A Tangled Web of History Repeating itself
Vincent Saxton Levers, the brother of my 3rd Great Grandmother Hannah Levers, led an interesting and sad life. He left his wife and children, committed bigamy at least twice and was convicted at York Assizes and transported to Bermuda. He returned to Nottinghamshire and died in Nottingham Workhouse in 1861.
His daughter Sarah Levers, born 1823, married a policeman Joseph Ball. I wonder if he knew about Sarah’s errant father? Sarah and Joseph Ball had six children.
One of them was Rebecca Levers Ball born 1848 in Derby.
Rebecca married Richard Bingham and they lived in the Hackenthorpe area (then in Derbyshire), after which they moved to Sheffield. They had four sons, one of whom died as a baby.
Richard became a provisions dealer and seems to have been quite successful, having several shops in Sheffield. However, something went wrong and the couple parted.
Richard, by then in his mid forties, with three sons in their late teens or early twenties, set up home with another lady and had three daughters with her.
When this other lady died, leaving the daughters aged 7, 5 and 3 years old, Richard returned to Rebecca his wife and it seems Rebecca brought these daughters up until she herself died about 7 years later!
Richard and Rebecca were buried together in the graveyard at Masborough near Rotherham.
She must have been a very forgiving woman!
History Repeating Itself……..
Meanwhile, around the same time as Richard was setting up home with his new lover, one of Richard and Rebecca’s sons, William George Bingham had married Emily Smithson in 1891.
Whilst working in one of the family’s provisions shops, William’s step cousin came to work as a shop assistant.
One day, William said he was going to Lincoln to stay with friends, leaving wife Emily at home.
However, he didn’t go to Lincoln, he went with his step cousin, the shop assistant, and travelled to America. They had been having a secret affair. William and his lover moved to Canada where they had a baby together called Margaret Adelaide, known as Rita, in 1899.
Back in Sheffield, William’s deserted wife Emily filed for divorce. The divorce was granted under adultery and desertion in 1903.
William and his step cousin and baby had returned to England in about 1902 and set up home in Rotherham where they married in 1904 after William’s divorce was finalised.
The following year in February 1905 William’s new wife, his step cousin, died, leaving him a widower with 5 and a half year old daughter Rita without a mother.
History then repeated itself.
William got back together with his first wife, the one who divorced him for adultery and desertion.
Just ten months after the death of his second wife William remarried his first wife Emily at the Register Office in Rotherham on 16th Dec 1905.
William’s original wife Emily then brought up William’s daughter Margaret Adelaide “Rita”.
Tragically “Rita” died aged 19 on 22nd March 1919 whilst a student at the Academy for Dramatic Art in London. She died of cerebral haemorrhage induced probably by influenza.
There were no other children.
William at this point was a successful businessman with several provisions shops in Rotherham and Sheffield. It seems it was a family business and an uncle, his father and brother had all at times been involved.
(I’ve attached an advert for R. Bingham and Sons from 1929. The company ran for many years after William’s death)
Despite the previous scandal of his divorce, William was a well thought of and respected member of the community. He was active in many societies and sports and served on the council in Rotherham.
William was a keen fisherman and President of the local Rotherham Piscatorial Society. William was also an ardent chess player and first President of the Rotherham Chess Club. He donated cups “Bingham Cup” for success in both fields. Also a founder of the Rotherham Golfer’s Club. William was also an ex-chairman of the old Rotherham Football Club. The Sheffield Daily Telegraph dated 25 January 1926 ran an article stating that “Rotherham Sporting Circles have suffered a severe loss through the death of Alderman W G Bingham JP”
William and his wife Emily were made Mayor and Mayoress of Rotherham just a few months after the tragic death of “Rita” in 1919. William later became Deputy Mayor and also a magistrate, Justice of the Peace.
In his obituary he was described as of a quiet and retiring disposition.
William later became an Alderman, a position bestowed upon him by fellow councillors. In 1926 William Bingham died. His funeral was reported in The Sheffield Independent dated 28 January 1926, the headline being “FLAGS HALF MAST, ROTHERHAM TRIBUTES TO DEAD ALDERMAN”. The report stated that flags were at half mast on all Rotherham public and other buildings and blinds were drawn. The route from Linden House, Moorgate (William’s home) and the Parish Church, Rotherham were lined with sympathetic spectators to the funeral of the late Alderman W G Bingham, ex Mayor of Rotherham. There was a large congregation of mourners in the church and after the service the body was taken to Sheffield and cremated, his ashes buried at City Road Cemetery in Sheffield. His obituary talked of the high regard and esteem in which he was regarded by colleagues and friends and the public.
William’s wife Emily Bingham deserves mention here. This is the woman who had been cheated on and abandoned, but who had returned to William after the divorce, remarried him and even brought up William’s daughter by another woman. How many other women would have had such strength of character?
Emily died in 1950. She never had any children of her own.
In her will she left money to (amongst others), the three half sisters of her husband (the ones his father had had with the woman he lived with after leaving his wife Rebecca).
What a tangled web!!
Both Rebecca and her daughter in law Emily had the humiliation of their husbands leaving them. They then chose to go back to their errant partners and bring up the children of the “other women”. Forgiving and selfless? Or was it a case of reclaiming what was rightfully theirs? Both husbands were successful businessmen and perhaps this was a deciding factor, the promise of financially stability in a world where women were often financially disadvantaged by separation and divorce.
