They walked across fields behind her cramped home in Nuneaton to a barn called Astley\u2019s Hovel. Polly was never to return to her five young children, who depended on her entirely. Her body was found the following morning with her throat cut.<\/p>
\u201cMy wife Tina has always known that she was the descendant of a person who was murdered,\u201d explains Stephen Moore. \u201cHer mum used to point out the street in Nuneaton where their ill-fated ancestor lived. Five years ago I decided to write a book about Polly\u2019s tragic life.\u201d The Undoing of Polly Button<\/a><\/em> has just been published, and the director Ken Loach, who was born in Nuneaton, has described it as a \u201cterrific story\u201d.<\/p> Stephen has painted a clear but dark episode in Nuneaton\u2019s history, all reinforced with fascinating and meticulous detail. However, this is much more than a book about a historical murder, because Stephen has researched all of Polly\u2019s five children and discovered that she has more than 1,000 living descendants. The project is snowballing to include them all.<\/p> Polly remains at the heart of the story, and her life is Dickensian in its drama and tragedy. She was born as Mary Green in Nuneaton in 1792, to parents who worked in the silk-ribbon trade. Her nickname \u2018Polly Button\u2019 may have come from \u2018Molly\u2019, a nickname for \u2018Mary\u2019, and her prowess as a weaver and needleworker. The silk-ribbon trade was a thriving industry in Nuneaton at the time, and the town depended on it.<\/p> Between 1814 and 1829, Polly gave birth to five children, all by different fathers. \u201cIt was a classic tragedy. She was about 20 years old when she became pregnant by Daniel Wagstaff, who was from a wealthy local family. Socially they were unequal, and he refused to marry her. This abandonment was the beginning of Polly\u2019s undoing, and her prospects spiralled downwards. She faced the social stigma of being an unmarried mother and the anguish of how to provide for her baby, Elizabeth.\u201d<\/p> Under a filiation (illegitimacy) order, Wagstaff was ordered to pay 3s a week for his daughter. However, when he died in 1824 the maintenance stopped, leaving Polly in financial distress.<\/p> History repeated itself when Polly had two more children with men who died before their offspring reached adolescence: a son William and a daughter Hannah, who is Tina\u2019s great great grandmother. She also had two more daughters, Ann and Jane, in the 1820s, by separate fathers.<\/p> \u201cIt was desperately sad that three of the fathers died young and the family was left so vulnerable, especially given the icy blast that Nuneaton was about to suffer.\u201d Stephen\u2019s research into life in Nuneaton in the 1820s makes for shocking reading.<\/p> \u201cThe move to free trade in 1826 exposed the town to competition from cheap, high-quality ribbons from France. Hand looms were being replaced by power looms, making cottage industry obsolete.<\/p> \u201cNuneaton suffered total economic collapse in the 1820s. The consequences were poverty, disease, social unrest, suicides and bankruptcies. Amid all of this, Polly was a lone parent struggling to raise five children.\u201d<\/p> Living conditions became squalid, and remained so for many years. Mortality rates were so high that the Government commissioned a report by inspectors, which Stephen found online and at the local library.<\/p> \u201cNuneaton had open dung heaps; foul, stagnant pools; and privies with no drain that were exposed to the highway. Its inhabitants were starving, and soup kitchens served up gallons a day to keep them alive.\u201d<\/p> Polly was enduring such hardship when she met her final partner, John Danks. He was a farm labourer from Astley, near Nuneaton, who moved to the town and later married his second wife Jane Floyde. They lived close to Polly\u2019s home in Abbey Street.<\/p> Danks and Polly must have begun a relationship in around 1828, because a year later their daughter Jane was born. \u201cA filiation order against Danks was secured, but he had to be apprehended to attend the hearing. Clearly, he was reluctant to acknowledge responsibility for his child.\u201d<\/p> However, Danks didn\u2019t pay maintenance to Polly, and by 1832 he owed her the considerable sum of \u00a34 8s 6d. Polly was pregnant by him again, and the situation began to escalate. His wife Jane knew about the affair, and had heated exchanges with Polly. Did she know about her husband\u2019s enormous debt, however? Another warrant was issued for Danks\u2019 apprehension, so perhaps he began to panic.<\/p> On the fateful Saturday evening, Danks sloped across the fields behind Polly\u2019s house, believing he was unseen, and called on her to come out with him for a walk. Polly made him wait because her children were hungry and she had to go out to buy bread. She then locked them in the house for safety, and was helped over a low perimeter wall by Danks. She never returned, and her mutilated body was found the next day by the landowner. It\u2019s impossible to imagine the anguish that the children must have suffered on learning of their mother\u2019s death.<\/p> The hue and cry went up for John Danks, who everyone knew to be Polly\u2019s lover. He was arrested and appeared a few days later in front of an inquest, which Stephen found reports of on the British Newspaper Archive.