Morris Fuller; The man behind the Scandal Part 3
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Part 3 Hannah Fuller and Morris's schooldays
Knowing what we know now about the circumstances surrounding Morris Fuller’s father, it appears even more remarkable that the shadowy figure of Hannah Fuller maintained a stability for the family throughout many turbulent years. Was any pride in Thomas’s rise to High Constable sufficient recompense for the shame of the preceding bankruptcy let alone the ensuing disastrous insolvency and its inevitable consequences? Is it possible that the independant course she took as an educationalist (from at least 1833 and very likely earlier) meant that her income was not lost to Thomas’s creditors? To find out how she might have been able to survive, we must first look at her father, Joseph Morris and his last will and testament: Joseph Morris (1752-1826) was a well respected Butcher and businessman in Lewes, Sussex and Hannah was the 4th of the 12 children born to Joseph and Ann Shoosmith (1762-1833) They were a Dissenter family having first worshipped at the Countess of Huntingdon’s Connection Old Chapel at Cliffe, Lewis moving with the breakaway Independent Calvinist preacher Jenkin Jenkins when he took many of the congegation to start afresh at the Jireh Chapel that he had built in Lewes in 1805. He was also one of the founding trustees of the new chapel. Both Joseph’s own children and his grandchildren born to Thomas and Hannah Fuller were baptised at the Old Chapel and the new Jireh Chapel, including our very own Morris Joseph who seems to have been baptised Joseph Morris after his grandfather. Joseph made quite an elaborate will and went to great lengths to ensure comfortable provision for his widow Ann, and a described a tortuous calculation to ensure the fair distribution of his residual estate between “any child children or issue of my body”
“Now in order to equalize the portions of all my children I do direct that on the division of the residue of my personal Estate the share of my son Joseph Morris or of his issue shall be less by one thousand and two hundred pounds the share of my son Benjamin Morris or of his issue shall be less by eight hundred pounds the share of my son Ebenezer Morris or of his issue shall be less by one thousand pounds and the respective shares of my daughters Elizabeth Verrall Sarah Martin Mary Hooper & Martha Hooper and Hannah Fuller or of their respective issue shall be less by five hundred pounds each than the shares of my other children And I declare that if at the time of my decease any of my children or any of my sons in law shall be indebted to me in or any sum or sums of money for which I shall have any security or securities in reciting from him her or them respectively it shall be lawful for my Executors and Administrators for the time being to deduct from the legacy or share or respective legacies or shares to which any such debtor or debtors or the wives or issue of any such debtor or debtors will be intitled under this my will all such sum or sums of money as shall be so due to me from such debtor or debtors provided always” Without knowing the value of the Estate, it is not possible to calculate just what Hannah’s inheritance would have been. Given the sums of money illustrated it is probably safe to assume that Hannah was entitled to a not insignificant bequest. There is however no evidence that Thomas Fuller had borrowed from or owed money to Joseph on his death, but whatever everything would have become Thomas’s upon their marriage. Before the Married Women’s Property Act of 1870 any money made by a woman either through wages, investments, gifts or inheritance became the property of her husband once she was married. One exception to this would have been if a dowry or marriage settlement had been drawn up and provided by a bride's father for his daughter's financial support throughout her married life and into her widowhood. To speculate, if this was the case, had a marriage settlement put Hannah in a position to fund and manage her Establishment for Young Ladies independently of Thomas and his bankruptcy? And, does the inherited share less £500 which was common to all the daughters indicate that Joseph had settled them each equally with a dowry on their marriage to their respective partners? This needs to be further investigated, but whatever the facts she was able to keep her school going until she died. Did this stability allow Hannah to pay the cost of educating her sons? Unless a marriage settlement or other trustee document survives, the truth of the matter will never be known. Thomas as husband is always able to cite the fashionable addresses of the “Establisment” until after 1845 when she appears to have kept Thomas at a distance at least for the later years of their marriage.
Apart from the census, the earliest opportunity to verify facts regarding Morris Fuller is his attendance as a scholar at Brighton College noted in Census of1851. I had also noted, as an aside, that a Mr Fuller played cricket for Brighton College in June 1850. Batting at No 10, he was out, bowled l.b.w. for 0 in the first innings. The College had won before he had the chance to bat again. This of course of itself means nothing as there was also an Andrew Fuller who was a scholar at the College at the same time. Brighton College opened for business in January 1847 and so Morris must have been amongst the very first of the pupils enrolled. The school was a long time in the planning and started off on a modest scale in the pre-existing buildings of Lion House. Details were presented to the public in January 1846
The Illustrated London News from Oct 13 1849 has a brief acount of the College upon its taking up residence in the new buildings:
After contacting the Brighton College Archivist, Mr James Harrison, his first searches found no trace of Morris Fuller as a student in the Register. Initially, he was only able to find an Andrew Fuller, the son of a retired solicitor from Chichester. He went up to St John’s in Cambridge in 1852 the year after Morris; and like Morris was ordained as priest but was ordained a year before Morris. However, James’ persistence paid off and he found in the Register the folowing information:
NAME Morris Joseph Fuller
AGE 171/2
DATE OF ADMISSION 26 Jany. 1848
DEPARTMENT Upper
CLASS 4th.
