Why This Ordinary House Holds an Epic 200-Year History! | S2E3 | A House Through Time

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[00:00:01][music] >> When we live in a house, we're just passing through.

[00:00:10]People have occupied it before us, >> [music] >> and others will take our place when we leave.

[00:00:16]A hundred human dramas played out in every room.

[00:00:23]In this series, I'm going back in time to uncover the secret life [music] of a single house, a Georgian terrace here in Newcastle on Tyneside, where I grew up.

[00:00:35]Newcastle's changing [music] fortunes have seen it transformed from a coal-fired city of innovation and industry to a cultural powerhouse with its own unique character.

[00:00:50]>> [music] >> In many ways, number five Ravensworth Terrace is an ordinary house.

[00:00:59]But, as I'll show you, in reality, [music] it's an amazing treasure trove.

[00:01:08]Delving into the archives, I'll use the personal histories of the residents of this house to uncover an epic story spanning 200 years.

[00:01:18]We found this incredible piece of evidence. Yeah.

[00:01:23]Yeah, I do remember. Yeah, okay. Yeah.

[00:01:26]It's a report of a theft, a theft from this house. He was convinced that this was the spirit of his deceased daughter.

[00:01:36]And here on the corner is our house.

[00:01:39]A fearful stab in the back part of his head.

[00:01:43]This was obviously a case that scandalized Newcastle.

[00:01:48]This [music] is the ultimate detective hunt, uncovering lives that weren't recorded in the history books, but through which we can tell a new version of our nation's past, an alternative history of Britain from within the walls of a single house.

[00:02:09]>> [music] >> Welcome to number five Ravensworth Terrace in the West End of Newcastle upon Tyne.

[00:02:26]It's 1910.

[00:02:28]Our last [music] residents, William and Mary Orme, have left the house, and there's a new family living here, the Eagles.

[00:02:37]On the census, we've discovered that the head of the household [music] is 41-year-old Grace Eagle, who lives here with two of her children.

[00:02:46]But the census [music] isn't the only piece of evidence we can draw upon.

[00:02:49]There's another source that can help us understand Grace's [music] household.

[00:02:54]We found this incredible document that tells us something about what our house was like in the year 1910. Because that was the year that the government conducted a survey of every property in Britain. And the surveyor who was sent here to Ravensworth Terrace defined this area as declining lower middle class.

[00:03:17]This is a bit of a come down for the house, which was built as part of an elegant suburb on the edge of town.

[00:03:24]But Newcastle is now a thriving industrial city, and the house is surrounded by busy shops, businesses, and factories.

[00:03:33]Because of the city's transformation, the wind blows the smoke and grime from these new factories over our house in Summerhill.

[00:03:44]The 1910 Valuation Office Survey tells us >> [music] >> that Grace doesn't own the house, but is a tenant, leasing it for £32 a year.

[00:03:53]That's almost £12,000 today.

[00:03:56]It's a lot [music] of money, but we've discovered that five Ravensworth Terrace isn't just Grace's home. She's also running it as a boarding house, taking in guests who pay for bed and board.

[00:04:14]We now know a little bit more about number five Ravensworth Terrace, but we still don't know very much about the head of the household, Grace Eagle.

[00:04:23]Now, she's listed in the census as being married, but her husband isn't living here with her and the children. So, what's happened to him? Are they separated? Is he helping to raise the children? Or has Grace turned this family home >> [music] >> into a boarding house in order to help maintain her family?

[00:04:43]Our search for answers has revealed some surprising results.

[00:04:51]We've done some more research into Grace Eagle, and this is [music] what we've uncovered. It's a public notice from a local newspaper, and it reads, "I Henry Eagle, or Igel, hereby give notice that I will not be responsible for any debts contracted by my wife, [music] Grace Eagle, from and after this date, 29th day of November, 1899."

[00:05:16]This is extraordinary. [music] This is Grace's husband, who we now know is called Henry, saying he will not take any responsibility [music] for his wife's finances. But just as incredible [music] is what happens five days later.

[00:05:32]This is another public notice in the same newspaper, this time taken out by Grace. [music] "I Grace Eagle, or Igel, hereby deny that I have contracted any debts for which my husband, Henry Eagle, is liable."

[00:05:47]Now, this is really unusual. This is a dispute over money between a husband and a wife being conducted not just in public, but literally in the newspapers.

[00:06:00]To discover why Grace and Henry seem to be at each other's throats, I'm searching for more information about their backgrounds. [music] Because we now know both their first names and that they sometimes go by the family name of Igel, >> [music] >> we've been able to find their marriage certificate. They get married in 1886, so 13 years before the couple end up taking [music] out those notices about debt in the newspapers. It tells us that Grace's maiden name is Small, and that she's just 17 when she marries. Henry [music] is a little older, he's 24.

[00:06:39]The marriage certificate also tells us that Henry is a mechanical engineer and that Grace is a machinist.

[00:06:46]They have three children, Grace Marie, Leonora, [music] and Henry.

[00:06:53]So, why did Grace end up living separately in number five Ravensworth Terrace?

[00:07:00]Although Grace and Henry were married over 130 years ago, there are, amazingly, still people alive who knew them. We've managed to track down their grandson, Carl.

[00:07:14]This is Henry here.

[00:07:16]He died when I was five years old, but I have some happy memories of him. So, in the records we found for Henry and the family, they used two surnames, Eagle and Igel. Why is that? Well, well, this the the his matriculation certificate here, that shows him Heinrich Igel, spelled I G E L.

[00:07:39]And then gradually, as he came over here, that Igel became Eagle, E A G L E, and the Heinrich >> Indeed, and the Heinrich was dropped for Henry. So, that's lots of migrants, they they Anglicize their name.

[00:07:55]>> Anglicize the name. Can you tell me where Henry came from originally? Yes, he came from Romania, and his parents had come from Vienna.

