Family – Too Many John Masters!
Icen Cottage – The Mitfords and The Arnolds
Icen Cottage – Thomas Provis Wickham