Читать книгу The Life and Times of Mary Ann McCracken, 1770–1866 - Mary McNeill - Страница 16

CHAPTER 4

CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE

1770–1790

One of the first unusual experiences in Mary McCracken’s life came to her at school.

The main educational establishment in Belfast in the middle of the eighteenth century was the “Latin school” for boys, founded and maintained by the Donegall family. It was situated beside the Parish Church and provided a grounding in the three Rs and the classics. From time to time other masters in the town gave tuition in various subjects, pupils going from one to the other according to their requirements. Such competition irritated his Lordship, and in 1754 the following notice appeared:

The Earl of Donegall, at the request of a great part of the inhabitants of the town of Belfast, has at a great expense put the School House in repair, and brought to town the Rev. Nich. Garnet and appointed him schoolmaster for the Town. The Earl and his Trustees have heard that some of the inhabitants do send their children to other schools. They have ordered me to acquaint the Inhabitants, as well as their other Tenants in the Neighbourhood, that they are not pleased with such treatment, and hope they will not be laid under the necessity of taking notice of any individual who shall continue to do so.

John Gordon, Agent.1

For girls, the very elementary academic instruction provided by one or two impecunious ladies was augmented by classes in sewing, knitting and embroidery, and for both girls and boys of any social standing at all the dancing master was essential.

Into this situation came young David Manson. Born at Cairn Castle, County Antrim, he settled in Belfast in 1752, determined not merely to teach but to teach in a very particular manner. When as a child in the depth of the country David was recovering from a serious illness, his mother had taught him, by means of play, the first simple lessons, sowing in his mind at the same time the seeds of his future success. Before coming to Belfast he had prepared himself by study, and by practical experience of teaching in places so far apart as Ballycastle and Liverpool, to set up a school where children “will be taught to read and understand the English tongue without the discipline of the rod by intermingling pleasurable and healthful exercise with their instruction.”

Meanwhile, in order to support himself and his wife, and to gain the acquaintance of citizens, Manson started a small home brewery.2 His beer was good – about brewing also he had his own particular theories – and much talk and discussion must have taken place over the counter of the little shop, for such notions on education sounded novel to minds accustomed to normal 18th century schooling. Gradually a group of enthusiastic supporters emerged, foremost among them being Henry Joy, and in spite of all Mr. Gordon’s warnings an advertisement appeared in the Belfast News-Letter of October 1755 to the effect that

David Manson, at the request of his customers, having opened an evening school at his house in Clugston’s Entry, teaches by way of amusement English grammar, reading and spelling, at a moderate expense.

This new venture was to be run on co-educational lines and Henry Joy’s eldest child, Elinor, then about six years old, was one of the first pupils. Others followed from both the Joy families and from the McCrackens. There were also the Templeton children, Catherine and possibly Elizabeth Hamilton, Lord Templetown’s son, a clever lad from Cushendall called James McDonnell, and many more. In due course Mary Ann McCracken herself appeared, and as the influence of her school days remained with her always it is necessary to give a brief sketch of this very unusual establishment.

At the time of Mary’s arrival Manson was at the height of his fame and had moved to a large, specially built house in Donegall Street, an area recently developed and much sought after for its proximity to the country and fresher air. Here he took some boarders. Long before this, however, he had evolved a definite educational system. Each class-room was divided into two “companies”, based on the accepted grades of society, and every child was given a ticket of membership, bearing the letters F.R.S., to be retained or forfeited according to behaviour. Each company included a King, a Queen, Princes and Princesses, Dukes and Duchesses, Lords and Ladies, etc., rank being acquired by the satisfactory preparation of home-work. The actual amount of preparation was left to the discretion of each child, but if the royal crown was coveted upwards of 24 lines had to be memorised, the qualifications for other ranks being graded accordingly. Not everyone could attain nobility, and those who managed only eight lines or less were tenants and undertenants. The school day began at 7 a.m., when repetition was heard and the children took the places they had earned. After the break for breakfast at 9 o’clock there was reading, spelling and grammar, and here a Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor officiated, the former being called upon to explain difficult words, and the latter to correct punctuation. Worked into this elaborate performance was a scheme whereby the children could help one another. After the lessons had been heard a successful landlord took in hand a less successful tenant, and every line learned by the latter constituted £1 of rent due to the landlord, who kept a note in his ledger of all rents due and paid. Whoever held the position of King and Queen for a week had the privilege of calling a Parliament on Saturday, when arrears were settled, and those tenants “who had nothing to give acceptable to the land-lord must plead poverty with their feet uncovered, their arrears being discharged out of the fund of toys which were taken from those who had used them at improper seasons.”