[00:08:05]His father was the physician to King Carol. To King Carol in Romania?

[00:08:12]In Romania, yes.

[00:08:14]After university in Bucharest, [music] Henry left Romania to begin a new life overseas.

[00:08:21]So, Henry as a as a young man packs his bags and leaves for Newcastle. Yeah, he came over here to the Tyne with a bag of gold that his mother gave him. Bag of gold?

[00:08:32]>> That's what That's what they said.

[00:08:33]>> story. Oh, yes, and we >> Well, he looks like he could have a bag of gold. I mean, they don't exactly look like they're No. they're struggling.

[00:08:40]Well, as a young man, he qualified as a pharmacist.

[00:08:45]Henry was an educated man [music] with a degree in pharmacology, and the Newcastle of the 1880s was a major center of the chemical industry. So, Tyneside was the perfect place for a man of his talents.

[00:09:01]When he did hit [music] the jackpot, of course, with his invention, which was Eagle Iodine, he invented a painless antiseptic. I don't know whether you've had the pleasure of having actual iodine on a cut somewhere, but it doesn't half sting.

[00:09:17]>> I have had the pleasure, and I would agree with that diagnosis.

[00:09:20]>> stuff, Eagle Iodine, it was extremely well received.

[00:09:25]Henry was a classic serial entrepreneur, dabbling in engraving, printing, and paint making before inventing Igladine, his painless antiseptic.

[00:09:36]Henry took his inventions to trade shows, which is how he met Grace, who was working as a demonstrator, helping to sell the machinery that made ladies' underwear.

[00:09:46]So, he meets Grace, they fall in love, they get married, but things don't really go to plan.

[00:09:54]He was a philanderer.

[00:09:56]He was known from the time that the history that I know of him, that he tended to enjoy the company of of women, and I'm not a bit surprised that Grace was bothering or the fellow.

[00:10:09]And that's where you think their marriage went wrong?

[00:10:11]>> Oh, yes. By the stories I've heard, I I don't think anyone would be happy with the behavior of a husband who who's was so uh uh outrageously fond of other ladies. Yes. So, when she's had enough she becomes much more independent. She moves into Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:10:30]>> Yes. And forms a business. Quite a thing to do at the time.

[00:10:32]>> Oh, big business. Yes. Grew a business from nothing.

[00:10:37]A remarkable woman she's been. Yes.

[00:10:40]Uh with a great deal of independence to split the family, of course.

[00:10:46]So, 12 [music] years after their very public row about money, we find that Grace has left her philandering husband and set up [music] on her own. Her eldest daughter, Grace Marie, stays in her father's home, but her two younger [music] children, Henry Junior and Leonora, come to live with Grace >> [music] >> in the boarding house in Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:11:08]So, I now want to know more about this business >> [music] >> and who Grace and the children shared their home with. So, I'm going back to the 1911 census.

[00:11:18]We have E.R. Ruffell, who is listed as a merchant agent, and because this is Newcastle that probably means he's working in shipping down by the Tyne.

[00:11:27]But then it gets a little bit more interesting. We have Arthur Gordon Laws, who is an actor.

[00:11:34]And Horace Bertles, who's listed as a musical artist.

[00:11:39]Next is Ernest Edgington and Linda Maud Edgington, who again are musical artists, and they're married to each other. So, we have to presume that they're a husband and wife double act.

[00:11:50]So, rather wonderfully, Grace isn't just running any old boarding house. She's turned this house into a boarding house [music] that specializes in offering accommodation to the stars of the music hall.

[00:12:04]>> [cheering] [applause] >> In an age before radio and when cinema was still in its infancy, music hall was the most popular entertainment of the day.

[00:12:20]Newcastle was a major city on the music hall circuit. Tyneside's large working-class population flocked to the music [music] halls to watch an ever-changing mix of popular acts and well-known performers.

[00:12:34]There were [music] at least 12 music hall venues around Newcastle, and Grace's boarding house was within a few minutes' walk of five of them.

[00:12:43]One of the closest was the Tyne and Wear Opera [music] House, a place that would have been well-known to Grace's boarders.

[00:12:50]I last [music] came here as a child back in the 1980s, but today I'm here to meet theater expert Dr. Anne Featherstone, who I'm hoping can tell me more about Grace's theatrical lodgers.

[00:13:03]They were, uh I suppose you'd say uh music hall royalty. Linda and Ernest Edgington, who were known as the Lottos.

[00:13:16]And they were trick cyclists.

[00:13:18]Now, that's quite a trick. One of these people, and I rather think it's him, is is Ernest Lotto. Both of them came from different um cycling acts. So, Linda comes from the Kaufman sisters.

[00:13:33]Not real sisters?

[00:13:34]No. No.

[00:13:36]>> Stage names?

[00:13:36]>> Stage names. So, this couple get together. They're like the like the uh the supergroup of trick cycling.

[00:13:42]>> They They actually are. They are the marriage of two trick cycling families.

[00:13:47]Absolutely.

[00:13:49]The trick cycling dynasties of Edwardian Britain come together. This power couple of trick cycling world. That's right.

[00:13:57]And what are they doing with the bicycles? There is a a cartoon image of them with all their different sorts of acts on it.

[00:14:13]They do football.

[00:14:15]Dribbling the the ball using the >> On on bicycles?

[00:14:19]>> On bicycles.

[00:14:22]I have to say as well, for the early 20th century, Queen Victoria's not long in her grave, these are quite racy costumes. Well, you see, there is Linda in her in her costume there.

[00:14:36]I mean, this is an age when women are wearing ankle-length dresses.

[00:14:39]>> This is a lot of exposed flesh for 1911.

[00:14:42]>> there. You couldn't walk down the streets of Edwardian society [laughter] dressed like this. Certainly not dressed like that.

[00:14:48]>> like that. Even in Newcastle today you'd probably get some stares just like that.

