Author: Tonge, Eliza
Biography:
TONGE, Eliza, formerly ROGERS (1767-1844: findmypast.co.uk)
Her pension application of 23 Aug. 1837 reveals that she had married Edward Tonge on 5 Apr. 1788 at St. James’s, Piccadilly, as Eliza Rogers. There are many Eliza[beth] Rogers in church registers but the best candidate is probably the Elizabeth Rogers born on 15 February 1766 and baptised on 24 Mar. at St. James’s, Piccadilly, the daughter of Weeks Rogers and his wife Elizabeth Baker who had married in 1750. It is probable there were many older children. It is possible her father died in Cow Cross Workhouse (midway between the City and Holborn) in 1773 but the circumstances and history of the family are unknown. Following her marriage in 1788, she had at least six daughters and two sons, some baptised in Westminster in the 1790s and others at Downton, Wiltshire, in the 1800s. It is not clear exactly what happened later. By 1824, she was probably in Cheltenham when her daughter, Adelaide, married. However, her pension application reveals that her husband had married a Mary Moncrieff at Stoke Damerel on 6 Oct. 1825. His "second" wife also submitted a pension application, was exposed, and was subsequently prosecuted. Both applications were refused. The exact details of the affair are unclear but it seems likely Eliza Tonge had separated from her husband. By 1834 she was listed as running a Preparatory School for Young Gentlemen at Sandford Lodge, Corpus Street, Cheltenham, (possibly assisted by her daughter, Madeline, who was later recorded as a teacher in the 1851 and 1861 Censuses); her pension application records her residence there in 1837. Her husband, a retired assistant surgeon on half-pay in the Third Royal Veterans Regiment of the Royal Marines, died at Calais, aged 75, on 2 Aug. 1837. She died on 4 Nov. 1844 at the Rectory, Stocking Pelham, Herts., the home of her daughter Zepherine who had married the Rev. John Rudge Relton in 1834. The enigmas of her probable father, her husband, and her later relationship with her daughters, clearly need more work and this may alter our assessment of her.(findmypast.co.uk 27 Oct. 2021; ancestry.co.uk 27 Oct. 2021; A New Guide to Cheltenham and its Environs [1834], 312; Cheltenham Journal 2 Dec. 1844) AA
Other Names:
- Mrs. Tonge