It was indeed a novel school.

As for punishment – it was the hey-day of clubs, and at the back of the room an empty space was known as “The Trifler’s Club” to which idlers were relegated. Worse still: there was a large wooden figure called the Conqueror, and those who defied the stigma of the Club were obliged to have so many rounds of boxing with this unresponsive opponent. It was a first principle with Manson never to use the rod, hence this rather ingenious plan for self-inflicted corporal punishment.

Another feature of the school was the carefully prepared books and apparatus. Manson compiled spelling books, a grammar and a dictionary; he had various unusual devices for teaching the younger children to spell phonetically and, seeing how constantly they played with the battered packs of cards rejected by their elders, he had “spelling, reading and memorial cards” specially printed, and used for the many games then in vogue. “Manson’s cards” and his school books were in wide circulation for years after his death. The Bible and the newspaper were used by the older pupils for reading, as was also The Lilliputian Magazine, one of the recent publications for children emanating from Mr. Newbury’s shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard. In the Lilliput playground, situated at the edge of the town near the lough, was a well kept bowling green for the boys and also the Flying Chariot – a wonderful mechanical velocipede of Manson’s invention – made for the enjoyment of the pupils, and, at stated times, of the public. For shorter spells of exercise the children were permitted to use the courtyard of the nearby Brown Linenhall.

Mechanisation was already in the air and outside his teaching hours Manson spent much time with his inventions, one of which was a spinning machine set in motion by one man and operating twenty spindles, thereby making it necessary for the spinner to use her hands only. He presented this model to the Poorhouse for the use of the girl inmates, and we can imagine how entranced he must later have been when Robert Joy’s new spinning and weaving machinery was being set up. He was much concerned about the effect of these new methods on the traditional economy of the countryside, and published a pamphlet in which he maintained that the new industry should be built round agriculture and not centralized in towns. All these points of interest he would present to his pupils in simplified form, and one young mind at any rate was obviously stirred and set on its ultimate course. But before everything else Manson was a teacher:

Every tutor, [he wrote] should endeavour to gain the affection and confidence of the children under his care; and make them sensible of kindness and friendly concerns for their welfare; and when punishment becomes necessary, should guard against passion and convince them ’tis not their persons but their faults which he dislikes … These things are easily comprehended; but the great nicety lies in the execution: for knowledge, diligence and sobriety are not sufficient qualifications for this employment without patience, benevolence and a peculiar turn of mind, by which the Preceptor can make the course of education an entertainment to himself as well as to the children.3

His interest in the education of girls was remarkable. “Young ladies”, it was recorded after his death, “received the same extensive education as young gentlemen. He, and the schoolmasters taught by him were the great cause of infusing into their delicate and tender minds the rudiments of the good sense and erudition for which our ladies during this age have been remarkable.”4 Elinor Joy progressed so quickly that while still a child she was able to help her father in comparing manuscripts and “correcting the press”, and Mary Ann McCracken attained at an early age an unusual accuracy at figures.

This benevolent and much loved schoolmaster was made a freeman of the town in 1779, and when he died in 1792 he was given the honour of a funeral by torch light, his remains being laid in the parish graveyard at midnight.5 Shortly afterwards, Elizabeth Hamilton, already arrived at literary fame, wrote of him thus:

David Manson’s extraordinary talents were exerted in too limited a sphere to attract attention. He consequently escaped the attacks of bigotry and envy; but the obscurity which ensured peace, prevented his plans from obtaining the notice to which they were entitled; nor did their acknowledged success obtain for him any higher character, than that of an amiable visionary, who, in toys given to his scholars, foolishly squandered the profits of his profession. A small volume containing an account of the school, rules of English grammar, and a spelling dictionary, is, as far as the writer of this knows, the only memorial left to a man, whose unwearied and disinterested zeal in the cause of education, would, in other circumstances, have raised him to distinction.6

Such was the person from whom Mary Ann received her formal schooling, and the place where her subsequently advanced views on education were no doubt nurtured. Much, too, was learnt at home. Her practical mother would instruct her in all the skills of housekeeping, which included, in those days, spinning as well as sewing, knitting and cooking and the preparation of simple medicinal remedies. Like all the McCrackens Mary Ann was clever with her hands. It is said that while still a child she made dresses for the Poorhouse children, the stout homespun being purchased with money which she collected from her friends. Dancing would be fitted in somewhere, and in that musical family music lessons would be a matter of course.

