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Unearthing Our Home's Hidden History: A Victorian Tale

2025-07-09

This evening, Ryan and I have been doing a mini history project – and it’s taken us on a journey back in time… Our house is a Victorian terrace built around 1865, tucked away on a quiet private lane. Its roof beams were made from the timber of an old wooden ship – and we’ve tried to put back some of the character, but we didn’t realise just how much history was hiding within. In January 1923, a woman named Katherine Ford passed away here at the age of 69. Her husband had died 25 years earlier in 1898, and she’d moved into this house shortly after. When she died, she left behind two daughters – Katherine and Dorothy. Her daughter Katherine went on to become a schoolteacher and, turned the house into a small local school after her mother’s death. Tonight, we visited the churchyard in Yealmpton, just three miles away, we found Katherine’s grave. She’s been resting there quietly for 101 years. Yealmpton was where she was born and lived with husband Henry. Ryan had a photo that was taken in 2021 of the grave which was on findagrave.com - from the photo he worked out that he was near bushes and started looking in bush areas first … and looked for the shape of the top of the stone… so he …

Topics: Family

Matthew Eaves — escape room franchise founder, operator, and writer. Also: franchise, posts, contact.