CFHS code : AL223
Parish : St Andrew the Less
Inscription : In Memory of our dear ———– MERCY ANN KAY d 24 November [1893] aged 51 indecipherable ANNIE [MARGARET] KAY [d February 1897] ——
Monument : Headstone/Kerb stones
Above information amended from Cambridge Family History Society Survey
Monument
Inscription
Mercy Ann Kay (née Phillips) (1841 – 24 November 1893)
Mercy was born in Bow, London and married Alexander Kay (1834-1898) in 1868. Alexander was Scottish and the couple had at least three children: Thomas Alexander (1870-), Mercy Georgina (1872-1954) and Annie Margaret (1876-1897). Alexander worked as carpenter/joiner and they lived at Kennington Road, Lambeth (1871) and Wilkinson Road (1881). In 1881 Mercy was living with the three children, and was documented on the census as being an owner of houses. Alexander meanwhile was a patient at the Brookwood Lunatic Asylum (sic), where he had been admitted in August 1879, having been ill for at least the previous two years. What happened to Mercy’s marriage is not known. In 1891 Alexander was lodging in Lambeth, and the census recorded him as both a carpenter/joiner and an ‘escaped lunatic’. Who or what brought Mercy to Cambridge is not known, but she died at 4 Auckland Cottages, Auckland Road and her funeral was held on 28 November.
Annie Margaret Kay (3 April 1876 – February 1897)
Annie was born in Clapham and baptised on 26 June 1881 at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Lambeth. She died at 56 Shakespeare Road, Herne Hill aed 20 years old and was buried with her mother on 13 February.
Sources:
Ancestry
Newspaper archives
Parish burial records transcribed by CFHS
by Claire Martinsen
[If you have any information about this family, please contact us at Friendsofmillroadcemetery@gmail.com]