The Nelsons and Margaret Marchant The Secret History of My Family

1903. Working-class Britain.

A labyrinth of destitution.

Street crime.

Gang warfare.

Drink addiction and welfare dependency.

Into this dark continent

came an army of upper-class do-gooders

to study and help the "problem families" they found.

And on the expeditions into the slums, these missionaries came

face-to-face with Britain's out-cast and unrecorded.

We knew very little about the history of our family.

She's sort of lower class. Not worth anything.

The working class? "Yeah, get over there.

"They're only crap."

Now, using the explorers' written accounts of their meetings

with the underclass...

..we've traced their descendants

all the way down to the present day

to find out what happened to the families that history forgot.

To think about where our family's come in 200 years,

from just one girl, I think she'd be amazed.

-We don't talk about it.

-SHE LAUGHS

A story told by the descendants themselves.

We are all prisoners of our family histories.

Don't forget where you've come from. Don't forget.

Tonight, the story of a long-term benefit dependent

condemned by the authorities as an unfit mother...

She's pregnant and is not married. A fallen woman.

..and the lady visitor who stepped in to rescue her kids.

She was very concerned about pauperism,

what they now call benefit dependency.

People do silly things, don't they, you know? When they're desperate.

I mean, Julie chose the house

for the size of the rooms, really.

But I chose it because of the size of the garden,

because I knew that it had good potential for a fish pond and whatever suits me,

you know, so that's what the plan was, to build a pond.

That's what I did, you know, so... I enjoy the outside space, you know,

that's my bit of territory.

My name's Roy Nelson

I'm 68 years of age and Susan Nelson is my grandmother.

The story begins in Victorian London in the slums of Deptford,

particularly in the area where Susan Nelson lived, Watergate Street,

where the cobblestones run down to the River Thames.

It was poverty-stricken.

The Humanitarian League at that time called it

"one of the dark places of the world".

A dark and dismal place where you wouldn't want to go.

At the turn of the century, Susan lost her soldier husband, John,

and she was left in the slums, a war widow with three young children.

In 1903, Susan wrote her first begging letter.

"Dear Sir, I am very sorry to be compelled to

"appeal to you for a little assistance.

"I tried the best way I could until I have become destitute

"and the only relief I can get from the parish is to

"go into the workhouse with my three little children.

"If you could assist me in any way, I should very much oblige to you.

"Yours faithfully, Mrs S Nelson."

Susan's begging letters ended up with

the Charity Organisation Society, known as the COS.

This was an early welfare fund, overseeing benefits

and charitable giving to the poor.

Susan was awarded benefits and her case was assigned

to a well-to-do woman called Margaret Marchant.

Their encounter would change the Nelson fortune forever.

Margaret Marchant was one of five children, of Thomas Marchant, a solicitor.

Very well-to-do.

The Victorian upper class.

My name is Alexandra Barcus and Margaret Marchant was my great-great aunt.

In 1907, Margaret becomes the right-honourable secretary

of the Deptford area Charitable Organisation Society

and finds that she's got to make some very, very hard decisions.

She's really got to choose who will get a limited amount of money,

who will have access to it, and who won't.

So Margaret felt it was necessary to investigate things a little bit further.

To make the kinds of determinations required

going into the homes of people and actually seeing how they lived.

Any suggestion that there might be drunkenness,

some sort of immorality,

or people who weren't trying to help themselves in any way

would mean that they were not eligible for these benefits from the COS.

They were very concerned about the idea of what they called

"pauperism", which we now call benefit dependency.

That people would become dependent on the funds given to them

and would not encourage them to seek work or to lead better lives.

Margaret's told by some of her volunteers that it appears

that Susan is living out of wedlock with the brother of her husband.

You're not married at all, are you?

-No.

-Have you tried to get work?

I can't get work.

I'm going to have a baby.

Not only that, she's pregnant.

For Margaret, to have Susan Nelson living "immorally"

on the benefits handed to her by the COS was totally unacceptable.