As for the small compact town of Belfast in which she was growing up – it, too, was beginning to expand. The population in 1782 is given as 13,105, having risen from 8,549 thirty years earlier.7 The High Street, with the Farset River flowing down the centre of it from Bridge Street to the “Key”, was still the main thoroughfare, flanked on either side by Waring Street and Ann Street and connected with them by Bridge Street and the Corn-market and by numerous Entries then the home of the smaller shopkeepers. In Bridge Street, Samuel Neilson, the oncoming son of a presbyterian manse in County Down, was building up the woollen drapery business that was shortly to be one of the largest concerns in the town, and in the adjoining North Street was the goldsmith’s shop of Robert Joy’s friend Thomas McCabe. Many of the dwellings in these streets still had thatched roofs, but at the Four Corners – the junction of Bridge Street, Waring Street, North Street and Rosemary Lane – stood the imposing Exchange, to which was added in 1777, as the first storey, the beautiful Assembly Rooms, designed by Sir Robert Taylor, whose name is perpetuated in the Taylorian Museum at Oxford. For this lovely gift the town was indebted to the munificence of the Donegall family.

An extensive development scheme was taking shape at the southern end of the town, where New Street [later Linenhall Street and later still Donegall Place] was being laid out to accommodate the splendid houses of the few very wealthy families. Here the Lord Donegall of the day was to have his town residence, the early family castle in the centre of the town having been destroyed by fire in the beginning of the century. So exclusive was this street that when it was completed no horse drawn traffic was permitted to pass along it, and on Sundays it was the fashionable parade for the well-to-do. After 1783 Mary Ann must sometimes have been taken by Uncle Henry Joy to watch the building of the White Linenhall at the end of the long vista up New Street.

This was not the first ambitious scheme for developing Belfast. As early as 1671 George Macartney, the foremost citizen of his day, on returning from a visit to Italy planned to make it a second Venice by utilising the extensive water-front and the various rivers that entered the Lough at this point. His scheme, however, did not materialise.

The Mall and the Bank were other favourite walks, which blossomed into finery on Sunday afternoons. The former ran from the site on which the White Linenhall was to be built towards Joy’s paper mill, along the pleasant Blackstaff, or Owen-varra, River, with trees and fields beyond. The Bank stretched from the present Arthur Square towards the Lagan, also amid rural surroundings. In Millfield corn was still being ground by the water wheel set up in the time of Elizabeth.

The older streets were ill-lighted and badly kept, and pigs from many styes wandered about at will. On market days the chief thoroughfares were crowded with booths and stalls. Second-hand clothing, imported from Glasgow and sold in the streets, was a profitable trade in times of depression and gave rise to many complaints from the more hygienically minded citizens. Samuel Foote might have included the beggars of Belfast when he remarked that “till he had seen the beggars in Dublin he could never imagine what the beggars in London did with their cast off cloaths.”8 In 1780 a gentleman travelling from Dublin to Scotland via Belfast wrote as follows to the News-Letter:

I was vastly surprised and hurt to see a long string of falling cabins and tattered houses all tumbling down with a horrid aspect, and the seeming prelude to a pitiful village, which was my idea of Belfast until I got pretty far into the town, when I found my error, for indeed with some trifling improvements it might be made to vie with any town in Ireland, save Dublin and Cork.9

And in 1785 another correspondent in the same paper inquires

if it is not inconsistent in the inhabitants to be daily giving proof of taste and increasing opulence in opening new streets, in public erections, etc. when they never once turn their eyes to shambles that for nastiness have not their equal in the meanest village in Ireland – tho’ they have been noticed by travellers and by some of them recorded to our discredit?

Leaving aside its beautiful situation, the Belfast of those days was a practical little town with few embellishments. By the 1790s Robert Joy’s slender spire on the Poorhouse, the cupola of the new Parish Church in Donegall Street, and the belfry of the Market House alone broke the low sky line, and when Captain McCracken’s ship was in port her masts, along with those of other vessels, were clearly visible from the opposite end of High Street.