[00:14:52]Yes. And and that's something that Grace would have had to be okay about.

[00:14:59]Because these people don't behave in quite the same way.

[00:15:03]So, if she was more a more of an uptight person, more conservative, this wouldn't be the job for her.

[00:15:09]>> I don't think so.

[00:15:11]Horace Bertles was another of Grace's lodgers who performed in the music halls.

[00:15:17]His act then was to catch plates in his mouth. But that gave had an unfortunate effect in that he smashed his teeth.

[00:15:26]That's got to be an occupational hazard if you're catching plates in your mouth.

[00:15:30]>> so.

[00:15:30]>> Hardly a surprise.

[00:15:33]He has a He has a change of um implement, and he does juggle meat.

[00:15:40]He juggles joints of meat?

[00:15:41]>> He does. Um Safer than the meat cleavers. Um a bit weird. Very weird.

[00:15:49]So, does he take the um the the joints and the legs of mutton back to Grace's house afterwards?

[00:15:54]>> My thought exactly. So, he's the only one who brings his own dinner. He [laughter] brings his own dinner. They'd probably need washing first, unless he's a really good juggler.

[00:16:03]And there are hundreds and hundreds of acts in Britain. Yeah.

[00:16:06]And hundreds of theaters.

[00:16:07]>> Yes. And hundreds of women like Grace >> Yes. making it all work behind the scenes.

[00:16:12]That's right.

[00:16:12]>> When they come back from a night on stage, what do they expect?

[00:16:16]>> They're back at the lodgings half past 11:00, 12:00 at night, and they're ravenously hungry. So, you've got to feed them with a good solid meal. So, you've got to be up 10:00, 11:00 at night >> Absolutely. ready to cook to feed five, six people.

[00:16:31]>> Yeah.

[00:16:33]And your reputation is built on that sort of sense of hospitality.

[00:16:38]I imagine the atmosphere in Grace's boarding house was one of fun and excitement.

[00:16:44]I can sort of see Grace as perhaps um liking theatricals. I think you have to sort of enter into it and be a bit theatrical yourself. So, we can kind of make some [music] maybe presumptions about kind of Grace's character, that someone who likes people, likes a laugh, >> Yeah. and is attracted to this kind of this world of the theater.

[00:17:06]>> Yes.

[00:17:09]But before long, the party comes to an end.

[00:17:18]In August 1914, war is declared, and a wave of patriotism sweeps across Newcastle.

[00:17:26]On the Westgate Road, around the corner from our house, the local recruiting station is besieged by huge crowds. In the first weeks of the war, 15,000 local men enlist.

[00:17:38]Thousands more are at work in the arm's factories of Armstrong Whitworth, in the Tyne's many shipyards, and in the iron and steel works nearby. They now run day and night to fuel the war effort.

[00:17:52]But as these changes start to affect Newcastle, >> [music] >> the foundations on which Grace and her family have built their lives start to shake.

[00:18:02]I get the impression that Grace was really tough, but the fact is she was going to need to be. Because as the atmosphere in wartime Britain grew darker and darker, she would have been worrying not just about herself, but also about [music] her daughter, Grace Marie. This is a photograph from Grace Marie's wedding of 1909.

[00:18:23]And this is a copy of her marriage certificate.

[00:18:27]And it shows that her husband's name is Paul Visser.

[00:18:31]And that he was German.

[00:18:36]Now, under the laws as it stood at the time, when a British woman married a foreign national, she took on her husband's nationality. [music] And what that means is that according to the authorities, Grace Marie was not British. She was German.

[00:18:53]For Grace, the coming of war must have been extremely [music] alarming. Her eldest daughter, Grace Marie, was married to a German, and Grace's own estranged husband, Henry, was originally [music] from Romania.

[00:19:06]Both women were British citizens by birth, but when they had married foreigners, they had legally taken on their husbands' nationalities and forfeited their own.

[00:19:17]Before the First World War, this distinction wasn't a problem, but now it is.

[00:19:25]On the 5th of August, 1914, the day after war was declared, the government [music] introduced the Aliens Restriction Act, immediately imposing a whole range of restrictions on German citizens living in Britain.

[00:19:41]Now the war's been declared, the authorities have rushed to clamp down on the movements and the activities [music] of anybody who's from one of the enemy countries. And that means all people from those nations, no matter how long they've been in Britain, no matter how embedded their lives are in the country.

[00:19:58][music] And also, any women who've married men from Germany or Austria >> [music] >> are caught in the same trap because they are considered to be enemy aliens. And that's exactly what's happened to this woman, Sarah Jane Kern. In the >> [music] >> headline of this article, she's described as an English woman, but she is now a naturalized Austrian citizen.

[00:20:20]And what she's done is she's moved house. She's moved in with her brother, but she hasn't told the authorities. So, both her and her brother are in court because they have contravened the Aliens Restriction Act.

[00:20:32]>> [music] >> That's a law that was passed just 23 days before they're in court.

[00:20:38]This is an article about a German butcher who lives in Newcastle who has homing pigeons. And they've been seen flying and circling over his yard and then flying off to the coast. And the fear is that maybe perhaps they are carrying secret messages back to Germany.

[00:20:54]Now, it's too easy to dismiss this as hysteria because there were German spies operating in Britain in the First World War, but these laws affect anyone from Germany and Austria and their family.

[00:21:13]The new Aliens Restriction Act has a direct impact on the Eagle family.

[00:21:19]Grace Senior has to register any foreign guests staying in her boarding house. If she fails to do so, she can end up in court.

[00:21:29]As for Grace Murray and her German husband, Paul, they are photographed and fingerprinted by the police.

[00:21:37]They're issued with permits to carry at all times and they're banned from traveling more than 5 mi from their home.

[00:21:46]These new wartime restrictions make it extremely difficult for Paul to continue in his job as a Newcastle shipbroker trading with other merchants on the city's quayside.