Margaret writes of Susan, that she is of "low character"

and "very troublesome".

And so in 1907, to protect Susan's three children by her

late husband, she took a drastic step.

The most significant decision that Margaret took was to remove the

three children from Susan's home and distribute them amongst relatives.

The money that Susan had been granted went to the relatives

to take care of the children.

It's heartbreaking, it's heart-wrenching to think that

a child, or children, would be taken away from their mother

due to the fact that she was carrying an illegitimate child.

Why do you think she felt that she had the right to do that?

If she didn't do it, someone else would have done it and probably less well,

so perhaps not a real right, but still delivering some hope,

giving them something they might actually be able to use to get ahead.

It would be the only way they could.

Margaret's decision to take Susan's children away from her would

change the course of history for the Nelson family.

But the one who was going to be most deeply affected was young Charlotte,

the first of the Nelsons to leave the slums behind.

I'm Suzanne Moss.

Charlotte was my grandmother.

Susan Nelson was my great-grandmother.

Some in the family say that Charlotte was sold

for a bottle of gin, others that she was left on the doorstep by gypsies.

But in fact, Miss Marchant organised for Charlotte to be taken

care of by a distant relative called Mrs Murray.

Mrs Murray was given three shillings a week.

She stayed with Miss Murray for about 14-odd years,

until she was 16.

My name is Victor Avey.

"Vic" to everybody, and I am the grandson of Sue Nelson.

My mother was Charlotte Nelson.

There's an ongoing relationship between Charlotte and Margaret.

For seven years, they were corresponding with one another.

Margaret's clearly very proud of the way in which Charlotte conducts herself.

This is the youngest of the Nelson family.

"Some 20 years ago, we received a grant for the widow

"and children and managed to get some of it banked for each child.

"I think the money Charlotte has spent on clothes

"and boots from time to time have been good for her health.

"She's turned out better than I expected,

"possibly because she lived away from home."

"I should wish she would now get married to a decent man.

"Yours, Margaret Marchant."

A little while later,

Charlotte starts to keep company with a young man called Arthur Avey.

Sometime in 1925, they got married.

Three days after, my eldest sister was born!

-LAUGHING:

-So they... Yes, they got on very well.

And then there was five more after that, I was one of them.

She did all sorts of work, really.

She worked in factories and anything she could find.

And that was my mum to a T.

Because she would never be without money.

She'd do anything, you know what I mean?

-She was only a little titch!

-HE LAUGHS

5'2" and a quarter! I loved her.

She really was... She was absolutely gorgeous.

Yeah.

Bringing up Victor and his sisters in Deptford,

Charlotte relied on occasional hand-outs,

casual work and little bits of welfare payments.

Now the authorities were offering her the chance to get

out of the slums.

'I am Colin Avey.

'I am Charlotte's grandson.'

In 1938, the family were rehoused in Mottingham, in Kent,

under the Greater London Council scheme in council housing.

Charlotte was the first Nelson to leave Deptford,

and she would be forever known as the posh aunt who got out.

It seems that being taken away from her mum did help Charlotte

to get on.

So Margaret Marchant and the COS had made the difference.

But being cut off from your mum

and family at such a young age must have scarred her.

Did Charlotte, your mother, did she ever speak of her own mother?

No, not really. It's almost as though it had been blotted out.

You know, it's in the past and I don't want to know it, don't want to remind it.

I think she just blanked it completely.

I can remember walking along Deptford Broadway

and somebody pointed over to a lady and said,

"That's your nan" and I said, "Oh."

And left it at that.

The way that my mother had blanked everything out,

I thought Susan couldn't have been a very nice person.

I just wasn't interested.

I've taken after my mother, you know, don't want to hear any more.

No, it's gone.

In my 20s, I started on the railway.

And I was on there for 25 years.

You get it in your blood, I think.

It was a pleasure to go to work in the morning.