In Rosemary Lane three Presbyterian Meeting-houses [two of them adhering to the “New Light” principles] clustered together, testifying to the growing numbers and differing views of that community, and in 1784 the first Roman Catholic chapel in the town was opened, an occasion made memorable by the attendance of the 1st Company of the Belfast Volunteers as a mark of their goodwill. As members of this company Francis and William McCracken were there and we can be sure that the event was much discussed in their household. So also would be the visits of John Wesley. Nine different times he came to Belfast on his journeyings through Ireland, preaching in the open air, or in the Market House, though on the last occasion, in 1789, the use of First Meeting-house was granted ‘in the most obliging manner”.

It is, [Wesley wrote in his Journal] the completest place of public worship I have ever seen … It is very lofty, and has two rows of large windows, so that it is as light as our new chapel in London. And the rows of pillars, with every other part, are so finely proportioned, that it is beautiful in the highest degree. The House was crowded both within and without (and indeed with some of the most respectable persons in the town) that it was with the utmost difficulty I got in; but I then found I went not up without the Lord; Great was my liberty of speech among them: Great was our glorying in the Lord, so that I gave notice contrary to my first design of my intending to preach there again in the morning; but soon after the sexton sent me word it must not be, for the crowds had damaged the House, and some of them had broke off and carried away the silver which was on the Bible on the pulpit; So I desired one of our Preachers to preach in our little House [the first Methodist chapel in Belfast was opened in 1787 in Fountain Street], and left Belfast early in the morning.10

Behind a rather sober exterior the town provided a great deal of gaiety and sociability. Dances, balls and card parties were held in the beautiful Assembly Rooms. A coterie met regularly here, and another in the Donegall Arms. There was a great deal of card playing, sometimes for very high stakes, and hard drinking was regarded as an accomplishment rather than a vice. A description of the festivities of “that old and very respectable meeting known as the Card Club of Belfast” at an anniversary celebration in 1784 of the Glorious Revolution, mentions no less than twenty-nine toasts and indicates that others followed: the toasts illustrate clearly the wide interest in liberal movements among the “respectable” citizens of the town.11 Festivities of this kind were very popular, and commemorations and rejoicings were often accompanied by fireworks and illuminations, particularly on the King’s birthday. The Adelphi Club, of which Amyas Griffith was a member, was a popular non-political affair.

Hospitality, lavish by modern standards, was dispensed in private houses, when guests were regaled with course after course of abundant food and drink. Indeed many a hostess in Belfast must have welcomed the arrival of Charles Frederick Schuller, “late cook to the Rt. Hon. John Foster, Speaker of the House of Commons”, and read with interest his advertisement in a News-Letter of October 1792 in which he

Begs leave to inform the Ladies of Belfast & its Environs that he has opened a Pastry Cook & Confectionary Shop in Hercules Lane (a few doors from the corner of Rosemary Lane) where all sorts of Cakes, Jellies, Pies & Comfits may be had. He like-wise dresses Dinners or Suppers in the newest & most approved manner; & hopes from his long experience & abilities to give perfect satisfaction to those who may please to honour him with their Commands.

In the same year George Langtry, a general merchant, was advertising his wares as follows:

Alicant Barilla	Gunpowder
Starch and Hair Powder	Castor Oil
Indigo	Variety of Teas
Black Soap	Prunes & Walnuts
Liquorice Ball	Shovels

Nails & Iron & a few puncheons of Strong Jamaica rum.

The two theatres played an important part in social life. Already Belfast audiences were renowned for their discerning taste. Mary Ann must have seen Mrs. Siddons in these early days, for the famous actress made the first of three visits to the town in June 1785. There were frequent concerts; pantomimes, side-shows, wax works, and menageries were all enthusiastically enjoyed. There was hunting and cock fighting for those who favoured outdoor pastimes, and for the literary there was the Belfast Reading Society.

The social life of the town reached the height of its excitement when Lord and Lady Donegall were in residence. The Chichesters – to use their family name – loved gaiety; and dancing, riding, hunting, amateur theatricals and cards took much of their time and a great deal of their very considerable wealth.

