Woman born and buried on one road

Deborah Knott was buried at St Nicholas Church

How often do you pass familiar buildings, statues and objects in the street without giving them a second thought?

The gravestone of Deborah Knott standing in St Nicholas Church grounds has a fascinating story behind it.

Deborah lived the whole of her life, from birth, through marriage, to death, in the small area around the church during the early 1800s.

Her husband and children disappeared from Leicester soon after her death.

Love and marriage

Deborah was born in 1800 on St Nicholas Street, which is now a continuation of the High Street - just round the corner from the BBC Leicester studios.

At that time Leicester's population would have rested at around 17,000 people. Her particular neighbourhood was small but densely inhabited.

In the period in which she lived, that first half of the 19th Century, Leicester was very different... very little survives Richard Gill, historian

Infant mortality was particularly high with a fifth of children dying before they reached the age of one, so Deborah was lucky to make it to adulthood.

She married James Knott in 1822 at St Nicholas Church, at the age of 22.

Weddings at this time would have been simple and quiet affairs, with just a few close family members witnessing their solemnisation of matrimony.

Local Historian Richard Gill said: "This notion that we have to have 150 guests at your wedding and you have a huge slap up meal afterwards, that is actually middle to late 20th Century. It didn't happen for my parents in the 1920s."

Children and housework

Deborah continued to live with her husband on the same road she grew up on, raising six children in the process.

Local genealogist Peter Cousins discovered that at the time of the 1841 Census the children ranged from between three and 16 years-old.

"They were quite regular in their habits, you might say."

Deborah's life in the 1800s would have been a very different experience to that of Leicester women today.

There were no aeroplanes, no electric light bulbs, no phones, no water pipes delivering fresh water, no flushing toilets, no NHS, and definitely no television or radio.

Very few areas of Leicester would still be recognisable to Deborah now. Among those that have survived are the Guildhall, five medieval churches, a few chapels, the City Rooms, and a small network of streets south of St Martins.

Richard said: "In the period in which she lived, that first half of the 19th Century, Leicester was very different and the sort of Leicester we think of as Victorian Leicester came more or less as she was dying. So very little survives."

Deborah's death

Deborah died on 15 May 1847 at the age of 47 and was buried in the grounds of St Nicholas Church in Leicester, where she remains to this day.

Deborah's death certificate states that she died of "enlargement of the liver" and "heart disease".

It may seem young to us now, but Richard believes it wouldn't have been at all shocking in the 1840s.

THE LIFE OF DEBORAH KNOTT 1800: Born in St Nicholas Street 1822: Marries James Knott at St Nicholas Church 1847: Dies on 15 May and is buried in same church 1849: James and her children emigrate to US

"No drains, no deposal sewage, clean water uncertain - so one was pray to all kinds of things.

"And medicine was really just a case of nursing people, no antibiotics or anything like that, and often the flu in the winter and summer diarrhoea carried people off.

"So it may well be some people thought, 'well she might have lived longer', but 47 wasn't bad."

In 1813 the Inspector of Nuisances, George Brown painted Leicester's conditions as a radical risk to the health of its residents.

He said the River Soar was "torpid and turbid", describing parts of it as an "open cesspool" emitting "pestiferous gasses which cause disease of the most malignant and mortal character".

Doctors of the time often didn't understand much more about disease than their patients; miasma, the belief that illness came from bad smells, was a popular concept.

There was just one hospital in the area during the 1800s. Leicester Infirmary was founded in 1771 but was only open to a small section of society.

Life after Deborah

Although Deborah's grave clearly marks her marriage to James Knott, her husband and children do not rest in the same churchyard.

An 1849 shipping list reveals that James Knott, his sons William and Fredrick, and daughter Elizabeth, emigrated to America.

They travelled on the Guy Mannering ship on her first East-West voyage from Liverpool to New York on 22 May 1849.

The journey to the new world and their new home took 38 days.

A year later the Knott's are registered as being settled in Illinois, and there appears to be a young wife for James.

Peter Cousins commented, "So he's not only gone to start a new life, it looks like he's started a new family."

Keep checking back to this page to learn more about Deborah Knott's life in early 19th Century Leicester.