Almost billable: or, who played the small parts?

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During my recent, inhabitual wanderings in the pre-Victorian musical theatre world, I bumped into all sorts of people who tickled my curiosity. And, typically, they weren’t the stars of the period. Anyway, curiosity must be assuaged so, I dug into a few of them, yesterday and today, between visits to my favourite Yambanese spots ...

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Boden. Not a very common name. But, for thirty years, it featured in small print on many, many a London bill. Those for Covent Garden, for a good few years. And sometimes it featured multiple times (with slight variations) on the same bill: Miss Boden, Miss R Boden, Miss C Boden, Miss H Boden, Miss E Boden, Master Boden, Miss A Boden … so, who were they all these Bodens. Well, I’ve got four of them. Miss A is, I think, a typo. The title of plain Miss seems to shift among the family. And ‘Master’ was ephemeral and I’m still looking. But the four?

Well, they were the children of one Daniel Boden and his wife Maria Augusta Byard, who were married at St Pancras Church, London 2 April 1801, to wit:

Emma Elizabeth Boden  b Fullwoods Rents, Gray's Inn x 8 July 1806; d Wandsworth ?5 April 1890

Caroline Frances x Holborn 25 December 1807; 

Rosa Augusta Boden b Russell Square 4 March 1809; d 21 Glycenia Rd, Battersea 23 January 1888

Harriet Isabella b William Street Lambeth 12 September 1810; d Wandsworth 1886 

There’s a puzzle to start with. Why did they wait five years before starting to have annual children? The usual answer to that is that father is away, earning money somewhere else … so who was Daniel Boden? Was he somehow connected with the theatre? I don’t know, but I suspect as much. There’s a singer, Mr Boden, in about in 1790, and a Mr Boden the viola player in Dublin in 1801, and, most particularly, a Mr D Boden who penned a ballad ‘Tom Larboard’, sung by Gibbon at Drury Lane, in 1806. Alas, I cannot find the family in the 1841 census, and Daniel apparently died just before the 1851 one, so that’s the best I can do.

My first sighting of ‘Miss Boden’ (certainly Emma) is 19 May 1817 at Astley’s Amphitheatre, in a ‘lyric melange’ entitled The Mutineer. She played an island maiden. However, she then moved to Covent Garden, where, in 1818, she appeared in the title-role of Tom Thumb the Great, played in the drama, Proof Presumptive, with Macready and Mrs Faucit, sang in the chorus of Rob Roy, played the child, Zamora, in the spectacle Zuma and another ('the child') in Bellamira and The Mason and his Child, Julia in Katherine and Petruchio, the Spirit of Light in Arthur and Emmeline, Cupid in Midas, the Fairy Ronou in the pantomime Monkey Island  … and was joined by her two sisters: Rosa was cast as Gustavus in The Illustrious Traveller and joined Emma in the pantomime chorus, 11 year-old Caroline was the boy, Julio, in The Devil’s Bridge, then Julia in The Soldier’s Daughter. The two little girls played the princes in the tower in Richard III.

In 1820, Master Boden joined them. He and Rosa played the stranger’s children, while Emma appeared as Count Wintersen’s child in The Stranger, and he then went on to play the Czarevitch in The Exile, Adelbert in The Warlock of the Glen and, in 1824, with Harriet, in The Hunter of the Alps and William in Presumption as well as Peter in Free and Easy. When Charles Kemble played Biron in Isabella, Master B was his little son. And now daughter four has arrived to top up the Boden quotient.

Master B's big moment

Emma was still the most to the fore … taking part in Juno and Ceres, Twelfth Night, Cherry and Fairstar, as Prince Arthur in King John, but come The Forty Thieves, where she played the Fairy of the Grotto, Rosa was Gossamer, and Harriet was Sylph …

In 1823 I see Caroline has taken over Prince Henry, Harriet is Agib in Timour the Tartar, Rosa has a duet in William Tell, Emma is Hero in Much Ado and the maid in School for Scandal and in Love in a Village, Plumante in Tom Thumb … and one of them plays Miss Paton’s page in Native Land and something in Mirandola ... and various other pieces.