Hello! Yeah...

I met my first wife in the dancehall.

One of my colleagues said,

"That girl over there likes you." I said, "Oh, does she?"

Got married on the 15th September, 1962.

19 years after we got married,

she started playing away from home.

So, she told me, I said, "Right that's it. I'm going".

He was there in the morning and when I came home from school, he wasn't there any more,

so that was, you know, that was a bit hard to take.

It's over 30 years since I last saw him.

Our daughter Ellie has frequently asked about him...

..um, just to find out what kind of person he is.

I did find out where he was living

but I never had the guts to try and make contact with him.

-Colin needed a dad, Suzanne needed a dad...

-Mmm.

-Do you think that was fair to them?

-Well...

Quite honestly, I can't see how I could've done anything else.

Although I was separated from my children...

But that was my doing, to stop my second marriage

getting slaughtered by their mother,

which would have happened.

Because of my dad I had an interest in railways from an early age.

I joined Network Rail in 2003 and I've worked

for various signal boxes since then and I'm currently at London Bridge.

There's a little blue man there...

That's me, but on a...

I did start on a box that size, so...

Well, perhaps a bit bigger, but, yes.

You can switch off from the outside world,

you don't have to worry about anything else.

It's your world. Whatever happens on your world is fine.

How long has it been?

Must be about 30 years. Must be.

Have you missed them in that time?

Oh, yeah.

Do you think there's a similarity that Charlotte

was estranged from Susan

and then you're estranged from your children?

Yes, there is parallel there, isn't there? Yeah.

You know, it's just one of those things that you have to sort of

push into the back of your mind and every now and again

it rears its ugly head.

Mum told me she married Dad to get out of a situation

where she was unhappy at home.

But a lot of women did that in the '50s and I'm sure before that.

It really makes me realise how lucky I am to be able to have met

somebody that I truly love, that I want to be with.

Not to have to marry because that was my way out

of an unhappy situation.

To be able to go on and study what I wanted to do...

I was just wondering if you could tell me how many patients I've got today?

PHONE: Yes, you've got eight patients...

To have my own business

and just be happy.

I feel what I've achieved is on a similar level to what Charlotte achieved.

You know, she's progressed, she's moved forward.

I'd love a reunion, to be able to, um...

To bring closure to things that have happened in the past.

At the end of the day, every man needs his dad, and there's been

a lot of father-son relationship and chats that have been missing.

All right, how's that?

I'm not sure what I expect from the reunion.

I'm intrigued, I'm intrigued.

And maybe he'll be able to answer a few questions.

What have you got there, then?

Two cards. One for Colin and one for Suzanne.

I mean, that one's like a little belated birthday card.

So you can still remember their birthdays?

Oh, yeah!

Yes, 26th of January and 28th of February.

I think it would be good for Ellie, it would be good for him

and it would be good for me to be able to complete that circle.

Now we've got the opportunity to finally put to bed

the emotional side of the family's history.

I'd like to tell him about my career, because I've basically

been following him around, I've been stalking him.

Yeah, a lot of emotions.

Oh, my goodness!

-Hello.

-Colin...

-Hello.

-THEY LAUGH

Long time, no see!

-A VERY long time.

-Where've you been hiding?

Oh, all over the place!

Hello, Dad.

Oh...

-All right?

-Yeah...

SHE SOBS

-You don't have to cry, you know.

-SHE LAUGHS

-I won't grow if you keep watering...

-I've got a card for you

-You've shrunk!

-Me?

-Thank you.

One for you. They're only cards. That's all.

And I bought that for you.

LAUGHTER

-This is Ellie...

-Yes.

-..your granddaughter.

Hello.

-Grandad you didn't know!

-No!

It's a bit strange.

Very strange. I've always been strange.

LAUGHTER

Had you wanted to see us before?

-I've always thought about the pair of you.

-Mmm.

-Yeah.

Wondering what you were doing, what you were up to.