[00:21:58]And in the atmosphere of wartime Britain, it's not difficult to see how ordinary people could come to regard Germans or Austrians living in the country as the enemy within.

[00:22:10]And it's also not difficult to see how this hostile attitude could lead to violence.

[00:22:19]In August 1914, Paul's offices on the quayside are set on fire by an anti-German mob.

[00:22:30]And things soon get even worse.

[00:22:35]Paul and Grace Murray, [music] along with their two young children, Pauline and Peter, were living in this house on Nuns Moor Road, not far from Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:22:45]What happened to them here in the first weeks of the First World War is hard to imagine, but a crowd appears out there in the street.

[00:22:56]They then started to shout anti-German slogans and then to pelt the house with stones.

[00:23:09]And the same thing is happening to other Germans or suspected Germans across Britain.

[00:23:17]I need to find out what happened next to the family.

[00:23:20]>> [music] >> So, I'm searching through the local newspapers.

[00:23:26]We found this really incredible piece of evidence. These are newspaper reports from August 1914, so just 4 weeks after the outbreak of war. And Paul Vischer has been arrested by the military authorities under circumstances of suspicion.

[00:23:44]He's alleged to have begun communications with Germany.

[00:24:01]This is St. Joseph's School in Benwell, about a mile from Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:24:05]In August 1914, this school was being used as a temporary makeshift internment camp for German civilians. And it's right here that Paul is arrested.

[00:24:18]According to [music] the newspaper reports, Paul is seen loitering outside the camp and trying to communicate with the prisoners.

[00:24:28]In his defense, Paul said that he came here in order to make contact with a friend. But when he's arrested, the police find incriminating evidence on his person. They find what the newspapers call letters which showed that he was attempting to open up a channel of communication with Germany.

[00:24:49]Now, as a shipping broker, it could well be the case that Paul came here in order to try to set up some sort of business deal. And that doesn't make him a spy, but it does make him incredibly naive because as an enemy alien, he should have been nowhere near a restricted area like this.

[00:25:09]Now, we'll never know for certain why Paul came here, but what we do know is that by doing so, he's put himself and his whole family in a disastrous position.

[00:25:20]Paul is arrested in August and a week later, he's brought before the local magistrates.

[00:25:29]When Paul's case comes to court, he is unsurprisingly tried under the Official Secrets Act. He's charged with being found in circumstances of suspicion prejudicial to the safety of the realm.

[00:25:43]Now, personally, I think it's far more likely that Paul was a businessman trying to make some money rather than a spy trying to contact the enemy. But in the atmosphere of 1914, it is not in the least bit surprising that he was found guilty.

[00:26:02]This is devastating news. Grace Murray's family has lost its breadwinner and they are in need of a safe place to stay.

[00:26:09]Grace Senior, her whole family now under suspicion, has to keep her eldest daughter and her grandchildren safe. Her only option is to move them in to number five Ravensworth [music] Terrace to live with her other children. But the Eagle situation remains precarious.

[00:26:27]Two women, [music] both married to foreigners, have now taken shelter in our house hoping they'll be safe from the waves of xenophobia sweeping over Newcastle.

[00:26:40]And what of Paul? I'm following his journey 300 mi south to find out what happened next.

[00:26:49]By September 1914, 10 and 1/2 thousand so-called enemy aliens had been rounded up.

[00:26:57]But the British government didn't have anywhere to house them all.

[00:27:04]So, they used whatever makeshift prison camps they could [music] find.

[00:27:09]Paul wasn't heading for a school in suburban Newcastle, but for Southend and to a hastily converted passenger ship, the HMS Royal Edward, that was moored [music] 2 mi off the coast.

[00:27:22]Do we know what conditions were like on the Royal Edward? Well, it was a transatlantic passenger liner designed to keep passengers on board for for weeks making the transatlantic crossing.

[00:27:31]So, it had a certain amount of space, but obviously had very little outdoor space. We know from reports with exchanged prisoners uh that they were occasionally allowed to play football on the deck. Uh but also that they had to stand on the deck for a pal, which was the normal counting of prisoners that to see has anyone escaped.

[00:27:48]When Paul was imprisoned on the Royal Edward, it held 1,200 enemy aliens.

[00:27:56]There's also a class system on board.

[00:27:57]So, if you were wealthy, you could have access to a first-class cabin. If you didn't, you would be in steerage class, which was three-tier bunk beds um and often very poor conditions even if you were actually a passenger liner, never mind if you were an interned German.

[00:28:10]Now, Paul, his business has been attacked, burned down. He's not going to be able to afford a luxury cabin. No, it's very unlikely he could have afforded that. And in fact, most most of the internees uh are are destitute at this point. And also, this is an indefinite captivity. These men are disorientated. They don't know how long they're going to be held for. I mean, this is a war the country's not prepared for. This is a policy that sort of quickly adopted. In many ways, this is an ad hoc internment policy.

[00:28:40]The level of spy mania in Britain at the start of the war is very, very intense.

[00:28:44]There's a real sense that every German is a spy. Every German is dangerous. Um and ordinary civilians find themselves caught up in this. It's not like being a soldier then who's been captured. You have affinity with the people cuz they're your comrade at arms, the men you've been fighting with. This is you just happen to share a nationality. But you still have the same problems that you have as a military prisoner of war, which is no privacy. Zero privacy. Day in, day out surrounded by other people.

[00:29:09]In camps in the First World War, this creates very serious mental problems. People in camps start to have mental breakdowns. A lot of them suffer from depression. We also have a report here of a prisoner who actually goes mad from the conditions.

[00:29:23]Prisoner goes mad on the Royal Edward moored off the pier at Southend.

[00:29:30]So, that mental pressure is beginning to really have an impact on the men on board. And these are men that Paul would have known. Well, these are men that he would have encountered on on the ship, yes. Do we know how long Paul spends on the Royal Edward? I have here his death certificate. He actually died on board the ship.