Master and Harriet played the Babes in the Drury Lane Babes in the Wood in 1824, but Emma was now coming to adult roles. She featured as Selima in Tarare and a Bridesmaid in Der Freischütz at the English Opera House, Nanny in A Man of the World ... and then settled at the Adelphi, where she debuted as a leading lady as Elvina (with bravura aria) in Valmondi, or the Unhallowed Sepulchre (11 October 1824) and continued as Cecilia Crofts in Killigrew, Cecilia in The Pilot, Donna Leonora in a burlesque Don Giovanni, Lilla in The Anaconda, Julia in The Life of an Actor, Clara in Luke the Labourer, Lestelle Vanheim in The Flying Dutchman, Elizabeth in Presumption, Dinah Friendly in The Bashful Man, Miss Aubrey in The Stout Gentleman, Mary in Jonathan in England ... with seasonal visits to the Lyceum, where she played Cecchina in The Freebooters, Balisa in The Oracle (‘Hast ne’er marked the flower’), Effie in The Vampire, Caroline Heartly in The Boarding House, Emily in Gretna Green, Rosabel in Sharp and Flat, Mary Hardacre in Amateurs and Actors, Sophia in Lying Made Easy, Mary in The Turnpike Gate, Laura in Lock and Key, Charlotte in How to Die for Love, Miss Fanny in Before Breakfast … and, between times, stood in for Miss Foote and .. Mr Denham on occasion!

In 1827 (19 November), Emma married coachbuilder Samuel Holman, and it was Caroline’s turn in the limelight. She became leading lady at the Coburg (Hut of the Red Mountain, One Hundred and Two, Vespina in Clari, The Outlaw’s Oath, The Launch of the Good Ship William). But now, briefly, things get a little muddly. Did Emma carry on after her marriage? Is it she as Julie in Military Tactics, as Claudine in The Hunter of the Alps, Alison in The Beggar of Cripplegate, and at the Surrey in The Broken Sword …

I see, by the way, that a witty commentary says of Emma: 'though [there is] something of a boarding school third form about her, is rather clever young lady' with a nice comment on her singing ..'  'she plays the smelling-bottle heroines at the Adelphi' ..

Emma and Samuel had a large brood of children. They can be seen in the 1851 census in Paulton Square, Chelsea with nine of them ... In 1881, widowed, she is living at Athol House, Battersea, with her youngest daughter and family ...

In 1833 (10 February), Caroline, in her turn, was married. Her husband was one George Courtenay Matthews (1809-1843), a banker's clerk, who sadly only lasted a decade or so. They had a son, George Guston Matthews 4 December 1834. Then a posthumous daughter Fanny Caroline (20 March 1844). In the 1851 census, she is a widow, dressmaker, with her two remaining children, and a new ?husband: Mr Thomas Shepperd, fishmonger … In 1871 they are seemingly in Islington with four children .. Caroline is admitting to 48. She was 64. Is this really she/they?

Two Bodens, two Tetts, Mrs Allcroft et al

Rosa and Harriet did carry on, however. And on and on. They became frontline features of the chorus at Drury Lane. When Malibran sang Sonnambula they were ‘villagers’ along with Mrs Allcroft, the Tett brothers, and dancers Miss Thomassin, Lidia and Ryals ... Occasionally, one of them got to step out in a small part – I see Rosa as Marcella in The Bottle Imp and Harriet as Martha in Rob Roy …

When Jullien staged his 1847 season at Drury Lane, they were still there in the ensemble: Harriet in the first soprani and Rosa among the seconds.

I don’t know how long they stayed. They're still there in the 'fifties. They remained, unmarried, with mother, at their home at 3 Store Street, until she died in March 1871, at the age of 92. Harriet died in 1886, Rosa [Augusta] 23 January 1888 … Emma in 1890 (5 April), and Caroline Fanny Matthews-Shepperd and her children ..? I lose her. And I wonder what became of 'Master'.

MRS ALLCROFT [née BUTLIN, Ann] (b ?Willesden 7 April 1805; d Pancras April 1869)

Mrs Allcroft was another almost-principal: a long-time chorus member who was allotted many a small role in big productions at the major theatres.