ON WHOSE NOMINATION Mr Cornford
WHERE BOARDED At home
GUARDIAN NAME Mr. Thos. Fuller RELATION RESIDENCE 75 Montpelier Road Brighton
DATE OF REMOVAL Michmas 1851
CAUSE OF REMOVAL Queens College Cambridge University
REMARKS Scholarship awarded Oct 1851
At last, it was good to have first hand contemporary evidence of this part of Morris’s career. Up to this point, much of it came from C.V.s collated over a number of years and after the events. Immediately following Morris’ death the most comprehensive version of this period in his life appeared in the Brighton Gazette on August 1st 1901 as part of the funeral report. The information must have been suppled by the family and it would come as no surprise to know that the gist of it had been prepared in advance by Morris.
There is however one discrepancy found between this glowing account of the precocious youth and the entry in the Register at Brighton College. This is regarding the date of his admission to the College which clearly says 26th Jan 1848 and not January1847 when the School first opened and which is implied in the press cutting. At this point, more importantly, was the fact that Morris’s father’s name had been crossed through and a Mr Cornford was given as the nominator of this student. As a bankrupt, Thomas probably no longer had the wherewithall to be a proprietor (shareholder) of the College, and with it the right to nominate or present a pupil. It was fortunate that Mr. Edward Cornford Esq., solicitor of Dorset Gardens, was able to fulfil this important role. This was the first time that I was able to connect this name with Morris, even though it was quite in evidence in hindsight! So, who was he and what was his role in Morris’s sojurn at Brighton College. The answer came again from the Brighton Gazette which published several notices in 1846 as we have seen above, leading up to the opening of the College the following year where he is seen to hold the office of Hon. Secretary of Brighton College
Whether or not it is right to hypothesise, it seems to be in Morris’s character to hold steadfastly to a belief regardless of what other’s may find to be not strictly accurate. With this thought in mind, I was most intrigued to find in the Brighton Gazette for a few brief weeks between August and November 1847 a flurry of poetry and charades (riddles) penned by A YOUNG COLLEGIAN In late October he produced a long poem by which time he had become The Young Collegian!
Arthur J. Macleane was a keen supporter of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. Morris in due course became similarly active. One of the Society's concerns was in counteracting the influence of Dissenters in the far flung parts of the globe that were opened up in the course of the 18th and 19th Centuries.
It must be left to two final press clippings to show the end of the journalistic career of this particular young man:
As yet I have been unable to find any strong links between Thomas Fuller and Edward Cornford, with the exception that they were both Committee Members of the Brighton Conservative Association in 1840. Cornford had not been solicitor to the Fullers' Fiat in Bankruptcy in the 1830’s, that role was carried out by the firm of Kell and Son, another Conservative Association contact. There must nevertheless have been circumstances that led to him presenting Morris to the College at the start of its 2nd year. To speculate further, it is not without the bounds of possibility that he might have acted for Joeph Morris in the matter of a marriage settlement for Hannah Fuller, or perhaps he just saw Morris’s potential in need of encouragement given the family circumstances. Nevertheless £75 for 3 years' fees still had to be found to keep him at the College until he reached Cambridge. When the College opened in1847 ”Occasional Scholars” were able to attend lectures, such as those advertised in the press, given by Classical Master, George Long. Was Morris “networking” in being a regular attendee at these lectures,was it him trying to ingratiate himself in press and trying to show he was worthy of being in fact, of Brighton College. Whatever the case, Brighton College was his route to the future clergyman we know as the Reverend Morris Fuller. Still eluding my researches is finding at what point the influence of the Oxford Movement took over from the Calvinistic Methodism of the previous generation. I may find more in his own writings…… but there are very many of those and whatever he may have thought of his literary style, I find it very hard going!
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Without the British Newspaper Archive much of this research would have been difficult, if not impossible. It is also thanks to the kindness, persistence and enthusiam of James Harrison, Archivist at Brighton College, that we have found our man in his formative years.
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