Born: 15 December 1821, 2 Duke St., Portland Place, Marylebone, London.
Died: 15 September 1890.
Father: Richard Paul Jodrell
Mother: Amelia Caroline King
Married: Charles Fitzgerald Higgins (b. 31 July 1815, d. 8 July 1860, son of Captain Fitzgerald Higgins of Westport [Ireland] and Mary Ouseley), 18 July 1842, Moorfields R.C. Church, London.
Children:
George Charles, b. 1 November 1843, d. 1 August 1863.
Emily Vertue Jane, b. 12 October 1850. Married Herbert Henry Churchill, 4 June 1871.
No children as of 1891.
Frederick Palliser, b. 16 September 1853, d. 4 January 1854.
Other information:
Amelia and Charles's elopement was mentioned in almost all the London and Dublin newspapers. The Times of London, for example, ran the following on Thursday, 21 July 1842 (page 6, column 5):
ELOPEMENT. - The following case of elopement has caused no small degree of excitement in some of the fashionable circles of society at the west-end. The facts of the affair are briefly these :- On Monday morning a young lady, of great personal attractions, and between 18 and 19 years of age, only daughter of a wealthy baronet in Portland place, was suddenly missed from the mansion, and it was immediately discovered that she had taken with her the whole of her jewellery, which was of considerable value. Every possible inquiry was promptly instituted, with a view of finding out the retreat of the fair fugitive, but no tidings could be gained respecting her by any of those members of the family whose anxious solicitude for her welfare prompted them to be on the alert. The "mystery," however, was in the course of a few hours cleared up by the arrival of the lady, who returned to her parental roof (which she had so unceremoniously fled from) in a handsome carriage, and by her side was seated a dashing young Irish gentleman of fortune, to whom she had on the same morning been united in bonds indissoluble at a church not far distant, the "happy couple" alighted, and entered the dwelling, when the lady acquainted her papa with the fact that she was married, and that she and her husband were about to quit London for the Emerald Isle. Whether a reconciliation took place between the baronet and his daughter we are unable to say with any degree of certainty ; but we believe that the "error" has been forgiven. - Globe.
The Satirist of 24 July 1842 also names names, as well as the fact that Amelia Vertue's cousin Emily Moylan eloped at the same time.
Amelia appears to have contributed a poem on the subject to The Age, which was printed under the heading "Family fun" on 24 July 1842:
The frisky Miss MOYLAN the other fine day,
With Mr. McDONALD had scarce ran away;
When her cousin, Miss JODDRELL, in case he should need her,
Begged leave, with one HIGGINS, to "follow the leader!"
Portland-place, July 20, 1842 AMELIA VERTUE
Two mis-spelled names, I notice, which seems to be about par for the course. Amelia may well have come to regret the hasty union with Mr. Higgins, though. Two months later The Satirist revealed that "Charles Fitzgerald Higgins, Esq. of Trafalgar Park" was merely the son of the tanner who managed Lord Sligo's stud (although with income from a literary estate worth £300 p.a.). Also revealed was the fact that Higgins' uncle was a crooked lawyer who, when asked by Lord Sligo to pay off a mistress, had managed to arrange for an annuity, worth £500 p.a., to be paid to himself instead (a moral justification for this action might have been that he had been one of His Lordship's catamites, but I have no reason to believe that he was).
Amelia took the name "Jodrell" after succeeding to the landed property in 1883.
