Author: Wyke, Anne
Biography:
WYKE, Anne, later BAYLISS (1796-1876: ancestry.co.uk)
She was baptised on 8 Nov. 1796 at St. Leonard, Broseley, Shropshire, the daughter of Abraham Wyke (1770-1833), surgeon, and his second wife Elizabeth Turner (1760-1837), who had married in Lambeth, South London, in 1786. Nothing is known of her education. Shortly before her marriage she published Bertha: A Tale of the Waldenses, and Other Poems. She married the artist John Cox Bayliss on 30 Dec. 1830 at St. Mary’s, Shrewsbury, with her father and sister, Elizabeth, as witnesses. They had four children: William Wyke Bayliss (1834-1889) entered the Church; Wyke Bayliss (1835-1906) became an artist like his father; one daughter, Ellen, died young; the other, Elizabeth Anne (1832-1896), married a clergyman, Charles Norwood Oliver, in 1864. In the 1841 Census they are recorded as living at Madeley, Shropshire. They moved to London as his prospects improved as an artist and teacher, and settled at Clapham Park Terrace, where they are recorded in the 1851 and 1861 Censuses. His mother, also Ann Bayliss, lived with them and died there in 1863. With her husband’s death in 1866, she probably became dependent on the resources of her children. His estate was valued at under £800 so she would not have been poor. In the 1871 Census, she is recorded as living with her daughter Elizabeth Anne, whose husband was curate at Dunham, Nottinghamshire. By this time, her sister Elizabeth had joined the household. On his appointment as curate at St. Augustine’s, Southsea, Hampshire, in 1875, Charles Norwood Oliver moved the family there (including Anne and Elizabeth). Anne died there on 5 July 1876, aged 78 (sic) and was buried on 10 July at Milton St. James. Elizabeth died in September the following year, aged 84. Two of Anne’s siblings also wrote volumes of verse: Elizabeth Wyke, The Prophet of the Alleghany Mountains and Other Poems (Ironbridge 1847), Richard Wyke, Belisarius, and Other Poems (Shrewsbury 1844). (ancestry.co.uk 31 May 2023; findmypast.co.uk 31 May 2023; GRO death certs; Mike Fraser, Wheels of Providence: Over the Ironbridge in the Victorian Journal of John Cox Bayliss [2014]; Johnson, item 995) AA