But at the back of everything lurked the ever-present dread of “the fever”. Outbreaks of typhus became more and more frequent as contact, through shipping, with foreign lands increased; frequently vessels had to lie out in Carrickfergus Bay for weeks of quarantine; on one occasion at least we know that Mary Ann was a victim, and Mrs. McTier writes: “We have all been greatly shocked by the death of poor Getty, his fever was a dreadful one, and no creature yet ventures to the house”. And again: “A fever certainly prevails here – tho’ its having been mostly among the better sort marks it perhaps more to us than at other times.”12 At last, in 1797, the Belfast Fever Hospital was opened, the first institution of its kind in Ireland.

Such was the general appearance of the town in which Mary Ann McCracken grew up. We do not hear of the Joys and McCrackens participating in the more riotous entertainments, but in their own circle of friends there was always time for mirth and gaiety and happy social intercourse. There were, no doubt, during Captain McCracken’s seafaring days, visits to the Blacks at Stranmillis, that lovely elevated district a mile or two inland on the banks of the Lagan, and we may assume that Francis Joy’s daughter would as often as possible take her children to see their grandfather at Randalstown, – the old gentleman who left such an indelible impression on Mary Ann. Political events in America, on the Continent and in Ireland; the development of their cotton and other trading enterprises; the interests stimulated by their love of music and painting were matters for constant thought and discussion by all in the McCracken circle, and there is ample evidence that the female members were accustomed to take their full share in family doings.

By 1790 the third generation of Joys and McCrackens were grown-up. The deaths of Uncle Robert and Uncle Henry had cast dark shadows, but there had also been the happy occasions of the weddings of Elinor and Mary Joy to prominent Belfast merchants, and no doubt there were other love affairs of which no record has been left. The McCracken family had moved from High Street to Rosemary Lane, and it was to this welcoming roof that in due course William and John brought their young wives: the house indeed became known as “Noah’s Ark,” for neither stray animals nor dear friends were ever turned from its door.

Margaret, the eldest, did not marry. She was tall and good-looking, quiet and reserved, with a misleading hint of haughtiness, extremely capable and practical. Mary Ann records with deep affection how much she was guided by the wisdom of her only sister: “My sister and I” she says “had but one heart, though she always kept in the background and left me to act frequently on her suggestions, although considerably my senior in years and much my superior in understanding.”13

Francis came next, also quiet and, one imagines, a sensitive and conscientious person. He was among the earliest recruits for the Belfast Volunteers in 1778, and later was to play an active if unspectacular part in the United Irishmen. He took over the management of his father’s rope walk and the sail cloth factory, and was connected with them till the end of his life. William, too, was an early Volunteer, and was to be more conspicuously associated with subsequent developments, finding a most encouraging and resourceful wife in Rose Ann McGlathery. He also was in the cotton business.

And next comes Henry Joy – Mary Ann’s adored Harry, and as Harry he will be known in this story. Much has been written and sung about this romantic figure; here we are concerned with the part he played in the family and in his sister’s life. Six foot all but an inch, extremely handsome, vivacious, intelligent and capable – life was almost too full of interests for Harry. From his schoolboy days he was noted for his quick powers of observation and his gift of mimicry: had he not, during Breslaw’s visit to Belfast [one of Breslaw’s turns, advertised in Dublin, Was “to cut off the heads of two horses, and the head of a postilion, and make the horses draw a post chaise round St. Stephen’s Green, dexterously whipped and flogged by the headless postilion”. Young MSS, Queen’s University, Belfast], detected the secrets of the famous conjurer, reproducing his tricks with all the appropriate patter to the immense delight of his young friends? Many years later while a prisoner in Kilmainham Gaol, he disguised himself as a clergyman and dilated with such vigour and realism to one of his faltering fellow-prisoners on the eternal punishments awaiting informers, that the unfortunate young man was reduced to abject terror. Everything that Harry touched drew from him a whole-hearted response – be it political discussion, family merriment, friendships, or the welfare of those suffering from injustice or poverty – everything, that is, but business. His courage [he was noted for the alacrity with which, in days of thatched roofs and poor water supplies, he answered every alarm of fire] and personal charm made him a natural leader, but behind all the high spirits there was in his sister’s words, “a deeply contemplative character which afterwards developed.”14