[00:29:50]9th of March, 1915.

[00:29:52]Cause of death, heart failure.

[00:29:55]Asthma and bronchitis. 35 35 days. Yes, so he's obviously been [music] sick for quite a long period. March 1915, so a really really bad winter.

[00:30:04]>> Yeah.

[00:30:06]This is >> it's damp. [music] Standing out in the rain for the roll call every day, several times a day, is not going to be good, especially once he has uh uh bronchitis as well. So this isn't a sudden death. This already had 35 days of him being sick. Yes, and it's been noted obviously that he's been sick for that length of time. So we don't know if he's had any medical treatment or if he's he's clearly not been taken to hospital. And this is quite unusual. I I have to emphasize that. People didn't die very often in British internment camps in the First World War. This just highlights how unsuitable these ships were.

[00:30:34]>> Cuz it isn't a camp.

[00:30:35]>> It isn't a proper camp, no. So this is a makeshift ship turned into a camp and it something like this happens and they can't cope cuz it's not designed as a camp. And Paul Dieskau died there. Yeah.

[00:30:45]Yeah.

[00:30:45]If this happened in a prison today, there'd be an investigation.

[00:30:49]Even at the time, this [music] would not have been acceptable. Under international law, civilian civilian internees aren't are not technically prisoners of war. So actually legally holding them is also quite dubious.

[00:30:59]That's the word civilian. We need to keep coming back to that. He's not a combatant. He's a guy who buys space on ships in Newcastle and he's died off the south coast for walking past a school and His only crime is to be an immigrant from the wrong country.

[00:31:15]It's just tragic.

[00:31:26]When news of Paul's death reaches Ravensworth [music] Terrace, Grace Marie hasn't seen her husband since he was interned 7 months earlier.

[00:31:35]We've been given access to a precious document that Grace Marie's [music] family have treasured for over a century.

[00:31:43]This is Paul Dieskau's daybook, his diary. And when he's in prison, he doesn't take this book with him.

[00:31:51]He leaves it with Grace Marie and we know that because she begins to add her own entries into this book.

[00:32:00]And it reads, Paulie left me, died Southend 9th of the 3rd, 1915.

[00:32:07]So the Dieskau family and Grace Marie, like millions of families, have lost their husbands and a father, but for Grace Marie to openly grieve, to openly grieve for the loss of her German husband, would have been very difficult in the middle of the most bitter war the world had ever seen in which a husband's country was the enemy.

[00:32:31]Even in death, Paul wasn't allowed to return to Newcastle.

[00:32:35]He was buried in Southend, 300 miles from his home and his family.

[00:32:45]>> [music] >> Both Grace and her daughter, Grace Marie, had been born in Britain, >> [music] >> but both had married men from other countries.

[00:33:00]And because of that, they [music] find themselves being treated with suspicion and prejudice. And in the case of Grace Marie, even being at risk of being deported from her own country.

[00:33:12]And there's another fact we shouldn't forget here. If this had been the other way around, if it had been the men of this family [music] rather than the women who had married foreigners, then their status as British citizens would never [music] have been called into question. It is because Grace Marie is female that her [music] citizenship matters less than that of a man.

[00:33:32]Even though her husband Paul is [music] dead, Grace Marie is still officially German. And in the early years of the war, the xenophobia gets ever worse and ever closer to Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:33:47]In May 1915, 2 months after Paul's [music] death, the passenger liner Lusitania is sunk by a German submarine with the loss of over a thousand civilians, [music] prompting widespread anti-German rioting across Britain.

[00:34:04]Behind our house on the Westgate Road, an angry mob smashes and loots the Kaufmann's butcher's shop.

[00:34:11]It's easy to imagine Grace Marie sheltering in the house with her children within earshot of the riots.

[00:34:18]They must have been thinking, they'll be coming for us next.

[00:34:24]But in the midst of all this turmoil, her life takes an unexpected turn.

[00:34:30]We know that Grace Marie had two children with Paul, but we've also discovered she had a third child, Basil, born in 1918, 2 years after Paul died.

[00:34:43]And we've managed to track down Basil's daughter, Jane Stubbles.

[00:34:48]Grace Marie's first husband is Paul.

[00:34:52]Grace Marie's second husband is Billy Haselhurst.

[00:34:56]And Billy is my grandfather.

[00:34:59]So after having this quite awful tragedy of losing a husband, there's this incredible turnaround in her life.

[00:35:07]>> Complete turnaround in her life.

[00:35:09]I don't think Grace Grace Marie expected to marry a second time, but Grace Marie and Billy fell in love.

[00:35:17]Completely head over heels in love with each other.

[00:35:20]Billy's family were great fun. They were entertainers, they were music musicians.

[00:35:25]And it suited Grace, it suited her personality. And what was Billy doing?

[00:35:29]What was his job?

[00:35:30]>> Well, when he met Gracie, he was a civilian.

[00:35:33]But soon after he met, he was called up to the Coldstream Coldstream Guards and he had to go south for training and Grace Marie and Billy decided to have a a weekend together.

[00:35:49]Her sister, Leonora, said, "Well, I'll tell everybody that you're coming to stay with me and then you and you can go and join Billy." And when they were away, they got married.

[00:35:59]They had obviously planned it, but nobody else knew, not even Leonora.

[00:36:03]They they eloped, really. They sort they sort of eloped. And so he's sent off to France. to France. She writes regularly.

[00:36:12]She's pregnant and he's away.

[00:36:14]>> father. That's Basil, my father.

[00:36:16]Um and Basil is born on July the 30th, 1918.

[00:36:24]And there's a photograph that she sent to him in France.

[00:36:29]It's beautiful photographs.

[00:36:31]There's something quite incredible when people have cameras of their own rather than having to go The intimacy. Yeah.

[00:36:37]Look at this one.