<\/a><\/p> \u201cApparently, Danks confessed to Constable Haddon, who detained him. However, he pleaded not guilty at his trial which took place at Warwick Spring Assizes on 30 March 1832.\u201d<\/p> Newspaper reports of the trial provided grisly detail of Polly\u2019s demise. She had been knocked to the ground and her head almost severed by slashes to the neck. A bloodstained knife belonging to Danks was found near a hedge 50 yards from Astley\u2019s Hovel.<\/p> Several witnesses testified for the Crown, including Polly\u2019s nephew James Green, who saw Polly climb over the wall to the waiting Danks. \u201cJames said it was a clear night, so I checked this against weather conditions in records held by the National Meteorological Library and Archive. The night was very dry, so James\u2019 testimony of good visibility seems to be correct.\u201d<\/p> A trail of bloodstains revealed that Polly had rallied herself and tried to drag herself home, despite being heavily pregnant and having mortal injuries. \u201cSadly, her character was put on trial, with one newspaper describing her as a prostitute and another as ‘a single woman of loose character’. If she did fall into prostitution, it must have been through desperation.\u201d<\/p> The evidence against Danks was overwhelming. Justice Parke condemned him to death, and he was executed on 2 April 1832 outside Warwick Gaol. His body was given to Birmingham Medical School for dissection.<\/p> Polly\u2019s story is operatic in its scale, with a tragic heroine, a desperate villain and a dark industrial setting. Stephen could have focused purely on the key events, but he has enriched the book by exploring the role of weaving communities and the impact of industrialisation, as well as tracing the fortunes of Polly\u2019s descendants.<\/p> \u201cI was curious to discover what happened to Polly\u2019s children and grandchildren,\u201d he explains. \u201cUsing Ancestry<\/a>, Findmypast<\/a> and FamilySearch<\/a> I mapped out all five lines. I was thrilled to discover that Polly has at least 1,000 living descendants.\u201d<\/p> Stephen then began the painstaking process of contacting them to explain her story. \u201cI used social media, email and letters. So far, I\u2019ve connected with 160 descendants and set up a family group on Facebook. We have members who live across Britain and some in Australia, New Zealand and Canada.\u201d<\/p> Convincing total strangers that they have an ancestor who was murdered 190 years ago was tricky. \u201cOnce they got over the initial disbelief, most were fascinated by Polly\u2019s story and keen to connect with other descendants. This year, to commemorate the anniversary of Polly\u2019s death, 70 of us met up in Nuneaton. It was so satisfying. They\u2019re lovely people and we enjoyed a warm, friendly, sociable event. Even descendants of John Danks joined us, which was an interesting dynamic.<\/p> \u201cI led everyone on the \u2018Polly Trail\u2019, which is a guided tour that I run around the key scenes of the murder. I was amazed at how fascinated people were by it.\u201d<\/p> All of Stephen\u2019s author profits are being donated to charity, including a women\u2019s refuge in Nuneaton. \u201cIt felt right to do so. People have really got behind the project and I\u2019ve had so much help free of charge from local historians, librarians and genealogy groups.\u201d<\/p> Stephen hopes that Polly\u2019s character resonates through the book. \u201cShe raised five children who survived into adulthood during a time of extreme poverty. Her fighting spirit must have kept her going as a lone parent struggling to raise a family.\u201d Polly\u2019s life was cut short, but her memory lives on through Stephen\u2019s fascinating work.<\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n By Claire Vaughan Published: Tuesday, 14 November 2023 at 10:05 AM On the night of 18 February 1832, Polly Button was lured out by her married lover, whose child she was carrying. They walked across fields behind her cramped home in Nuneaton to a barn called Astley\u2019s Hovel. Polly was never to return to her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":28937,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"7"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover.jpg",2560,1707,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover-1536x1024.jpg",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/11\/my-ancestor-was-murdered-by-her-lover-2048x1366.jpg",2048,1366,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Claire Vaughan Published: Tuesday, 14 November 2023 at 10:05 AM On the night of 18 February 1832, Polly Button was lured out by her married lover, whose child she was carrying. They walked across fields behind her cramped home in Nuneaton to a barn called Astley\u2019s Hovel. Polly was never to return to her…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/28936"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}End of an industry<\/h4>
Brutal attack<\/h4>
![\"Some](\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/52\/2020\/07\/edit-4390-600dpi-39d2931-scaled.jpg\" "\\"In")
Living legacy<\/h4>
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"