She was born Ann Butlin, apparently the daughter of 'James Butlin, surgeon, of New Road, Marylebone' (whom I later spot in the bankruptcy court and practising at Holborn) and his wife, Elizabeth, which, I guess, makes her the child of that name born in Willesden in 1805. Although I see her making a 'first appearance' in concert at Hastings in 1828 'with great success', and subsequently billed as 'of the Theatre Royal Norwich', she seems to have gone on the stage, in London at least, at the Tottenham Street Theatre, where I spot her, in November 1829, 'Pupil of Mr A Lee'), playing alongside Mrs Waylett and Vining in A Bold Stroke for a Wife ('sang the songs allotted to her in a very pleasing manner'), Rosa in John of Paris, and singing 'Rest thee, Babe' as Mrs Leporello in The Field of Forty Footsteps. She appeared as Rosa in a version of John of Paris, Lady Charlotte in High Life Below Stairs, Wowski in a ripoff of Inkle and Yarico, Susan in A Fish out of Water, in A Woman and the Devil, as Mattie in Rob Roy et al. However, she did not continue in this way. She instead crossed to Drury Lane, where she contented herself with being a Bridesmaid in Der Freischütz ('Miss Butline') and Marcellina in The Marriage of Figaro, Edda in The Ice Witch, and supplying the concerted music with such as Miss Byfeld, Miss S Phillips, Yarnold and Honner for The Emissary. She played a season at the Italian opera, where she was given the role of Thisbe in La Cenerentola, but soon returned to Drury Lane.

In 1832, Ann married Henry Francis Allcroft (b 26 October 1809; d 21 August 1835), also from the ranks of the chorus, and bore him a son, William Robert (1833-1908), before his death, at the age of 25. Henceforth, she was billed as Mrs Allcroft. She would remarry, in 1839 (9 May), George Brannan (1813-1871), heraldic painter, and bear him three daughters. She continued, however, to work as 'Mrs Allcroft'. 

As Mrs Allcroft, I see her as Iniz in Masaniello, Thisbe to the Clorinda of Sally Forde, the gipsy girl in Guy Mannering and Annette in La Sonnambula at Drury Lane, as Miss Schemer in The MP for the Rotten Borough, Gianetta in The Love Spell, the Miller's Wife in Blanche of Jersey and Elizabeth in Presumption at the English Opera House, as well as leading the chorus in such pieces as Catherine Grey, The Gipsy's Warning, The Maid of Artois, The Siege of Rochelle, Rob o' the Fen  ...  The credits would often read: 'Maids: Mrs Allcroft, Miss Boden, Miss R Boden etc'

She took part in the 1834 Westminster Abbey Music Festival, in 1840 she is at the Olympic, acting alongside Mrs Glover, and I see her, as late as 1848, singing Clotilde in Norma, at Covent Garden.

The name of Allcroft became prominent in the London music and theatre world through Ann's brother-in-law, Frederick William Allcroft (1811-1858), who produced large concerts and theatre seasons, and who is a whole other story.

I didn't succeed nearly as well in my chase after the lady known as Mrs East. In fact, I've plumb failed to find out who she was, where she came from, and what became of her. She arrives on the playbills of the Theatre Royal in the chorus of the first British Masaniello (4 May 1829) and she remains a presence in the West End for twenty years, creeping frequently out of the small print into the lower reaches of the principal cast list .. without dropping a hint as to her identity.

At the time she pops up, there is in the chorus a Mr East. So, I assumed that this Mr East had married a fellow chorine, and ... I looked. I chased all the slightly featured singing ladies of the period, and drew a blank. Misses Gould, Purton, A Tree, Nicol, Russell, Anderson, Allen, Somerville, Webster, Jackson et al were all in the Masaniello cast. So, she wasn't one of those. I checked all the Mr Easts who wed round about that time. How to tell? So, for the moment, failure, on that count.

Mrs East was quickly up to a named role. She was Sacha in A Bold Stroke for a Wife, Luminaria, the Spirit of Light, in the pantomime Jack in the Box, a Bridesmaid in Der Freischütz (Mr in the chorus), Maid in The School for Scandal, Hebe in Midas, Jenny Diver in The Beggar's Opera (Mr got to play Robin o'Bagshot), Clotilda in Leipsic Fair, a 'very tolerable' Abigail in A New Way to Pay Old Debts, Janette in The Adopted Child, Betty in The Hypocrite, Urfred in The Ice Witch, a maid in Lionel and Clarissa and in Love in a Village, Jessy in The Falls of Clyde, Mary in The Nervous Man, Iniz, now, in Masaniello for many, many performances, Martha in Rob Roy, A Gypsy in One o'clock, Julia in Teddy the Tiler, First Peasant in The Magic Car  ... When Don Giovanni was staged, the two of them were in the chorus, but when The Marriage of Figaro went on, Mrs got to play Marcellina.