I think we are doing OK, don't you?

-I think so. I've managed to get a job with Network Rail.

-Oh, did you?

-As a signalman.

-Oh, yes?

-And now I'm working at London Bridge.

Oh, yes? I know it well!

-Yes, I know.

-LAUGHTER

I'm basically following you around on your old haunts.

LAUGHTER

At least we done it, we found one another.

-Yes.

-It's lovely.

Oh, it's marvellous, really was.

Yeah.

Seems to be like a trait in the family, but I think that

that trait now has been broken.

Because I'm the sort of person that's never really

shown a great deal of affection.

But, my God, am I going to get it back now!

It's lovely.

Charlotte had managed to move away from the slums.

But Susan, her mum, stayed in Deptford, now without her three children,

but still under the watchful eye of Margaret and the COS.

The Charitable Organisation Society had a mission to identify

groups of people and analyse their situations to see

whether they were in fact deserving of benefits or not.

They were also concerned with people having large families

that they were unable to take care of.

That would take you right off the lists.

Susan had shacked up with her new man.

Her dead husband's brother, Nathaniel, had moved in with her.

By all accounts, Nathaniel was a bit of a rogue,

spending three years in prison.

But, despite his reputation,

Susan went on to have three children with Nathaniel, all out of wedlock.

Susan Jessie, who died in childhood, Nathaniel Junior and Alfred.

She made some choices that weren't so good

and she must have known, to some extent, that they weren't

the best choices, if she wanted to continue with benefits.

But she made those choices anyway, they were more important to her.

So, you know, you make your bed and you lie in it.

I think the members of this committee will agree with me

that it would be monstrous,

were I to recommend the expenditure of our funds in such a way.

Why not go to this drunken young idler, whoever he is?

Make him support you.

The COS decide that Susan must not receive any more money from them.

The other children were left without funds.

That is a black mark, I think, for Margaret and the COS.

No matter what Susan had done, the children were not

responsible for it and they should have received some benefit.

Now moved around between relatives and the work house,

the eldest of Susan's illegitimate children was Nathaniel Jr.

Nathaniel Jr, along with his younger brother, Alfred,

was deserted by his mother at the age of five.

He learned to fend for himself on the streets of Deptford,

also taking care of his younger brother

and eventually his own family.

Nathaniel Jr is my father.

Having served in the War,

Nathaniel Jr returned home through the rubble of Deptford

and met up with Tilly, his young wife.

He never left Deptford again.

Many servicemen like my father returned from war,

and like millions of others, weren't really happy to accept

the poverty and slums that were there before.

In 1945, a new Labour government set about laying

the foundations of the modern welfare state.

"Nor shall the sword sleep in my hand,

"till we have built Jerusalem in England's green and pleasant land."

APPLAUSE

Suddenly the old lady visitors were a thing of the past.

No-one to come into your house and make moral judgements.

Now everyone was entitled to benefits, as a matter of right.

I've just read a piece about family allowances.

-We can get ten shillings a week for our three!

-Oh, you'll never get that!

Oh, yes, you will!

We really want these family allowances to help...you!

When we were young, you had the family allowance and that

money could feed you for a little while, sort of thing, you know?

It was the bare essentials that just kept you going, like.

Today, in some cases, benefit does become a lifestyle,

because people get used to living on it and they can survive on it

and that's the way they go through life.

But in them days, if your father made the decision not to work,

everybody suffered and suffered badly.

My father had various jobs. He was never out of work.

He would take anything, he would do anything, know what I mean?

But there was nothing to spare and if we spent any more than

we really had, that's when the problems would start.

SINGING

As long as he could go out and have his beer, you know,

and his fag, he was all right, like, you know?

When he did go out and have a drink, he would sometimes have a good skinful.

SINGING CONTINUES

And you could hear. A lot of times you would hear him singing,

you know, coming down the road.

He was a bit of a tormentor, when he'd had a beer, like.

You know what I mean?

