A Male Companion

Readers who are familiar with 19th century British novels or early 20th century mysteries probably recognize the figure of the "companion," the well-educated gentlewoman in impoverished circumstances who serves as a friend/chaperone/glorified servant to a wealthier woman. Companions in such novels are often mistreated or actively abused by their patrons but sometimes manage to use their social connections to find happy marriages. These fictional companions were based on very real women who had few other professional respectable opportunities to make a living.

What is striking about the case of Caroline and John Hurd is that we see historical evidence that this was not a strictly gendered profession, despite the lack of any literary evidence I can find. Caroline and John Hurd were married in 1839; she was a Middlesex widow from an apparently mildly prosperous family. He was a "lazy, dissolute fellow" who made no effort to seek employment after their marriage. After living with her parents for several years, Caroline realized that this was not a good long term option. She and John had also had two sons by this point.

So Caroline sought the help of her local vicar in obtaining a position as a schoolmistress and was apparently able to do so; the vicar also helped her use influence to gain a position for John as "the companion and attendant to an Invalid military Gentleman." So now she's living on her own teaching and raising the kids while John is at some local manor house serving as this officer's companion.

John takes the job and is making a decent income but sends her nothing for child support. She remonstrates with him and also tells him that she hears he has STDs and is worried for her own health. John responds by telling her he's quitting his companion job, leaving Middlesex, and getting another wife. After six years of marriage, he vanishes.

At the time that Caroline is filing for the protection of her earnings and divorce, she says that she hasn't heard from John in 23 years. Notably, at this point she is living at the London Lock Asylum, an institution established as a refuge for women with venereal disease, primarily but not entirely prostitutes. We have no clear record of her death or the fate of her children.

The London Lock Asylum, besides being one of the first hospitals dedicated to the treatment of STDs, is particularly notable for mounting a public campaign against the popular 18th and 19th century notion that sex with a child would cure an STD and the governors of the hospital were the first to actively prosecute child rapists.

That said, the restrictions placed on women there were themselves very cruel by modern standards, both with regard to a minimal diet, constant laxatives, and 75% confiscation of income. Over half the inmates eventually ran away, being listed in the records as "Having Disappointed the Expectations of Their Benefactors."