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Investigating the past can leave you with more questions than answers: sometimes, it points up a lack of wider historical knowledge; at others, it is just lack of information, or information that doesn’t quite fit. You cannot be entirely certain as to the facts. Was this particular person, with this name, the one I am looking for? The existence of people of the same age and same name confuses the research, without additional information to confirm which one you have found. Investigating the past of Sr Matilda proves this point. The Community had two Sisters named Matilda, and, for those of you who remember the second one, I am talking about the first, who was Professed in 1871 and died in 1898. Most of her background is as factual as I can ever be certain of; but not all of it.
Born in 1836 in Hoxton, Middlesex, Matilda Mary Dixon was the daughter of Samuel and Mary Dixon. Samuel, born in Leeds but living in London, had married Mary Ebbetts in Buxton, Norfolk in 1832; Mary was the second daughter of John Ebbetts, a farmer at Cawston, also in Norfolk. Their oldest child, Henry Samuel was born two years later in 1834. As far as I can gather, they only had two children. Samuel worked as a Printing Press maker; he, Mary and the children lived for many years on Great Chart Street in London. By 1851, Henry (aged 17) had left school and was working as a merchant’s clerk; he later became a clerk for a banker. Samuel retired sometime during the 1860s and Matilda left the family home during the same decade to join the Community of All Hallows. She was probably clothed in 1867, giving her a four-year Novitiate, which was the usual length for a lay Sister.
Sr Matilda was only the second lay Sister to be professed; the first, Sr Martha, was professed in 1869, and died later the same year. Sr Matilda may well have helped to form lay Sisters within the Community, although the lead in this probably came from choir Sisters. However, Sr Matilda was a capable woman; in 1871, still a Novice, she was the head of a household at The Heath, Ditchingham, labelled ‘Ditchingham School’. Sr Matilda is the only Sister present; another woman, Jane Buck, was the certification mistress. Jane, aged 23, later joined the Community herself. There are three boarders: a 16-year-old pupil teacher, and 2 pupils. I assume there would also have been day pupils.
Now, this is where it gets uncertain. In 1881, Sr Matilda is registered on The Dam at Ditchingham. She is staying or living with her parents, Samuel and Mary. I am not certain if, therefore, Sr Matilda was still involved in the school. I suspect not; neither do I know if she was living with her parents permanently. She is still a member of the Community, as her occupation is Sister of Mercy. I know that other Sisters were allowed to go back to their families in times of need, and, as Sr Matilda’s parents aged, she may have been required to help support them. There are other suggestions as to why this might be. I do know that both Samuel and Mary died in the early 1880s: Mary, aged 78, in March 1882 and Samuel, aged 83, in 1883. Both deaths were announced in local papers, although Mary’s gives most information. It confirms the marriage mentioned above: not only is Mary the wife of Samuel Dixon, but she is also the second daughter of John Ebbetts. This makes the marriage as factual as I can get. The announcement also says that Mary died ‘after a long affliction’, implying that she might well have needed the support of her daughter.
It is also uncertain when Samuel and Mary moved to Ditchingham from London, and why. They were still in London in 1871, although no longer in Great Chart Street. Together with Henry, they are living in Clerkenwell. So the move took place sometime in the next ten years. This is where the uncertainty gets confusing. It seems Henry never married: certainly, he is still single in 1871. It is likely he died in 1876, as a Henry Samuel Dixon died in the third quarter of that year, in the district of Islington. Is it possible, I thought, that Samuel and Mary moved to Ditchingham after the death of their son? Possibly not. The probate record for Henry Samuel Dixon shows that he was living in Barnsbury at the time of his death; if my internet search is correct, this is not far from Clerkenwell, so seems likely. Henry’s probate went to his father Samuel, living in Ditchingham. Proof, therefore, that not only is this our Henry, but that Samuel and Mary had moved earlier? Well, probably. What is confusing me is the description of Henry and Samuel in that probate record: both are listed as gentleman. But Samuel was a retired Press maker, Henry was a clerk and, as Sr Matilda was a lay Sister, I had been thinking the family were working class. Normally, this part of the probate record is linked to occupation (at least, for men), and I would normally take the word ‘gentleman’ as an indicator of social class at this time (as opposed to behaviour). So this description complicates the facts, and may also point up my lack of knowledge of Victorian social history. It is possible that the term was more fluid than I have taken it to be; also, as a clerk, Henry’s occupation may have been further up the social scale than his father’s.
But it does seem likely that there was more than one Henry Samuel Dixon; in 1859, a Henry Samuel Dixon, born in 1834, joined the Honourable Artillery Company of the Army, resigning in 1866. His occupation had been clerk. I would have attributed this to our Henry, had it not been for one fact. In 1861, our Henry is registered with his parents, and his occupation is banker’s clerk. So who was the Henry Samuel Dixon who died in 1876? I am inclined to think it was Sr Matilda’s brother, but I cannot be as certain as I am about other information, such as the marriage of Samuel and Mary. Neither can I be certain as to what Sr Matilda did in the Community, after her stint at Ditchingham school. Was she still working for CAH in 1881, or did she have to focus on her parents? It is possible she was working at the hospital, which she could have reached from Ditchingham Dam. I do know that at some point in the 1880s, she moved to run All Hallows farm, under the supervision of Sr Emmeline, a choir Sister who was not resident there. M. Lavinia comments that “S. Matilda is quite willing [to go to the farm] & has no hankering for the hospital”. By 1891, she was at the Community House (which tells us nothing as to her actual work); she died in 1898, aged 62, after 31 years in religion.
While it would be helpful to pin down every fact exactly, life is not like that. Historical records do not always allow us to be certain; and, maybe, it is more helpful that way. In life, and in faith, there are certainties; but there are also many areas where we are best allowing a bit of uncertainty, a molecule of possibility that we may not be exactly right. Our faith is in God, who knows us better than we know ourselves. Allowing the possibility that God may guide us in uncertain paths may just mean we follow God’s path for our lives, rather than our own.
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