[00:36:38]When this photograph was taken, Billy hasn't seen his son yet. No.

[00:36:43]So this is the first image he gets of his son, this photograph.

[00:36:46]>> Yes.

[00:36:47]And she and she wrote Grace wrote to him, "I'm loving you and remembering our happiness of a year today in London together.

[00:36:57]And now Basil is sitting on my knee while I write you your very image."

[00:37:07]>> [laughter] >> That's beautiful.

[00:37:09]So she has a new baby, husband, but it's 1918.

[00:37:15]Um what what happens?

[00:37:18]>> [sighs] >> Um sadly, on November the 9th, 1918, [snorts] Billy is shot in France.

[00:37:32]And he dies on November the 13th, 1918, 2 days after the war ends.

[00:37:43]So when the war comes to an end and everyone's celebrating, she's probably celebrating as well. I'm sure she was.

[00:37:49]And then >> She was hopeful then Billy would be coming home.

[00:37:53]So Grace Marie now has three children.

[00:37:56]>> And she is twice been widowed in the First World War. That's right.

[00:38:04]How did she >> 1915 and 1918. [music] And what did what did your father say of his mother?

[00:38:12]He told me that she had been a great source of strength to him and that she was always optimistic.

[00:38:19]>> [music] >> Always optimistic.

[00:38:19]>> Optimistic. So the woman who'd been widowed twice, her message to her children was optimism. Absolutely.

[00:38:27]Perhaps unsurprisingly, the family left 5 Ravensworth Terrace, the scene of such upheaval.

[00:38:35]Grace Marie, [music] twice widowed by the age of 31, continued to live in Newcastle, but never remarried.

[00:38:43]Grace senior was reconciled with her errant husband, Henry, and moved [music] back to the marital home.

[00:38:52]After the war, thousands of men returned from the Western Front to find Tyneside exhausted, [music] divided, and tense.

[00:39:00]As the economy struggled to adjust to peace, the traditional industries of engineering, shipbuilding, and coal mining started to suffer. There were a series of strikes and even race riots across the country.

[00:39:14]The situation was so serious that there were those in government who believed the country was on the brink of revolution.

[00:39:26]And in this febrile atmosphere, [music] a new resident moves in to 5 Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:39:34]This is a page from a Newcastle trade directory. It's from just after the First World War, 1919.

[00:39:41]Here's Ravensworth Terrace. Here's number 5.

[00:39:45]It is a lodging house being run by Miss R. McQueeny. So, it looks like Miss McQueeny, just like Grace Eagle before her, is a single woman and she's making a living by renting out the rooms in this [music] house.

[00:40:00]From the electoral register of 1920, we know the names of Rose's seven lodgers: Richard Wild, Peter McQueeny, Terence Dolan and Thomas Dolan, Albert Eley, Albert Shepherd, and finally a man called Edward Carrigan. And from their surnames, it's clear that most of them are Irish.

[00:40:22]And we've done some digging into Rose's [music] background and found that she was born in Ireland in County Leitrim.

[00:40:30]Previous censuses show she came to England with her family as a girl and was brought up in Sunderland, 12 miles from Newcastle.

[00:40:40]Sunderland and had long been home to large communities of Irish migrants. Men and women, like Rose's parents, had been drawn to the northeast in previous decades by the abundance of work.

[00:40:54]The records tell us that Rose used to [music] work as a housemaid in the Grand Hotel in Newcastle.

[00:41:00]So, her background in [music] service would have held her in good stead to be the landlady of our house in Ravensworth [music] Terrace.

[00:41:09]To understand how Rose ran her lodging house, we've enlisted the help of design historian Professor Deborah Sugg Ryan.

[00:41:16]It was very important to lodging house landladies to have an air of respectability, and this would especially be so for Rose with a house full of male lodgers.

[00:41:29]So, she would have to be [music] seen to maintain a level of distance from the men in the house. And I think that one of the ways landladies did this is by imposing lots of rules and regulations on their male residents.

[00:41:47]Popular postcards [music] uh often portray this relationship of classically battle-axe landlady.

[00:41:59]>> [music] >> She would have taken a very dim view of female visitors in the house. She would have taken a dim view of dirty boots, feet on furniture, smoking, drinking could be a real issue as well.

[00:42:16]>> [music] >> There were many other aspects to Rose's job. She was cleaner, cook, and mother figure all rolled into one.

[00:42:27]Rose's days were really quite arduous.

[00:42:29]She would have had a very early start to get the fire going in the range to cook the [music] breakfast for her lodgers.

[00:42:38]Probably bacon and eggs, that was the classic thing. Possibly porridge, but that's quite a lot of work.

[00:42:45]Then she's got to do packed lunches as well for the men because they would be sent off to work with a packed lunch.

[00:42:53]And after that, of course, she's got all the clearing up to do. So, her day is probably spent cleaning and tidying up and then getting ready [music] for the evening meal.

[00:43:09]Rose as landlady of a lodging house wouldn't have had much space to herself.

[00:43:14]So, the kitchen was also her living room.

[00:43:17]Even though she's in this house full of people, it might be quite lonely and isolating down in her basement kitchen in the evenings because the convention was that the the lodgers didn't come down. Partly to for reasons around respectability that here she is as a landlady with this house full of men.

[00:43:39]Although her day left little time for a social life, it seems Rose did find time for one. Among the documents [music] we've discovered is her marriage certificate. It's been a bit difficult [music] to make sense of the documents we've discovered for Rose McQueeny because according to this document, her age in the year 1920 should be [music] 33. But then, according to this document, she should be 38 in 1920. And then, when we look at her marriage certificate again for 1920, she gives her age as >> [music] >> 28.

[00:44:15]Now, this could just be an administrative error, but her husband's age is just 24. So, it could be the case that Rose has listed herself here as being younger than she actually is in the hope of making this marriage look a bit more respectable, and that was not uncommon at the time.

