This "news in brief" paragraph appeared in the North Wales Chronicle of Tuesday, 19 January 1847:
RUTHIN.-- A pensioner, named Thomas Davies, met his death last week, under the following circumstances. It appeared that he had been at Ruthin, to receive his pension, and afterwards proceeded to Efnuchtyd [sic -- recte Efenechtyd] to see a relative, and started from thence for Clawdd Newydd. By some mischance he missed his way, and was found next day quite dead in a ditch.
How would the average reader of the newspaper have been likely to understand that prominent reference, right at the start of the piece, to the man being
a pensioner?
The question has arisen in a thread on one of the Welsh boards --
here (from Reply 36 halfway down the page), in case anyone wishes to see more details. It seems fairly likely that the report related to the Thomas Davies, 67 year old miller-turned-labourer, who has been our main focus of interest in the thread -- the details in his death certificate appear to match well (date, inquest, death by exposure, etc.).
My rough guess was that the chances were about 70% in favour of the writer of the piece having meant "out-pensioner of Chelsea or Greenwich Hospital". But it would be helpful to have the benefit of the wisdom of a broader circle on the point. Can anyone come up with a likely alternative explanation?
Back in the 1840s they were seventy years before the launch of anything approaching a general state-sponsored retirement pension; and Davies seems unlikely to have been "grand" enough to benefit from one of those fairly rare state pensions granted as a matter of royal favour or government discretion. But were there bodies such as the Post Office that already supported superannuation schemes for the generality of their employees -- with a local payment network of the type apparently implied by the news item? I suspect not; but I would be very interested to learn to the contrary.
As discussed in the thread, the soldiers' attestation and discharge indexes to WO 97 have suggested some possible candidates; but they offer nothing conclusive. It seems that the only sure way of discovering whether the Chelsea/Greenwich theory is correct would be to go to TNA and look at the pension payment returns for Jan/Feb 1847 in WO 22/116 (possibly WO 22/19). But first it would be a great advance to have some consensus that Davies's name really is likely to be there.
(Then may come the equally challenging question of finding some kind person within range of Kew who might be able to use an upcoming visit to check whether the documents actually include a page worth photocopying
-- offers gratefully received, but that is a quite separate matter.)
Rol