Nothing vicious about him, but he'd torment the life out of you, you know?

When he woke up, he was sober, so, you know, he was a bit more peaceful to live with, you know? Heh!

Yeah.

There was no money, or very little money.

One way of getting money was to go and knock on people's doors.

Sometimes you wouldn't get it and it may be a bread-and-dripping dinner, you know?

And dad would have the same. But most times, we got by.

It wasn't just through him that we knocked on doors.

You know what I mean? It's through what went on with my mum

and the position she got herself in with tallymen.

The tallyman was a door-to-door salesman, you know,

and they'd come round and they'd sell bed linen and anything, really.

Not only my mother, but there was a little group of them, you know.

If they wanted instant cash, they would buy a set of sheets for £2.50,

which they would have to pay off weekly, with interest.

But they'd maybe go out and sell them for a pound.

But it was a pound in their hand.

It was a pound they never had ten minutes before the tallyman came.

Can you leave it this week, only I'm a bit short?

Come on, love, but you're £8 owing!

She's what we call a pawn shop call.

You see, we sell her a pair of blankets and ten minutes later,

she goes and sells them for cash to some old woman down the street.

And then she's paying me five bob a week for the rest of the year for something she hasn't even got.

I mean, there was many a time when we wouldn't open the door.

They bashed on the door a few times, you know?

And then go, like, you know?

Ah, it's not a bad life, a tallyman.

I'm using me brains to the best of me ability.

It's what the Tories call free enterprise.

I followed in my father's footsteps in the fact that I've always

tried to work, always tried to provide.

I draw from him the way I am.

The way I am today, or the way I think, I get from him.

Unlike my dad, I grew up at a time

when almost everyone was entitled to generous benefits.

But I didn't want none of that. I wanted to work.

I got a trade, became a carpenter and worked it from there.

I think I was 21, 22 when we got married, you know, and I left home.

Yeah, yeah.

We lived in Deptford for a short time, then we moved to Brockley.

In the end, we was able to get the mortgage to buy our own home.

Eventually, we left London altogether.

We came down here to Kent.

When you're paying rent, you're just giving money to somebody else, aren't you?

When you buy your own house, at the end of the day,

it's bricks and mortar, but it's there, it's yours, you know?

And if it's not mine, it's my children's.

Yeah, it's a good investment.

And then we come into the living room,

which hasn't changed at all, really,

from the day we moved in, except it's been redecorated, you know?

-It's so different from when you were a kid.

-Yeah.

I mean, it's luxury compared to that, isn't it, you know?

Best thing I ever done, moving out of London.

Family's all down here as well.

So everything's hunky dory, sort of thing. Yeah.

Back in 1911, Susan Nelson was bringing up her three

illegitimate children without help or welfare.

Her benefits had been removed because of her behaviour.

Now their father and my grandfather, Nathaniel, failed to support her.

Not having any help at all from anybody,

she had no means of supporting her children.

People do silly things, don't they, you know, when they're desperate?

Newspaper headlines haven't changed so much in a century

and nor have our tabloid demons.

100 years ago, my grandmother became one such demon.

"Child in river, father's strange story of mother's action.

"Alleged attempt to murder a child."

"At Greenwich Police Court, Susan Nelson, 27,

"of Watergate Street, Deptford, was charged with attempting to

"murder her illegitimate child, Alfred, aged three, by drowning."

"Nathaniel Nelson, the prisoner's brother-in-law, said,

"on July the 25th, he was in a public house,

"when the prisoner came to the door and asked,

"'Have you got anything for this?' meaning the child.

"He left the public house and took the child.

"'I know he won't get no food while you are with him!'

"She followed, shouting, 'I'm his mother and I'm entitled to whatever you give him!'

"He then walked to the water gate and got in a boat to get out of her way.

"She followed and taking the child by his left arm and left leg,

"threw him in the water, saying,

"'There he goes! Where you ought to be!'"

