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Mrs Sarah FREEMAN, née Waite (1822/3–1863)
St Giles’s section: Row 10, Grave B40

Sarah Waite was born at Caroline Street, St Clement’s, Oxford in 1822/3 and baptised at St Clement’s Church on 19 January 1823. She was the daughter of the ostler Richard Waite and his wife Mary. Her older sisters Caroline and Mary Waite, were baptised at Holywell Church in 1820, but the family had moved to St Clement’s by 1822, when Caroline died there at the age of two.

Sarah’s mother Caroline Waite died at Caroline Street at the age of 36 in 1832 and was buried in St Clement’s churchyard on 29 June; and her father Richard Waite died in St Mary Magdalen parish at the age of 63 and was buried with his wife at St Clement's on 1 July 1837.

At the time of the 1841 census Sarah was a servant to the family of the wine merchant John Perkins at 47 Broad Street (one of the houses demolished to make way for the New Bodleian Library). Her future husband William Freeman, born in St Ebbe’s in 1824 and baptised there on 25 July, was then a young carpenter of 15, living in Friars Street, St Ebbe’s with his parents William and Ann Freeman and his younger siblings.

In 1847 in Oxford (reg. fourth quarter) Sarah Waite married William Freeman. They evidently moved to London soon after their wedding, and at the time of the 1851 census they were living at 6 Portobello Lane, Kensington, where William worked as a carpenter’s man.

Their only son was born three years later:

• John Waite Freeman (born in London in 1854 and baptised at Holy Trinity Church, Paddington on 8 October).

At the time of the 1861 census Sarah (38) was still living in Paddington with her husband William (37), who was now a carpenter, and their son John (6).

Sarah Freeman (possibly without her husband) appears to have moved back to her home city of Oxford soon after the 1861 census, as she was living at the north end of St John Street (which is in St Giles’s parish) at the time of her death in 1863:

† Mrs Sarah Freeman née Waite died at St John Street at the age of 40 on 20 June 1863 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 24 June (burial recorded in the parish register of St Giles’s Church).

Her husband is hard to find in the 1871 census. He appears to have married a second wife called May (born in Bermondsey), as by the time of the 1881 census William (56), who continued to work as a carpenter, and May (68) were living at 101 Bramley Road, Kensington.

William Freeman is again hard to find in 1891. In 1901 when he was 76 he was living alone at 23 Dartmoor Street, Kensington.

At the time of the 1911 census William (86) was living at Westbourne Park, Kensington in the home of his son John and his wife. It is hard to find his death.

---

The only son of Sarah Freeman and her husband William

John Waite Freeman (born 1854) married Mary Jane Armson in the Hackney district in 1876 and continued to work as a carpenter. At the time of the 1881 census John (who was 26 but gave his age as 29) and Mary (28) were living at 83 Swinbrook Road, Kensington with their first child Rose (1).

In 1891 they were at 16 Bosworth Road, Kensington with five children: Mary (13), who was already working as a domestic servant; Rosa (11), Alice (8), and William (5), who were at school; and twins Philip and Elsie (eleven months).
In 1901 they were living at 24 Silver Street, Kensington with four of their children: Rose (21), who was a servant; Alice Maud (18), who was a dressmaker; William (15), who was a telegraph boy; and Elsie Jane (10).

At the time of the 1911 census John (who was 56 but gave his age as 60) was working as a handyman and living at Westbourne Park, Kensington with his wife Mary Jane (58), and his elderly father: none of his children was at home (although five out of six were still alive).

John Waite Freeman died in Kensington at the age of 73 near the end of 1927.