>After his death John’s third wife Maria Elizabeth (neé Last) (1811-99), a teacher by profession, was denied a widow’s pension so lobbied to take over the manual distribution to provide an income for herself and their baby daughter Elizabeth Ruth Naomi Belville (known as Ruth).
It would be interesting to know if it was common practice for widows to be denied pension, and if so, for what reason.
I do not know whether Anglican and other churches were able to provide charity such as soup kitchens or emergency food distributions, but some reasons given for the New Deal in the US was that many people were unwilling to accept charity from churches, especially with rising sectarianism, and for that same reason, charity/outreach operations had perhaps become fragmented, and literally slicing up the pie smaller and smaller, in terms of funding, volunteers, and coverage, for a multiplicity of humanitarian non-profits.
Nowadays the State Governments simply fund, assist, and promote those non-profits, and mental health care, etc., so American taxpayers are not merely paying "church tax" but synagogue/church/mosque/temple/ashram taxes, to support the plurality of faith-based charities who serve the poor and marginalized. And that's why the government itself can be reduced in size and scope as public-private-religious partnerships take up the mantle.
I don't know but a probable answer is that she was "able-bodied", pand perhaps was not destitute, as I believe widows were not entitled to anything at the time simply for being a widow. Pensions were only introduced in 1908.
He had three wives in succession. Any one or three could make the claim. There was probably a limited budget that had to go through a small committee to allocate the new funds. After a while it runs out.
I've checked and indeed his first wife died in 1826 (maybe during childbirth looking at the date), his second in 1851, he married his third wife that same year. Ruth was actually his 7th and last child.
It was the 19th century. People didn't "just" divorce and people also tended to die of many deceases and during childbirth.
> Any one or three could make the claim.
Well, no. He could only be married to one at the time of his death (even if the others were still alive) and so only leave one widow behind to make a claim.
Under traditional English common law, a woman gave up her personal property rights on marriage (see Coverture). Upon separation from marriage, the husband retained the right to the wife's property, but, in exchange, had an ongoing responsibility to support the wife after dissolution of the marriage.[6][7] English law was amended by legislation including the Married Women's Property Act 1870 and Married Women's Property Act 1882 which reformed women's property rights relating to marriage, by, for example, permitting divorced women to regain the property they owned before marriage.[7][26][27][28]
"Dissolution" is a strong word considering traditional Christian beliefs, and it would seem that a man couldn't simply divorce a woman and her children and wash his hands of responsibilities, even if spending a year dead for tax purposes.
Because a woman entering marriage with a dowry, with property, with capital assets: those would be entrusted to the entire family and so the man, offspring, and heirs would end up with management of whatever resulted, during the marriage, after the divorce, and after his own bodily death
If that is a reply to my "Well, no" then it is beside the point.
You are quoting laws that are about responsibility to "ex-wives" during the husband's life while the discussion is about widows.
There can only be one widow and widows' pensions did not, and do not, apply to ex-wives. Under common law alimony typically stops at the paying spouse' death, too.
It would be interesting to know if it was common practice for widows to be denied pension, and if so, for what reason.