“Overture and Beginners Please”
Miss Sarah Matthews was a surprise package. I had never heard of her before. She had a life of two halves: an actress from our Theatre Royal, Bristol who was ‘discovered’ and became a success on the the London stage during the Regency period. She played everything from ‘breeches roles’ and farce to Shakespeare and opera. After eleven years she gave up the grind (it exhausted me just writing about it) for a quiet life as the wife of a country vicar.
Do other family historians receive pokes from the ether? This doesn’t happen to me often, but now and again when I am looking through the records some unfamiliar long dead person makes an appearance, several times at random. It is comes like a dig in the ribs with shouts of “Me! Me! Me!” There is nothing for it eventually, but to take the hint. This blog is full of such meanderings off the beaten track.
The ‘case’ of Sarah Matthews is slightly different but I did indeed get a poke. It is the surprising tale of an unlikely couple, a union of Show Business and High Church.
The story begins with me looking for inspiration, surfing old newspapers for Bristol references, when an item in 1808 caught my eye. (This is the literal truth. I only have one functioning eye.) It was under the heading ‘Ireland’, an ’extract of a letter from a gentleman at Waterford to his friend at Bristol dated 8th May inst.’
To read more download this long read: Sarah Matthews: A Poke from the Psychic Facebook
You May Also Like
The short sad story of Harri ...
07 October 2025
Charmouth Tales: “All he d ...
13 September 2023
The Family Tree of a Jam Pan
07 August 2023
Leave a Comment
About Me
I have been researching the social history of the West Country for 50+ years. During this time I have collated information on a wide range of people living and working in the West Country including miners, ethnic minorities, petty criminals, sailors, tommies, benefactors, brassmakers and many more. The thing that I find amazing is that ordinary people always lived extraordinary lives. I hope you like my blog that brings together my lifetime of research.
Popular Post
“The railroad ran through the middle of the house………”
12 October 2025The short sad story of Harriet Guest, once of Brislington
07 October 2025
Blog Comments
Alison Hepburn
21st September 2025 at 3:48 pm
Thank you for the link to Sarah Matthews, that’s another cracker. I suspect that we think alike, I have been collecting and writing stories about the people who lived in my street, mainly the women, to put in a publication of some sort working with our local museum. The street is near the quay here in Topsham and the people here were poor and have been largely forgotten. I laughed when i read about you ’trawling’ through the records, that is what I have had to do to find snippets about them and then reconstruct their stories.
I think that is why I enjoyed your work so much, you are writing exactly what I would like to write myself.
My daughter Katy lived in Bristol until recently working as theatre designer and she paid the rent by working front of house at the Old Vic which is where her fascination with the Macreadys started. I hope your grandson is having fun and doing well there. Katy’s research is engrossing and it’s good being able to help her with it, I am away next week but when I get back we have two days booked in Bristol archives so that she can learn how to use them. Thank you again
Alison
PS I think that Julia and Mazzy Macready met at the Royal Academy of Music in London, Maddy was there in 1840 studying piano.
dp lindegaard
22nd September 2025 at 5:04 pm
Thanks Alison, I like the twists and turns of going down a rabbit hole, but quite often landing in a dead end. Terrible mixed metaphors.