And so it continued, with time at Covent Garden, the Adelphi and the English Opera House, and the more than occasional role, such as 'a milliner' in My Wife?, 'a vestal' in Brutus, Urgana in King Arthur, Betty in The Hypocrite, Mrs Jervis in A Quarter to Nine, Thisbe, alongside Abby Betts, in Cinderella, Arwedson in Gustavus, Ursula in The Black Domino, Cynthia in The Siege of Rochelle, and, when the original Lady of Lyons was produced, she created the little part of Janet, the innkeeper's daughter. She was Lelia in Amilie, Tyb in the pantomime Gammer Gurton and Dame Cicely in Valentine and Orson, played Curiosa in The Cabinet, Barbarina now in The Marriage of Figaro ... after a decade of mostly walk-ons, progress was coming, amidt a welter of variegated appearances in comedy, opera, pantomime...

In 1839, she took a break from Covent Garden, and visited Edinburgh, where Mr and Mrs Wood were starring. She got to play Lucy Bertram, Lisa in La Sonnambula, Rosalie in The Climbing Boy and, when Mrs Wood had a night off, she sang the role of Elvira in Masaniello. Progress, indeed.

She returned to Covent Garden, but in 1840 she departed for the Theatre Royal, Bath, where Adeline Cooper was first singing lady. But she got to sing Lady Allcash, Ännchen in Der Freischütz ('a sprightly, clever actress, possessing a good voice, evincing considerable skill in its management, and is a very useful member of the operatic corps ... warmly applauded'), and in The Freebooters. But this time, she did not return to Covent Garden. 

I'm not quite sure where she did go. Maybe Wales. Is it she at Cardiff in 1843, and singing Diana Vernon at Swansea? Anyway, Mr East seems to have been gone for some years .. so, where is she in the 1841 census? And after.
Well, maybe I have the answer, and maybe not. In 1844, in Calcutta, an actress named Mrs East was burned to death when her dress caught fire ... but she was 'long resident in Calcutta' ...

That's the best I can do. But I will keep trying.

And one more.

If the Bodens were ubiquitous on pre-Victorian playbills, what to say of the Tetts? Oh, you won't spot them  very often. Not without a magnifying glass, anyway. I don't think they ever emerged from the ranks of the also-sangs. But they sang, oh did they sing! For nearly half a century, the musical-theatre bills of the patent houses almost always featured one, two, or, often, three Mr Tetts among its cavaliers, peasants, villagers, servants et al. That is, when the theatres bothered to list the principal choristers. They became somewhat of a West End feature, and when the last of them died, he was given a little obituary in the theatre press.  So, who were they? Well, I calculate that there were five of them. From two, and maybe three, generations.

One Mr Tett. Assuredly Joseph.

Benjamin Tett (d 4 February 1807) at his death, was described in the press as 'the oldest chorister' at Drury Lane. Highfill and co, in their mammoth work on 18th century London theatre, say that he may have been a brother of the Joseph who follows, but I'm not sure. If he really were the 'oldest' chorus singer ... he may have been even from one generation further back ... but I imagine he was, somehow, connected with the Tett family of Hinton St George, Somerset, which produced

Joseph Tett (b Hinton St George, x 19 September 1761; d London April 1828). Like Benjamin, Joseph belonged to an era in which usually didn't credit choristers on the bills, but Highfill gives a list of 1790s shows in which they appeared. I am assuming (as they do) that any 'Mr Tett' on a Covent Garden programme in the 1800s ('a lad' in Love in a Village etc) is Joseph. And when three of his sons join him, he is 'Mr' and they are Messrs C, S and W.

1807 and two Misters Tett ... Joseph and who?

Now, Joseph and his sons, had long careers on the stage, and apparently took part in the Oratorios, the Ancient Concert and other like performances, but it was not their whole career. Each of them had a 'day job'. Three of them, the same one. They were involved in the paper-staining trade, and later expanded into painting and paperhanging. They must have stained and hung well, for Joseph left a comprehensive will, which is housed in the British National Archives, and from which we know that his second wife, Elizabeth (née Tuesley, m 1808), the three singing sons, and one daughter [Jane] Louisa (Mrs William Wood) were his whole surviving family. The music, it seems, unlike the Bodens, flourished in the male side of the family. His first wife, and the mother of his children, was Ann (née Tyrrell) (d 28 July 1798).

1814: Mr and Mr S: 'a priest'

Charles Tett (b Soho 29 November 1790; d Kensington 28 July 1864) was the brother who got noticed in The Era. Paper-stainer, paperhanger, painter, and latterly a corn-dealer from 38 Dean Street, he was also the most often seen on theatre bills, often, indeed usually, in the company of brother Sam. He also became secretary to the Choral Fund.