This is my nan we're talking about,

and I cannot believe that she did that to my dad.

My name is Maureen Reid. I'm the daughter of Alfred Nelson.

As luck would have it, there was a barge boy there.

He grabbed my dad and pulled him out the water.

In the end, Nathaniel changed his story in court.

He admitted that he was drunk when he gave his statement,

so my nan Susan was found not guilty.

It wasn't just that what happened when he was three or four years old.

His whole life growing up was not nice at all, but it didn't

make him a bad man.

So I've got to have great admiration for that.

My dad married my mum Phyllis in 1931.

They had eight children, me included.

They was always happy, my mum and dad.

That's what I remember about them.

Although there was lots of us

and the money was scarce, meat was scarce,

but we always had shoes on our feet,

we had clothes on our backs, we had food on our plates.

My dad worked as a ferry man and a labourer in Deptford

and he made sure we all worked.

Him and his brothers never relied on benefits.

If you grow up with parents working, then it runs through your family

and it comes from how you're brought up.

And we've all been really, really close, my brothers and sisters.

I mean, and all my grandchildren,

they all got good jobs,

they all work, none of them have,

sort of, gone by the wayside,

to be quite honest with you.

Do not be alarmed by noise in an air raid.

During the War, Deptford was bombed continually.

SIREN WAILS

Four of Alfred Nelson's children were evacuated to Durham.

One of the four, Alec, known as Boy-Boy, came back different.

# We'll meet again

# Don't know where... #

I'm Alec Nelson.

My dad was Alec, known as Boy-Boy to the family.

Grandson of Alfred,

great-grandson of Susan Nelson.

He was evacuated at the age of four and he lived with a farmer

and his family.

My name is Deborah Stewart, formerly Deborah Nelson.

Dad was Boy-Boy Nelson, or Alec Nelson.

To many of the children, though, the country

came as a revelation of a larger, sweeter life.

For the first time, probably, two classes in England confronted

each other on the home ground,

so to speak, of the upper-middle classes.

While he was away, Alec discovered

a love of the countryside and fresh air,

and was inspired by someone to explore maths and further education.

When he came back after the , aged eight,

he had such a strong Northern accent that his mum

and, I guess, other members of the family, couldn't understand him.

And they were telling him to sling his hook.

His aunts would say to him,

"This lady, this isn't your really mummy.

"She found you on the door-step."

And they would say this again and again and again till he cried

and then when he cried, they would say, "No, not really.

"She is your real mum, really."

But he never got over that.

He talked about feeling rejected from his earliest memories.

I think that deep down, Dad always knew that he was different.

He had drive and ambition

and from a young age, he recognised that education was the way.

The 1944 Education Act raised the school leaving age to 15

and introduced the Eleven-Plus.

Alec was keen to grasp this opportunity.

He was the first Nelson child to pass the Eleven-Plus

and gain a place at grammar school.

Unfortunately for Alec, his family couldn't afford the school uniform.

His arse was always hanging out of his trousers, we were told.

He was humiliated and punished by the teachers.

Certainly, he received the cane on many an occasion.

Alec was also under pressure from home to start work and

contribute to the household finances so he left school.

And started learning how to become a carpenter,

which became his trade in life.

Dad had been studying from when he started work,

he'd been doing night classes, funding his own books and exams.

That's determination, isn't it?

He wanted a different way of life.

Mum and Dad knew each other at school and they started

seeing each other when Mum was 15, Dad was 16.

They got engaged, I think, a year later

and married when Mum was 19, Dad was 20.

And four children came along in five years, so very quickly.

I guess what I remember of the Nelson side of the family,

often your big family gatherings, your partying and drinking.

18ths, 21sts, engagements, weddings.

Always lots of booze flowing.

Always lots of drunk people. Always ended up with a fight.

Nan Phyllis would always get drunk and at the end of the evening

when she was really drunk, she would sing. Gosh!

She would sing...