[00:44:36]Now, her husband's name is [music] Edward Carrigan, and that's the same Edward Carrigan who we saw earlier listed as being one of the residents of number five Ravensworth Terrace. So, Rose has married one of [music] her tenants.

[00:44:52]The records tell us that Edward is also Irish, born in County Mayo.

[00:44:57]In the First World War, he then listed in the Irish Guards but didn't see active service.

[00:45:05]At the time of his marriage in 1920, [music] Edward is working as a laborer in one of Newcastle's many coal mines.

[00:45:14]We have to presume that Edward and Rose got married because they were hopelessly in love, but there might have been another, more practical reason for their decision to get hitched because 6 months after they get married, Rose gives birth to twins.

[00:45:30]Patrick and Francis, these are their birth certificates.

[00:45:33]And because we think that this room, which is now a kitchen, was the Carrigans' bedroom, it's very likely that the boys were born >> [music] >> right here.

[00:45:44]Sadly, the elder twin, Francis, dies within a month.

[00:45:48]So, Rose and Edward, along with baby Patrick, are [music] now a family of three.

[00:45:55]We know that Edward was working as a colliery laborer, but 6 months later, the birth certificates [music] of the twins tell us that he's now a colliery fireman.

[00:46:05]One of the duties of a fireman in [music] a pit was to detonate the controlled explosions that were used to open up the seams of coal.

[00:46:17]With Edward now in a skilled job, we can imagine that the family are more comfortably off.

[00:46:24]On the surface, there's [music] nothing unusual about the Carrigans' situation.

[00:46:29]A busy boarding house run by a mother with a young baby and a new husband.

[00:46:35]But looking through the local newspapers, we've uncovered a story featuring Edward Carrigan that makes me think there is much [music] more going on here.

[00:46:48]The journalists at the Newcastle Daily Chronicle have got slightly carried away because this is a really >> [music] >> big story. The title is explosive sensation, far-reaching conspiracy may be disclosed.

[00:47:02]On the 21st of October, 1921, the Newcastle police spring a trap to arrest two men, Richard Purcell and Gilbert Barrington.

[00:47:11]>> [music] >> It happens outside the Irish National Club, 5 minutes away from Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:47:18]As the police are arresting Purcell, Edward Carrigan of Ravensworth Terrace, Newcastle, rushes in among the police officers and seizing hold of Purcell with both hands endeavored to drag him away from the custody of Sergeant Arthur and Detective Hardy.

[00:47:36]Two other policemen then grab Carrigan and pull him away. He continues to resist and he's taken to a police station where, hardly surprisingly, he's charged with obstructing the arrest.

[00:47:47][music] The two men at the heart of this case, Purcell and Barrington, are seen together in this photograph. They're accused of stealing 355 lb of explosives from a local colliery and of plotting to use it to [music] endanger lives and property in the United Kingdom.

[00:48:09]Purcell, Barrington, and Edward Carrigan are all locked up while the police try to unravel the conspiracy.

[00:48:17]To find out what Edward Carrigan has got himself mixed up in, this young Irishman with a new wife and baby, I've come to the archives >> [music] >> to investigate Purcell and Barrington.

[00:48:30]Purcell's name crops up in 1920. He attends a meeting of the Irish Self-Determination League. The meeting is in Durham, so not far from Newcastle.

[00:48:40]10,000 people gather, and among the speakers are both Purcell and Barrington. We've found a quote from Purcell's speech. He says, "The Irish throughout the world were rallying to the call of their motherland.

[00:48:54]If the English government boasted of having an English garrison in Ireland, well, there is an Irish garrison in England.

[00:49:02]And they would hold the fort for Ireland and keep the orange, green, and white colors flying."

[00:49:08]Purcell's words about an Irish garrison standing ready in England weren't spoken in isolation.

[00:49:18]Across the Irish Sea, Ireland had been in a state of rebellion since 1919 when Republicans had declared independence from Britain.

[00:49:28]In response to the escalating conflict in Ireland, sympathetic members of the Irish community in Britain set up the Irish Self-Determination League to campaign for Irish independence.

[00:49:42]>> [music] >> So, if Edward's associate Richard Purcell is part of this campaign for Irish independence, >> [music] >> does that mean Edward is too?

[00:49:53]And does Edward, who we know has access to explosives from the colliery where he works, have something to do with the theft that Purcell and Barrington [music] stand accused of?

[00:50:05]I'm hoping to find answers from historian Dr. Jared Noonan.

[00:50:10]Kerrigan is a significant figure in the Irish community on Tyneside. And we know that because of a memoir written by a guy called Gilbert Barrington.

[00:50:19]And Barrington, uh, believe it or not, was a member of the Irish Republican Army, the IRA.

[00:50:24]So, the man that we know Kerrigan knew was an IRA commander. Yes.

[00:50:31]As was the man who he tried to prevent being arrested by the police, Richard Purcell.

[00:50:36]>> So, two figures that Kerrigan knows are in the IRA.

[00:50:41]So, is Edward in the IRA?

[00:50:43]If we go to the statement written the memoir written by Barrington, uh, he mentions, uh, Kerrigan here on this page.

[00:50:53]And he refers to an incident in which an aerodrome was burnt. The aerodrome burning was done by E. Kerrigan, Lieutenant C Company.

[00:51:02]Lieutenant C Company in the IRA. Yes.

[00:51:05]So, he's part of an IRA cell in Newcastle. Yes, he is. As lieutenant, he would have been, uh, uh, the second in command of that company. And that company was ordered to burn down the aerodrome.

[00:51:19]On the 8th of April, 1921, while Rose would have been serving dinner at 5 Ravensworth Terrace, a team from C Company of the IRA are 2 miles away at Gosforth Aerodrome.

[00:51:32]The first team set fire to haystacks to distract the local fire brigade.