1833: Mr C and Mr S

Samuel Tett (b Soho c 1788; d 1861) latterly called himself a 'house decorator' while continuing a parallel theatrical career to that of his brother. He too became involved with the New Musical Fund as a committee-man and a steward. He christened one of his childen Joseph Haydn Tett (1824-1841). His first wife (30 May 1816), soprano Mary Russell, was a member of the ladies' semi-chorus at the Ancient Concert and sang in the Birmingham Festival of 1817. She died soon after (1818) and he remarried Sarah Mitchell (1 September 1823) by whom he fathered several children. Mr S Tett and Mr Tett are in the choir for the 1820 Norwich Festival, Messrs S and C are among the 'professional amateurs' at Worcester in 1842, and, in 1831, I actually spot Sam listed for a named role in Covent Garden's The Miller and His Men. In 1833, the two are singing in The Tempest, Artaxerxes and Macbeth at the Adelphi.

1838: Mr C and Mr S.

William Tett (b Soho 1796; d Hanway Street, August 1847) was much less frequently seen on the boards. He had a business as a plumassier and artificial-flower maker in Hanway Street, Oxford Street, a wife Julia née Luffman, and that's all I know. I see him, with his brothers, in the chorus at the English Opera House (The Freebooters) and later at Covent Garden.

Two Tetts and Mrs Allcroft

Addendum:  I had cause to revisit this wee piece some years down the line, and got tempted into a little further investigation. Aother longtime chorine was Mrs MAPLESON so ... and she fell into place effortlessly.

Mrs M was born Elizabeth RUMMENS. I suspect she may have been related to the Mr [John Frederick] Rummens (the name is not common!) who ran a dancing academy with his brother-in-law Mr Weippert in Gower Street. Who seems to be the Frederick Rummens who had a toyshop in Leicester Square ... Anyway, we are told that she was born 17 November 1806.

Miss Rummens appears on the Drury Lane bills at pantomime time 1828 but I don't see much of her until she marries musician James Henry Mapleson in 1830. She appears in 1831 and 1832 in Henry Bishop's concerts alongside such as the Misses Inverarity, Pearson, Hughes, Anna soon to be Bishop, Harriet Cawse, Mrs Wood ...  she appears as a soloist at Vauxhall Gardens .. but she soon became a fixture as a chorus leader in the major houses, with the occasional solo opportunity. In 1838, I see her as third lady in The Magic Flute, teamed with Miss Forde and Fanny Healy. In 1843, she led the shorus at the Birmingham Festival, when La Donna del lago was performed. In 1847, she led the chorus at Windsor ...

In the 1861 census, at 46 Leicester Square, where her husband describes himself as 'music copyist', she declares herself, still, 'vocalist', as does daughter Elizabeth. Son Alfred is also a copyist, sons Charles and Victor have no profession.  Father Mapleson died 4 October 1869, leaving a mere £300. Elizabeth died at 17 Oakley Square, 7 December 1880.

Oh, there was another Mapleson son, of course. The one who was to make the name an operatic byword. 'Colonel' James Henry. He was born 4 May 1830. Do those numbers add up ...

The Mapleson tomb: 

OK. Another? The name of Mr Tolkien appears regularly, between 1827 and 1832, in the chorus at Drury Lane ('a choral sprite', 'a humming bee', Bacchus in Midas &c). George William TOLKIEN (b Islington 31 October 1805; d 34 Spring Road, Birmingham 1877) was the son of another George (musician) and his wife, [Eliza] Lydia née Murrell. He married Miss Marianne Hall in 1827 (27 October). Whether she was a chorister as well, I have not discovered. Anyway, they would have half a dozen children, George gave up chorussing and became a music teacher at first in London, and then in Edgbaston where he saw out his days.

I tried to track down Miss VAL[L]ANCY ('of the Royal Circus, of the Adelphi, and a long time Columbine and dancer at Drury Lane') between 1812 and 1827, but I drew a blank. After her appearance as Venus in Midas (1827) I lose her. 