# BLEEP 'em all

# BLEEP 'em all. #

# So cheer up my lads bless 'em all. #

I think Dad enjoyed a drink. but wasn't so keen on the...

that big party atmosphere.

I think it was just the way he wanted to live his life

and bring us up as his children was a bit different.

With the clearance of the pre-war slums,

new schemes were offering many more the chance of a home in the suburbs.

So 1964, Mum and Dad heard on the news that the Greater London Council

were offering cheap mortgages.

A unique way to get a house.

About 300 people surged around the office the builders

established on the site.

The first 187 who deposit £50 on the following Saturday morning,

would be the lucky ones.

So for someone that was self-employed,

this mortgage was the only option for him to ever buy his own house.

They struggled, they saved for a deposit.

They went to Strood in Kent, chose their plot

and the end of 1964, when I was four years old, we moved in.

Alec was about to start school and I was going to follow

shortly behind, so it was about education. I know it was.

And he always made it very clear to all four of us,

you can do whatever you want in this life

if you get yourself an education.

And I felt exactly the same as the boys.

I was no different being a girl.

I knew I had opportunities.

When I finished my A-levels, I got a place at university

and, yeah, Mum and Dad were very pleased about that.

And then from there I sort of... I've found my niche.

My career in computing started taking off.

Now I'm a business consultant.

We moved in in...just about 16 years ago.

March 1999, I think, is when we moved in.

This is the kitchen.

Fairly typical modern kitchen, really.

Very standard units, easy to clean.

Are you a millionaire?

I don't know, really. What do you mean by a millionaire?

How do you measure a millionaire?

In bricks and mortar you can't realise it, can you, really?

Let's go upstairs.

What makes you want to be socially mobile?

Perhaps there's an explorer gene that some of us

have got that encourages people to want to try new things.

You've got to want to make the changes or find

and seize the opportunities.

That's my school tie from

Sir Joseph Williamson's Mathematical School for Boys,

was my grammar school tie.

I've done so many different jobs.

When I first left school, it was insurance and accounting insurance,

and from there,

I went to the Army & Navy department stores accounts.

And I remember thinking, "I need to do something for me,"

and that's when I did get the mortgage...

You know, I'd already been saving, I was thinking about doing it.

That was the point I thought, "I'm going to do it," and I did.

What do you think your dad would've made of you living down here?

He would have loved it. Oh, I feel emotional.

He would have loved it.

Yeah.

That's, perhaps, what he got from when he was evacuated.

That time and space.

And he always talked about wanting to go back to

being in the countryside.

Oh, this is England's green and pleasant land, isn't it?

How old was he when he died?

He was two days after he was 49. Very young.

Sorry.

I missed him then, I miss him now.

I wish my children had met him.

While some of Alfred Nelson's family did really well,

many of his children and grandchildren

worked to keep their heads above water.

But some of them were never really secure.

And when my grandad, Alex, saw his wife walk out,

he had to go on benefits to bring up his children.

Alex worked as a guard on the railways.

He then married Karen and had five kids.

In the 1980s, my nan Karen left the family home.

In the end, Alex did something that he didn't want to do.

He left work and then he became a single dad.

To me, that seems very heroic.

They were now dependent on benefits,

National Insurance and social housing,

but they got by and they were happy and they were healthy.

My name's Tierney Nelson-Martin

and Susan Nelson is my great-great-great-grandma.

My grandad Alex was helped by an expanded welfare state to feed

and house his five kids.

Some of them, like my mum Vicky, have remained on benefits.

She still lives near Deptford with me and my four brothers and sisters.

Tierney is 17, Tia is ten,

Tegan is nine, Leon is eight

and Liam's five.

They've learned their lesson from me, obviously.

They want to have a job before they have kids,

instead of just having kids and no job.

It's kind of hard to find jobs, but I've got interviewed before.

But...didn't really go nowhere

so I just gave up trying.

-What was that for?

-It was McDonald's.

