The Brighton connection

My PLANKs

The Brighton connection (post 1830s)

George PLANK (c1816-1888) was my great-great-grandfather.

What were the highlights of his life?

George was born at Stoke (now part of Guildford) between 1807 & 1819. His father was Isaac PLANK (?), a weaver. This has been gleaned from census returns and George's marriage certificate. I have yet to find his baptism or the marriage of his father.
Another possibility is that George was illegitimate and, when he married, used his maternal grandfather's name for that of his father on the certificate. This might imply that Margaret PLANK, the only sister of Isaac above, was his mother? Alternatively he might have been the illegitimate son of Elizabeth PLANK (nee YOUNG) who was the sister-in-law of Isaac above. After her husband, Jacob PLANK, died in 1811 she had an illegitimate daughter, Elizabeth, who turns up in Brighton at the same time as George - was this a coincidence or did they travel to Brighton together?
Early records describe his occupation as an agricultural labourer (when he arrived in Brighton) and then a porter. From his 30s onwards he was a carpenter.
At the time of the 1841 census he was a patient at the Sussex County Hospital in Brighton.
On 9th January 1843 George married a heavily pregnant Maria WADEY, one week before she gave birth to a son named John. This was their second child and a third, William, was born in 1855. Maria had been born along the coast at Newhaven.
By the time of the 1861 census George appears to have left his wife as she was described as the Head. He made his way into Kent and turns up again in 1871 at the Tonbridge Workhouse, described as a Widower (but Maria did not die until 1892), Pauper and Carpenter.
He died on 13th January 1888 at the Minster Workhouse in Kent. He was described as a Carpenter Journeyman of Margate.

This is George & Maria PLANK's family:

Winifred PLANK/WADY
(1840-1910)

Winifred was born on 21st April 1840, nearly 3 years before her parents married. On her birth certificate the father was named as John PLANK. Was this a mistake on the certificate or on Maria's part? Winifred never took her father's name and, when she married James RANDELL, a labourer, in 1864 her name on the certificate was Winifred WADY. They spent the rest of their lives at Brighton and had at least 5 children.

In the 1861 census (3 years before she married) Winifred was at the ‘Home for Female Penitents’. This was probably St Mary’s Home which was founded in 1853 to facilitate the reform of female penitents (ie former prostitutes). In 1860 an official survey found 97 brothels in Brighton! The home also took in the aged, the poor, and unmarried mothers, but was Winifred a prostitute at one time? When she married her address was Albion House. In the mid-1860s St Mary's moved to larger premises in Finsbury Rd where it was known as the Albion Hill Home. Is this Albion House? So was she there until she married?

John PLANK
(1843-1933)

John was my great-grandfather. He was born on 16th January 1843, a week after George PLANK married Maria WADEY.

William PLANK
(1855-1878)

William was born on 22nd May 1855 and joined the Royal Navy at the age of 18. His Naval Service Record at the National Archives tells a very interesting, and ultimately sad, story. His character is initially described as Very Good but, with the exception of one ship, this deteriorates to Fair and Indifferent. There are three Indifferent entries and against each one he appears to have spent 42 days at Lewes Gaol (then a naval prison). I have been unable to find out what he did. Absent without leave? The last entry on his record, on the Eurydice, states 'Ship lost'. The Eurydice was a wooden sail training ship for young seamen that left Bermuda on the 6th March 1878. On the 24th March, off the Isle of Wight, the ship was struck by a sudden gale and snowstorm which resulted in her capsizing. All the officers and crew (including William), with the exception of 2 seamen, were lost. A total of 317 men died. For more information see the following sites:

Extracts from The Times newspaper

Memorial at St Ann's Church, Portsmouth

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) wrote a poem about this disaster entitled 'The Loss of the Eurydice'.

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