A Redruth mining family with connections to Mexico
Martha: died 24th August, 1901
Laid to rest: St Day Road Cemetery, Redruth
Martha was born in 1851 in Redruth, and married William Eastwick, a mining engineer, towards the end of 1875. Their first child, Carrie, was born in Redruth the following year, and soon after that they departed for Mexico.
Three more children were born to the couple between 1880 and 1884 in Mexico. By 1891, Martha and their four children were back living in Redruth, with William presumably working away overseas; they were wealthy enough at this time to employ a servant. Four years later, in December 1895, Martha and her three daughters left for Mexico onboard the ship 'Nicaraguan', sailing from Liverpool to Veracruz, presumably to be reunited with William. Their youngest child, John, who at this time was aged 12, did not accompany them: perhaps he stayed behind to continue his studies.
Their eldest daughter, Carrie, settled in Mexico and perhaps married: Martha and her daughter Annie sailed to New York in 1897, presumably to visit Carrie and/or William. By 1901, Martha, William, Mabel, Annie and John were living together in Clinton Road, Redruth. Martha sadly passed away in August of that year, and Wlliam died just three days later.
Carrie died in Mexico at the age of just 38, in 1914.
There is some evidence to suggest that their son, John, went to live in South Africa in 1914 and worked as a mine over-seerer, though he had returned to Redruth towards the end of his life, and is also commemorated here.
As the tin-mines in Cornwall became less profitable in the late 1890s, many families of mine-workers must have followed a similar pattern to that of the Eastwick family, with one or more wage-earners spending all or part of their working life overseas, and sending money back to family in Cornwall. Many house-names in Cornwall reflect the locations that miners had worked in to earn the money used to build the house: there is blog about this topic at the 'random bits of history' blog site: click here for external site.