However, in that same Midas, another Lane faithful 'Mrs BEDFORD' played Juno. Her husband was Jupiter .. and I clicked. Its THE Bedfords! The to-be-great Paul Bedford and his new little wife 'Miss Lucy Greene of the Bath Theatre and the Theatre Royal, Dublin' (m 16 October 1821). Also, if I read aright, of Covent Garden (Polly in Beggar's Opera, Rosetta in Love in a Village, Adriana in A Comedy of Errors, Diana Vernon in Guy Mannering, Isabella Wardour in The Antiquary, Florence St Leon in Henri Quatre, Olivia in Twelfth Night), the Birmingham Theatre, Winchester, Southampton, the Rotunda Dublin, a leading lady ('Bid me discourse'), a 'pupil of Bishop', 'not a pupil of T Welsh', a support soloist on a Catalani tour of 1823-4 ('remarkably sweet and pleasing'), and the subject of rather a lot of 'indispositions', which seem to have hampered her time at the Garden.

It was 2 November 1824 that the couple made their first appearance at Drury Lane, as Hawthorn and Rosetta in Love in a Village. Lucy quickly to find her place: as juvenile singing lady in the old English repertoire which served largely as a support programme. In particular Rosetta (or occasionally Lucinda) in Love in A Village, or Sophia in The Lord of the Manor. Constantia in The Cabinet, Margaretta in No Song, No Supper.  She was allotted Celia (with songs) in As You Like It, the shrunken Countess Almaviva in The Marriage of Figaro, the equally shrunken Rose/Ännchen in Der Freischütz and supported Elizabeth Feron in the not very auspicious Isidore de Merida ('My true love lies sleeping'). She and her husband visited Liverpool and other provincial houses (Elvira in Masaniello) between times, and her old teacher included her in the lists for his Lenten concerts up to 1832 ... but when the aspectacular The Emissary was mounted, Mrs Bedford joined the other second string ladies -- Miss Butline, Miss Byefld, Miss Bruce, Miss Phillips, the Misses Absolon et al -- to perform the choral part. 

Lucy's career had somewhat withered away since the days of its early promise. Was it the continued ill-health? She died the following year at the age of 32 (29 March 1833).

Now they get more difficult. Miss Smith and Miss Jones time. But I have tried.

Miss ABSOLON and Miss E[mma] ABSOLON? Daughters of Mr John ABSOLON? Teensy bit of guesswork here, but ... 

Miss Absolon (sic) comes into view in 1829 when she deps for Mrs Waylett at the Tottenham Street Theatre, and her name is attached as a 'sung by' to a song 'The Bonnie Braes o' Hielan' Heather' principally sung by Emma Love. In the same ad is mentioned Mr A Lee. [George] Alexander Lee, musical director of the Tottenham Street Theatre. In 1830, Mr Lee made a bid for the lease of Drury Lane, in partnership with ... Mr John Absolon, tailor, of 9 Bridges St, Westminster. This Mr Absolon's two eldest daughters, Elizabeth Amelia (b 2 September 1805; d 15 St Augustine Rd Camden, 23 October 1867) and Emma Elizabeth (b 5 March 1808 or 22 November 1811) ...  I think it's fair to say these are our two singing Absolons, at Drury Lane in the early 1830s? They moved, in 1832 to the Queen's Theatre where they played larger roles, but after 1833 I see them no more.

However, we do see papa. In the headlines. In 1836 he was operating from 12 New Bond Street, as a military clothier. On 26 March the building went up in flames, destroying over 20 surrounding buildings. 

The County Fire Office promptly accused Absolon of having torched his premises, for the insurance. He fought them, and it seems he finally won, but the affair left him bankrupt. He resituated to Jermyn Street but the palmy days were over. Elizabeth stayed single and died in 1867. Emma appears to have married. 

The girls' brother, John (1815-1895) became a successful artist and illustrator. The family historians have made a right muddle of the Absolons, and since they can't agree, who am I to adjudicate.

Looking for a few more not-Smith-nor-Joneses, I came upon a Miss Marsano. Can't be many of those, I thought. And there weren't. But there were two. Daughters of one Giovanni-John Marsano, an Italian importer of everything (it seems) from tuberoses to vermicelli to capers and macaroni, to oil (olive, I presume?) and his wife Elizabeth Georgiana née Spencer. They had a bunch of sons, and their daughters were Rosa (b 1811) and Angela Elizabeth (b 1821). Since a Miss Marsano is dancing at Vauxhall in 1826, I plumped for Rosa, but ... around 1833 a Miss is at Covent Garden, at 1836 at Drury Lane, then at the Haymarket. From where she got sacked. And little Miss M took the Haymarket to court, where it was revealed that her first name was ... Angela! So I suppose it is Angela at the St James's in 1839, damncing in the corps at Drury Lane in 1847, and is she the Miss T Marsano 'of Drury Lane and Covent Garden' who is promoting a ball at the Portland Rooms in 1850 ...  so, why does Angela describe herself as 'dressmaker' in the 1841 census ... day job? And where is Rosa? Between these year, and her death in Holborn in 1883.

