Author: Blanchard, Anne
Biography:
BLANCHARD, Anne, later VASEY (1795-1876: ancestry.co.uk)
She was probably the daughter of Thomas James Blanchard and his wife Susanna Gale who had married on 3 Nov. 1794 in Chippenham, Wiltshire. They were witnesses at her marriage in 1825. Although there is no record of her baptism, her death report and 1851 Census entry indicate that she was born in 1795 or 1796. Nothing is known of her education but when she underwent bankruptcy proceedings in November 1824 she was listed as a schoolmistress and authoress of Midnight Reflections. Since her publisher, John Arliss, was co-petitioner, her financial difficulties probably resulted from publication and not from any school she may have been involved in. The first edition was modestly subscribed with about 150 names, mostly from Chippenham, London, Margate, and Ramsgate; the second edition added only 25 names and may have run into trouble. After her marriage she reissued it--possibly made up of unsold copies--under her married name. She also compiled a schoolbook, The Natural Historian (1828). She married George Vasey, a London engraver and sometime schoolmaster, at Chippenham on 31 Dec. 1825. They subsequently lived in London where two children were baptised at St. Pancras in 1832 and 1833. No earlier issue have been found which, although unusual, is supported by the 1841 Census listing which records them at Hamilton Place, St. Pancras, living with their only son, George Wickliffe Vasey. In 1851 she is recorded as living with him at Pickwick Road, Corsham, Wiltshire, with her age given as 55 and occupation, schoolmistress. By 1871 she appears to have moved back to Chippenham and was recorded as a lodger and seamstress. By then her son had married, had three children, and was living at Wanborough (about 25 miles away). She must have returned to London at some point thereafter. She died, aged 81, on 22 Nov. 1876 at Blue Anchor Lane, Bermondsey. The whereabouts of her husband and her relationship to him in the period from 1851 until her death are unknown. (ancestry.co.uk 8 Aug. 2022; findmypast.co.uk 8 Aug. 2022; London Gazette 16 and 26 Oct. 1824; Swindon Advertiser 2 Dec. 1876) AA
Other Names:
- Mrs. G. Vasey