Mrs Mary Elizabeth BEAUMONT, née Sarjeant (1850–1894)
St Giles section: Row 50, Grave K37
In remembrance of
Mary,
the dearly loved wife of
D. Z. Beaumont
who fell asleep 28th March 1894
Aged 43
“Until the day break and the
shadows flee away.”
Mary Elizabeth Sarjeant was born in Islington near the beginning of 1850. At the time of the 1851 census Mary (1) was living in Bethnal Green with her mother Mary (30), a commercial traveller's wife born in Bocking, Essex, and her younger brother William (three months), plus a 17-year-old house servant and a 12-year-old nurse. The family is hard to find in 1861.
Dudley Zamoiski Beaumont was born in Scarborough on 18 September 1836, the fourth son of Thomas Wentworth Beaumont and Henrietta Jane Emma Hawks Atkinson (see his tree in The Peerage). He attended Harrow School and was matriculated at the University of Oxford from Christ Church on 17 October 1855 at the age of 19. He was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn on 6 June 1863. He married his first wife Eliza Mary Hone at St Nicholas's Church in Brighton on 9 December 1865, and they had two children, both born in Brighton: Frank Beaumont (1866/7) and May Eliza Beaumont (1868). At the time of the 1871 census Dudley (34), described as a fundholder, and Eliza (30) were living in Brighton with Frank (4) and May (2). Eliza appears to have died in Brighton just after that census, probably as a result of childbirth, as an unnamed baby surnamed Beaumont died in the same quarter.
Later that same year, on 18 November 1871 at St Nicholas's Church, Brighton, Mary Elizabeth Sarjeant (22) became the second wife of Dudley Zamoiski Beaumont (35). They had three children:
- Harold Ernest Beaumont (born in Hastings, Sussex in 1872/3 and baptised at St Peter's Church, Brighton on 17 March 1873)
- Una Mary Beaumont (born in Brighton, Sussex in 1875 and baptised at All Saints Church, Hastings on 22 December)
- Daisy Edith Beaumont (born in Upper Norwood, Surrey in 1878/9, reg. first quarter of 1879).
At the time of the 1881 census Mary (30) was living at Broadstairs in Kent with her husband Dudley (43), who described himself as having an income from dividends, her stepdaughter May (12), and her own children Harold (8), Una (6), and Daisy (2). They had two servants, a nurse and a housemaid, both aged 15. Her stepson Frank Beaumont (14) was boarding in Brighton at the home of the medical gymnast Johannes F. Bienemann.
By the time of the 1891 census the couple had separated. Mary (40) was living at Hove in Sussex (on her husband's means as the head of the household) with their children Harold (18), Una (16), and Daisy (12), who were all described as scholars, plus one servant. Meanwhile Dudley (55), also living off his own means, was lodging in Hastings in the home of a widowed dressmaker, Sarah Perry (48) nee Gallop.
Mary must have come to live in Oxford in the early 1890s, as she died there in 1894:
† Mrs Mary Elizabeth Beaumont née Sarjeant died at 17 Wellington Square at the age of 43 or 44 on 28 March 1894 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 31 March (burial recorded in the parish register of St Giles's Church).
Her death notice in Jackson's Oxford Journal reads simply: “March 26, at 17, Wellington-square, Oxford, Mary Elizabeth, wife of D. Z. Beaumont, aged 44.”
Her effects came to £97 14s. 7d., and her executor was Samuel Barker, M.D.
The husband and children of Mrs Beaumont
Mary's husband Dudley Zamoiski Beaumont was living in Bethnal Green in London when on 21 August 1900 he was admitted to the Priory Lunatic Asylum in Pembrokeshire.
At the time of the 1901 census Mary's three children, all unmarried, were living together at 26 Waldegrave Road, Penge, Surrey. Harold (28), who was working as a private secretary, was the head of the household and looking after his sisters Una (26) and Daisy (22). They employed a general servant.
Their father was discharged from the Priory Asylum on 21 September 1901 and died at 97 Church Road, Upper Norwood at the age of 71 on 15 December 1907. His effects came to £15,884 4s. 9d., and his executor was his son Harold.
Harold Ernest Beaumont (born 1872/3)
Near the beginning of 1911 at St Anne's Church, Soho, Harold Ernest Beaumont married the widow Mrs Charlotte May Wilce (née Dobby, born in Woolwich in 1883). At the time of the census that year, Harold (38), described as an agent for a leather manufacturer, was living at 2 South Hill Park Gardens, Hampstead with his wife Charlotte (25) and Charlotte's son Benjamin Wilce (2). They had just one son together, Dudley Harold Beaumont, who was born in Hampstead in 1913.
Harold Ernest Bennett's home was at 61 Park Avenue, Worthing when he died at Graylingwell Mental Hospital, Chichester on 29 April 1934. His effects came to £101 1s. 11d., and his executor was his son Dudley.
Una Mary Beaumont (born 1875) and Daisy Edith Beaumont (born 1878/9)
The two daughters of Mary Beaumont never married, and spent the rest of their lives together. In 1911 Una (36) and Daisy (32) were living in a ten-roomed house with two servants in Walton-on-Thames.
By 1952 they were both living at Popova, Kingsley Green, near Haslemere, Surrey.
Una's home address was given as Popova when she died at the Alvernia Nursing Home in Godalming at the age of 77 on 15 October 1952. Her effects came to £11,774 4s. 9d., and her sister and her solicitor were her executors.
Daisy was still living at Popova when she died in Chichester on 26 July 1963. Her effects came to £28,706 17s., and her bank and solicitor acted as executors.
Please email stsepulchres@gmail.com
if you would like to add information
These biographies would not have been possible without the outstanding transcription services
provided by the Oxfordshire Family History Society