Today we have a blog post that we hadn’t planned. One of our members was asked a fascinating question on X (formerly Twitter)and we simply had to explore. If you have any questions you’d love to know the answer to you can contact us using the form on the home page or at @PboroWomensHist on X.
The question was about this ledger stone sitting in the New Building in Peterborough Cathedral. She asked us whether we thought these two ladies, Letitia Parsons and Louisa Ainge, could have been lovers. It would make a rather romantic (if depressing) story, but we were suspicious from the start, particularly with the 14-year age gap between the women and their burial in the cathedral grounds. Unless a diary appears that proves the two women were lovers (very unlikely), we can safely assume they were friends, but it still raises the question of why two female friends were buried in the cathedral?
The first thing to catch our eye about their deaths was that they died consecutively, just six weeks apart, and both died within Minster Precincts. We know this because the only people granted the opportunity to be buried within the cathedral grounds (church and graveyard) were those of great stature (religious, civic, wealth) or those who died in the grounds. At the time in question this included the elderly residents of the almshouses and even prisoners who died in the Abbot’s Prison! As neither woman was able to have a position of great stature thanks to their ages and sex (how times have changed!) they must, therefore, have been living in the grounds.
Minster Precincts was not a very populous area, and experienced few deaths: there were three each in 1818 and 1819, and two in 1820 a mixture of older people (some from the almshouses) and babies, nothing unexpected. However, between February 1817 and May 1817, there were no less than six burials, and five of them were women.
The first death was a man, Samuel Wells. He lived at the Vineyard, a mansion round the back of the cathedral, and was buried on 17th February. However, his death took place a full week before. It’s possible that his burial was delayed because the ground was frozen, but we have not been able to determine whether he was buried in the cathedral or in the grounds outside.
On 27th February, Letitia Parsons died in the Prebendary House. She was only twenty-five, and the daughter of one of the Prebends, the Reverend Joseph Parsons. Her father’s status meant that she merited burial inside the cathedral. However, she was not buried until 5th March. Again, it’s possible that the ground was frozen even inside the cathedral: Europe was in the grip of a mini-ice age at the time.
On 19th March, Mary Wells died at The Vineyard. She was the daughter of Samuel, twenty-eight years old, and a close neighbour of Letitia’s. According to the newspaper, she had suffered from a long affliction. Her burial was delayed for nine days.
Letitia’s friend, Louisa Ainge, had been in Peterborough for some weeks already, possibly since Christmas. She had been living in Hitchin and was likely to be the daughter of religious or wealthy man. She died on 20th April at the Bishop’s Palace, across the courtyard and was buried with Letitia four days later, hence the ledger stone. The day after Louisa was buried, Jane Cave was buried. She died at a Prebendal House, but we don’t have a date of death. Her relative, Catherine, also died in the Prebendal House and was buried on 5th May.
Aside from a baby in July 1817, nobody else was buried in or near the cathedral until May 1818. Whatever dreadful affliction had gripped the precincts had passed. But what was it?
The incredibly cold weather of the early 1810s caused crops to fail, people to starve and typhus to ravage communities. However, the people living within the Precincts were largely shielded from this level of want. Peterborough had a dispensary, established in 1815, which served the wider community with outpatient clinics. The dispensary mainly treated malarial patients, as malaria was endemic in the fens. However, in 1817, their chief concern was the prevention and management of smallpox.
Smallpox is a virus, much like chickenpox, with a fairly long incubation period. It takes between 10 and 14 days from exposure to develop symptoms, and becomes infectious as the fever takes hold. The rash does not appear until after the patient becomes infectious, so it spreads easily. Some strains are 90% fatal, but with any type, there’s a significant risk of developing meningitis or pneumonia, neither of which were treatable in the 1810s. Vaccination against smallpox was in its infancy in the 1810s, and many people thought vaccination was madness. Sound familiar?
Smallpox was terrifying. There was no treatment, only hope and prayers. The poor were isolated, the rich self-isolated. We see this in Dickens’ Bleak House, when Esther and Charley become sick and literally lock themselves into two rooms. Even though they had no idea how smallpox spread, people understood the importance of avoiding contact with others. Epidemics were hushed up, and when we examined the death rate in the Minster Precincts, we began to theorise…
Samuel Wells was 67 when he died, after a long and fruitful life. His funeral did not take place for a week, which gave people time to arrive from London and beyond. Letitia died just eight days after his funeral. If she died of smallpox, she must have contracted it before the funeral, perhaps while visiting Vineyard House to comfort his daughter Mary.
Mary died twenty-one days after Letitia. Her death was easily explained by her longstanding ill health. Her funeral was delayed for nine days. We suspect her funeral was delayed because smallpox was beginning to rapidly spread through the Prebendary Houses.
Louisa Ainge did not die at the Prebendary House where she was staying. She may have been moved to the Bishop’s Palace for reasons of space, but it’s also possible that she was moved to the grounds of the Palace. In the absence of an isolation hospital, smallpox patients in Peterborough were isolated in temporary huts. She died one month and one day after Mary.
It’s likely that Jane and Catherine Cave came to stay at the Prebendary House for Letitia’s funeral. They never left and appear to have been infected at the same time as Louisa.
We did not notice a significant change in the death rate at St John’s church in 1817, where the parishioners of Peterborough were buried. This suggests that if smallpox was the culprit in the precincts, the contagion was contained. Smallpox is not inevitably fatal, and we cannot know how many people caught the disease and survived.
It’s noteworthy that almost all the deaths were women. These women were probably infected while caring for each other, locking themselves in, refusing to leave until it was safe. We can perhaps assume that they sent the servants away. There were plenty of men in the precincts, but none appear to have been afflicted, so perhaps they also left. The contagion does not appear to have spread to the King’s School in the precincts. These women were incredibly disciplined.
The contagion was kept secret. Samuel, Mary, and Letitia had their deaths announced in the local newspaper. Louisa, Jane and Catherine did not.* We can assume that the Bishop did not want the news to get out. Imagine the panic, the parents pulling their children from the school, the disruption to services, the potential for civil unrest…
We cannot be certain that smallpox was the culprit. There are no death certificates in 1817, no need for inquests. Perhaps these women just died randomly, of disparate causes. These women died quietly and their story can only be told now thanks to an interesting ledger stone.
Romantic love does not seem to be the reason for these women to be buried together, but a deep friendship is an equally blessed state to be buried in – spending eternity shoulder to shoulder with your best friend sounds a rather delightful prospect. These friends were buried together as their families grieved at their losses – the ledger stone is a sign of their love and grief. After all, grief is the price we pay for love and these women were loved very much.
*Louisa’s was announced in Bell’s Weekly, with no cause of death attached.
This blog was researched and written collaboratively by Claire Richardson and Sophie Michell.
Peterborough Women's History 
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