[00:51:39]Meanwhile, Edward Kerrigan, leading another team, [music] enters the aerodrome.

[00:51:44]They cut the telephone wires, bind and gag the night watchman, and then set fire to the hangar.

[00:51:51]Two airplanes are destroyed as Kerrigan and [music] C Company escape into the night.

[00:52:03]This is a >> [music] >> pretty professional, kind of kind of military operation.

[00:52:07]Yes.

[00:52:08]Led by Edward. Yeah. He was, uh, a senior member involved in the operation.

[00:52:12]So, this is much more than being in the Self-Determination [music] League and campaigning for Irish Home Rule. Yes.

[00:52:18]It is. The belief that, uh, in order to get the British government to take seriously Ireland's demand for freedom, that [music] they had to they had to resort to violence.

[00:52:28]Over the course of a single year, the local IRA were responsible for over 80 arson and sabotage attacks. Across Tyneside, they targeted gasworks, waterworks, timber yards, and railway stations. They acquired over 400 firearms, including three machine guns and large quantities of explosives, all destined for the rebellion [music] in Ireland.

[00:52:52]Five years earlier, Edward had joined the British Army. It's 1915, middle of the war. But he's now sending guns to people who are fighting the British Army. So, he's had a real conversion.

[00:53:02]That wasn't unusual. Um, uh, a significant proportion of the, uh, Tyneside's IRA membership were ex-soldiers.

[00:53:09]Barrington, uh, believe it or not, fought in in in the British Army in in the Great War.

[00:53:15]So, Edward's also, he's still working as a fireman in the colliery. Rose is still running the boarding house at 5 Ravensworth Terrace.

[00:53:24]But by night, Edward's a commander in the IRA. Yes.

[00:53:29]So, Rose Rose must know what's going on.

[00:53:32]Do you think? I would say so. I would say that she does know. There there were, um, uh, there was a Republican women's organization, um, called Cumann na mBan, the League of Women, in which women would have, um, helped IRA men in order to divert suspicion.

[00:53:48]Operations like the burning of the aerodrome, women would have accompanied the men so they would look like courting couples out out just for a walk.

[00:53:54]On Tyneside, the IRA's female volunteers were heavily involved, assisting the men on operations, gathering intelligence, and [music] hiding stolen guns and ammunition in safe houses.

[00:54:07]There were even reports of the IRA women using babies' prams [music] to transport weapons. According to one commander, the Tyneside IRA were among the best in Britain, and the women were even better than the men. So, this is a a young couple with a baby, a nice lodging house, and they are, kind of, also leading this double life. And we know that most of the lodgers are Irish as well. In a boarding house, you will constantly have people coming and going.

[00:54:36]So, it would have been perfect cover for storing, uh, rifles, uh, maybe even machine guns, ammunition, and, um, explosives, uh, which, uh, Kerrigan could have gotten from the mines.

[00:54:48]So, this is not just a lodging house.

[00:54:50]No, not just a lodging house. It has another another purpose.

[00:54:54]We call this an IRA safe house.

[00:54:57]Definitely, yes.

[00:54:59]Number 5 Ravensworth Terrace is an IRA safe house.

[00:55:04]It's [music] amazing to think that our house was linked to the IRA's war against Britain.

[00:55:11]>> [music] >> And Edward Kerrigan was secretly a senior member of the IRA.

[00:55:17]But what I've [music] yet to find out is whether the police managed to connect him to the explosives theft or [music] uncover any of his other IRA activities.

[00:55:31]>> [music] >> When the explosives case finally comes to court, Edward Kerrigan's IRA associates, >> [music] >> Purcell and Barrington, refuse to give evidence. Instead, they give defiant speeches demanding that Ireland be granted [music] independence. They are both found guilty and sentenced to 3 years in prison.

[00:55:50]But, astonishingly, the police are unable to connect Edward Kerrigan to the theft of the explosives or to any other operation, including [music] the attack on the aerodrome. And he gets off with a £5 fine.

[00:56:05]He returns to Ravensworth Terrace a free man.

[00:56:10]On the 6th of December, 1921, just a few weeks after Edward was released, a treaty was signed between the Irish rebel government and the British, which created the independent Irish Free State. But it wasn't the complete break with Britain that many Republicans had hoped for, and it excluded Northern Ireland.

[00:56:29]For the Kerrigans, this marks the beginning of a new chapter in their lives because in April 1922, just a few months after Irish independence is declared, Edward Kerrigan goes home to Ireland. And presumably, like the many thousands of Irish people who went back to the land of their birth, he did so full of optimism for his own future and that of the new independent [music] Ireland.

[00:56:53]Edward, Rose, and their son [music] Patrick move to Dublin, where Edward joins the Civic Guard, the Free State's new police [music] force.

[00:57:02]Most of these new recruits are former IRA operatives.

[00:57:07]The Kerrigan family settle in County Kerry and begin a new life [music] together in the new country.

[00:57:15]Over the course of a decade, the lives of the people who lived in number 5 Ravensworth Terrace are one by one turned upside [music] down by the turmoil of the early 20th century.

[00:57:27]And what was a theatrical boarding [music] house becomes a hotbed of rebellion.

[00:57:32]It is often said that the First World War and the years after was the moment when the optimism and relative innocence of the Victorian and the Edwardian age came to a violent end. Well, you can really see that in the lives of the people who lived in these rooms in those years.

[00:57:51]While Edward and Rose Kerrigan are in Ireland, 5 Ravensworth Terrace is changing. In the 1920s, a synagogue is built next door, >> [music] >> and a new family buys number 5, the Smyths, who will live here for the next four decades. As I discover, theirs is a household [music] of secrets. And this long-lost photo collection reveals the biggest secret of all. Now, the family friend who loaned us these photographs helped us put names to faces, but they don't know who this little girl is.

[00:58:24]So, who is she? Who is this girl?

[00:58:35]>> [music] [music]