Angela married twice (John Sparks Dalton, Henry Ely), had half-a-dozen children, and lived into the twentieth century (d Heathfield Rd, Croydon 26 March 1901).

I have plucked a few more names from the bills above. 

The Mr HATTON who is listed is the subsequently well-known musician John Liptrot HATTON (b Liverpool, 12 October 1809 d Margate, 20 September 1886) at this stage chorus master (3 guineas a week) at Drury Lane. Hatton had a well-cultivated, but small, singing voice, and on occasion he appeared on stage (Kuno is Der Freischütz, Hecate in an emergency, an Officer in The Maid of Artois). Mr Hatton thought he was worth more money, the management declined to double his salary, and Hatton appeared no more at the Theatre Royal. However, his friendship with the bass Staudigl got his opera Pascal Bruno produced in Vienna and raised his profile somewhat. In the 1860s he was to be seen at Margate's Hall-by-the-Sea, and touring as pianist with Parepa for Bateman.

Mr S JONES said he was from Antrim. His family historians say he was from Shropshire. Over the years, he called himself variously Robert Sinclair Jones, or Robert St Clair[e] Jones or Sinclair Robert Jones. He appears to have been born in 1804, 'father Robert Jones, surgeon', but his statistics are a bit muddly. He is recorded as twice married, but his first three children were born before the first of those marriages. Allegedy to Emma Bond who would have been rather teenaged. In 1841 they were living in Theobalds Road. He married her in 1844 (14 October), by which stage they were esconced in Red Lion Street and he was 'professor of music' ...

Collecting up his multiple appearances on stage is not easy, but I see him at Drury Lane in 1829 in the historical play The Partizans (Blanc Mesnil) and in Jack in the Box (Blueblaze). In 1831 he is Amund in Alfred the Great, in 1832 Roderiquez in My Own Lover, and Robin Hood in Ivanhoe, during Malibran's 1833 season he played Rudolph in The Students of Iena, then The Hermit in Der Freischütz, Fiorello in The Barber of Seville, in 1835 Anselmo in The Red Mask, Count de Horn in Gustavus III, Captain of the Guard in The Maid of Cashmere ... mostly one, or sometimes two or three, notches above 'villagers and sprites' level.  He can be seen at Drury Lane and between times at the English Opera House as Pietro Galvani in The Exile of Genoa, General Baillie in The Highland Cateran, Captain Shortcut in The Spitfire, Alidoro in Cinderella, Sempronius in Caractacus, Don Pedro (Commendatore) in Don Juan, Second Priest (Frazer was the other) in The Magic Flute, Burgomaster in The Gipsy's Warning, Faunus in Acis and Galatea, Earl de Courcy in Rob of the Fen, Marquis Posillipo in The Devil's Opera, Matteo in Fra Diavolo, The Maid of Palaiseau, Domenico in Scaramuccia, Donald Mucklethrift in The Lass o' Gowrie, Hiems in Love's Labours Lost, Merrie Devil in the pantomime, Rica in Mabel, The Doge of Venice with Vestris in The Greek Boy ...

Then comes the 1841 census. Theobalds Road, 'wife', three children ...

And on it goes: Carlino in The Students of Bonn ('sings with true Lablachian gusto'), Father Luke in The Poor Soldier, Rodolpho in Sonnambula, the Spirit of Sleep in King Arthur, the Herald in Fortunio, Erni in William Tell .. but the press took exception when he was promoted to Pompolino in Cinderella: 'with the exception of a singularly excellent voice of great depth and power, he does not possess a single requisite for the impersonation. He is most valuble as an adjunct in concerted music, small soli ... but ... And it seems that was precisely the truth.

He was another Herald in The Daughter of St Mark, Forte Bracchio in The Enchantress ... visited Sadler's Wells to sing Hecate for Phelps and Mrs Warner .. was Magog to the Gog of Horncastle in the Drury Lane panto, Rovedos in Don Quixote, Martin in The Maid of Artois, Don Henriquez in Loretta .. Weiss and Borrani were part of the company, so there was no danger of Mr Jones being overcast. But his stentorian bass voice always found a place for him: Jaloux in The Siege of Rochelle, Prince Ottokar in Matilda of Hungary and when the opera moved to the Surrey Theatre he was Corporal Grenade in The Daughter of the Regiment, when it moved to Sadler's Wells, he was there, he sang in concerts at Surrey Gardens, at the Richmond Theatre, rhe Canterbury Music Hall, with Jullien at Vauxhall, and finally returned to Drury Lane. I see him as Christmas in Harlequin Good Queen Bess, Major Galbraith in Rob Roy, the Cadi in The Cadi's Daughter .. and then comes the 1851 census. 