Captain McCracken was anxious to settle all his sons in the cotton industry and at the age of seventeen Harry began work at one of the mills; soon he was sent to Scotland to recruit skilled workers. Humdrum routine bored him, but he revelled in close contact with the working people. For them he started the first Sunday School in Belfast, finding a room in the old Market House and collecting some of his friends as teachers. Girls, men and boys were his pupils: “Writing as well as reading was taught. They did not presume to impart religious knowledge, but they taught their scholars how to obtain it for themselves, by which every sect might equally profit. It was afterwards found to be practised in England [probably a reference to Robert Raikes.]; and then Mr. Bristow [the Sovereign] came to the place of meeting with a number of Ladies, with rods in their hands as badges of authority, which put to flight the humble pioneers.”15 Thus did Mary Ann describe this early attempt at social service, which included also a lending library. How different from Hannah More’s statement to the Bishop of Bath and Wells that she taught in her schools only “ such coarse works as may fit them [the working class] for servants. I allow of no writing for the poor. My object is … to train up the lower classes in habits of industry and piety.”16

John, the youngest of the family, united great business ability with an infinite capacity for enjoying the leisured accomplishments of life. “Designed by nature to be a painter,”17 – so Mary Ann described this brother – drawing and music delighted him, and his father’s love of the sea became in him a passion for sailing and yacht-racing. Politics meant nothing to him, or rather, an activity to be most carefully avoided as likely to lead one into nasty and difficult situations: there was nothing, absolutely nothing, of the social reformer in John’s make-up. He married young and his wife was very beautiful, and he became one of the most successful cotton manufacturers in the town.

Mary Ann’s character will unfold itself as her story is told. Physically she was slight of build and lacked the commanding presence that others of the family had inherited from their father. No early portrait of her exists, but from the miniature, painted about 1801, we can derive some idea of what she looked like in her early twenties. Of all the family she seems to have most resembled her mother in appearance – the same round face, full lower lip and dark eyes set wide apart, eyes that gave some indication of the powerful will and strong emotions that inhabited her slender frame. She had been a delicate child and retained the fragile appearance that often accompanies tubercular tendencies. She gathered up in herself the outstanding qualities of all the others so that each of them found in her companionship and understanding. Very early she showed a marked interest in figures and book-keeping, and when barely out of her teens persuaded her sister Margaret to join her in starting a small muslin business in order, so she said, that she might have a little money to use as she pleased.

These apparently light-hearted ventures into industry, undertaken first by Mrs. McCracken and now by her daughters, sound formidable to us with twentieth century notions of factory regulations, trade unions and so forth. For Mary Ann, however, it would be a case of distributing cotton yarn to hand-loom weavers who worked in their own homes. But, comparatively simple though the venture may have been, it demanded much from the proprietors: a knowledge of weaving; a variety of patterns always available, for trends of fashion were fickle then as now; the marketing of finished goods; an adequate system of book-keeping; some financial outlay; and the continual correspondence that such transactions would demand. Mary Ann was responsible for the office end of the undertaking, and recalled years afterwards how she revelled in the daily errand to the post office, which had to be accomplished before breakfast.

It remains only to mention young Edward Bunting. Sometime in 1784 a fatherless lad of eleven arrived in Belfast to take up his duties as assistant to Mr. Ware, organist of the new parish church of St. Anne. The child had shown unusual talent and for two years had been trained by his brother Anthony, an organist of some repute in Drogheda. We know nothing of the introductions or the circumstances that led young Edward to Mrs. McCracken’s home, but there he was received as one of the family, and there he was to live for the next thirty years. Very shortly after his arrival Mr. Ware was obliged to travel to England and he left his juvenile assistant not only to deputise for him at the organ but also to undertake the instruction of his pupils. The deputy was much more exacting than his master, and Bunting afterwards recorded with amusement that one of these pupils – Miss Stewart of Wilmont – was so taken aback by the audacity of her young instructor that, on being reproved a second time “she indignantly turned round upon him and well boxed his ears.”18

Such a youthful genius cannot have been a simple addition to Mrs. McCracken’s family. “Atty” as he was called [probably a corruption of Eddy] was, naturally enough, a self-opinionated boy; he had a biting tongue that remained with him to the end of his life and, except in his professional work, he was self-indulgent and lazy. He was the same age as young John. Mary Ann was two years his senior.

This then is the picture of her family circle and her home surroundings. Next comes the political background.