Mr and Mrs Jones, with now 4 sons, in Red Lion Street, and he is professing 'actor, vocalist, and author'.  It was true. Mr Jones had turned his hand to writing.

His The Bride of Golconda, or The Genius of the Ring 'a gorgeous spectacle of enchantment' was produced by Batty at Astley's 1 November 1852. 'One of those glittering hippo-dramatic spectacles on which [Astley's] lin a great measure founds it claim to public patronage'. It featured an elephant and a fox hunt. After three weeks it was shuffled off in favour of an equestrian version of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Mr Jones complained that his script had stipulated SIX elephants ...

The 1850s were not kind to the Jones family. Having already lost two infants in 1848, they saw two more perish in 1854 (19 November) along with their mother when their home in Red Lion Street was destroyed by fire. The two eldest boys -- barely in their twenties -- were said to be among the thirteen men who were lost from the dismasted East India troopship Bombay in December 1858. Whether they were crewmen or army recruits, I cannot discover. Mr Jones remarried, a much younger lady named Christiana Osborne in 1855 (4 November), had two more sons, and after a turn at Wilton's Music Hall (1859) retired from the stage ...

In 1861 he can be seen 'retired vocalist' in Southwark's 3 Elizabeth Place with his new family. He died there in early 1864. It had been a long and laudable career as something more, perhaps, than a comprimario basso.

Mr Tayleure was another long-server. John TAYLEURE (b Pontefract 26 March 1782; d 2 Adelaide Street, Strand 28 March 1861) was the son of William Tayleure, musician, and his wife, Catherine née Miller. Quite where he began his career I am not certain, for father and elder brother were both active in Yorkshire and Lancashire, but by 1811 he was installed at the Theatre Royal, Liverpool along with his wife. That wife was the former Mrs Maria or Mary Bernard, and seems to have been rather older than he when they were wed in 1802. 

At Liverpool, John played comedy (John Lump in The Wags of Windsor, Ponder in Man and Wife, Mingle in The Beehive, Somno in The Sleepwalker, Scaramouch in Don Juan), musical roles (Matt Mainmst in The English Fleet, Robin in No Song, No Supper) and the usual selection of stock company roles (L'Éclair in The Foundling of the Forest, Sam in Raising the Wind, the apothecary in Romeo and Juliet etc) but his speciality was the delivery of comic songs in and between the plays ('Tim Stitch and his Beautiful Maid', 'Tippitiwitchet', 'All Alive in Liverpool', 'No Phister sticks on a head', 'Dorothy Dump', 'The Yorkshire Dandy', 'On Scotia's Hills My Maggie Dwells'). 

He stayed a decade at Liverpool, during which time I see that he fathered a daughter (1813), but in 1821 he moved to London, a contract at the Haymarket and a day job as a print-and-bookseller in Panton Street.  He made his Haymarket debut as John Moody in The Provok'd Wife, followed up as Snags in Life in London while taking the odd visit to his old stamping grounds and selling books by day. Mary soon disappeared from the bills, and apparently died circa 1823. Which seems to have also been the time that John left the Haymarket. He was engaged in 1824 for the English Opera House (Kilian in Der Freischütz, Dominie Sampson, Grizzle in Tom Thumb, Dr Starch in The Bashful Man) when another Mrs Tayleure joined him in the cast lists. He had married Miss Jane Grant, henceforth to be, as Mrs Tayleure, a considerable character actress at the best London theatres.

On 6 October 1826, John made his first appearance at Drury Lane playing Flutterman in Ella Rosenberg. He initially was seen in good roles -- Dandie Dinmont, Sir Benjamin Backbite, Tag in The Spoil'd Child, in the operas Leocadia (Crespo) and The House of Grenada -- but gradually was less frequently seen, while Jane went on to grand notices at the Strand, the Haymarket et al. I see him at the Lane, still, in 1835, but I think the print-selling had by now taken precedence. 

John Tayleure lived to nearly 80 years of age. He had, like most of the folk in this article, had a useful career rather than a spectacular one. Why, then, is his death commemorated in Who's Who in the Theatre? Ah well, at least they got the date right.