We have a careers person at school,

but I don't really go to her

because before I go to her I probably research

and if I'm going to go to her,

she'll probably tell me what I already know.

I told them I want to be a labourer.

Wait, what's that?

Building work. Build an house.

I thought you were talking about Parliament and stuff.

Oh, no!

Oops.

Not far away, my mum's sister Sharon lives with her five children

and she's also on benefits.

-What do you want?

-My tablet.

-And what do you want?

-My iPad.

iPads and pads and tablets.

Right, here you are.

-I'll share it with him.

-Share it with him.

-Right, take them all.

-Go on, you get the lemonade.

Right, here you are.

'Well, there's me and my five kids.

'There's no man figure.'

No running. Walk.

'So now it's just me and my children.'

-And what's it like being on your own?

-Great.

Great.

Sharon, have you ever had a job?

No.

I did want to be an archaeologist

or an architect or a lawyer.

That's what I always wanted to be.

-But then Mummy had children so she can't have no-one.

-Yeah.

Can you imagine what life would be like without benefits?

Like in the way that Susan would've had to survive?

No, I wouldn't want to. No.

I can't even imagine what she had to...the things

she had to do to get food or to get clothes or whatever.

I can't imagine it.

Proper nouns?

My grandad, my mum and my auntie have all lived off benefits,

but me and my cousins don't want to do that.

Well, if I work hard, I can actually get a good job that I want to do,

because, nowadays, people don't work hard in school

and they just get, like, a job they don't like.

I want to get a job I like, so that's why I work hard in school.

And what kind of job would you like?

Well, I want to be an actress or a singer.

I'm doing my mocks,

then we have time to revise for the actual thing, which is in June.

Then, hopefully, from there, uni.

Does it make you proud that she's got that attitude?

Of course. Proud Mummy.

# I heard there was a secret chord

# That David played and it pleased the Lord

# But you don't really care for music, do ya? #

More than 100 years ago the Charity Organisation Society

made judgements about people like us.

They decided whether my ancestor Susan Nelson deserved

benefits or not.

But once welfare became something for everyone,

charities like these came to an end.

And Margaret Marchant retired soon after the War.

In 1946, after an extraordinary journey

the COS ceases to exist.

Although Margaret had no children of her own,

she certainly had many children in her life.

Two of those were her niece and nephew,

Godfrey and my grandmother Eileen Marchant.

I never met Margaret, but I was told about her all the time by my gran.

I was politically minded through high school and into college.

I believe that one should put one's money where one's mouth is.

That if you believe in something strongly, that rather than

just donate money to it, you need to go out and do it,

and so I did.

In the first summers after my year at college, I began volunteering

at a women's service clinic giving information about birth control.

Often these were people without access to information or

people who were without funds or had very little money.

FOOTSTEPS APPROACH

So, most of this stuff has been in here since...

-Do you have any idea?

-It's about 30 years, I believe.

'We are in a storage unit to look at some furniture

'that was bequeathed to my grandmother

'by my great-great-aunt Margaret.

'It's the last remaining things we have of her and of my gran.'

Oh, I love this.

All of this stuff would have been in the house with Margaret.

Most of them would have come from Deptford.

It's a little upsetting to see some of these things

because it brings back so many memories.

You know, things I used to play with.

The Marchants were represented by Margaret,

my grandmother Eileen and her brother Godfrey.

My sister and I are the main representatives of that line

and with us, that will end.

There are no others.

-Pardon?

-There's no-one to inherit them?

-No nephews?

-No.

The more I think about it, especially as I learn

more about my past and about some of my ancestors,

or I think about all the wonderful stories Gran told me

and things I did and what fun I had,

and knowing that there is no-one, really, to tell any more.

I'm going to cry. Sorry.

I'm off to meet the distant descendants of Susan Nelson.

Nearly 100 years after a Marchant and a Nelson were last in contact,

Margaret's great-niece has come back to south-east London

to see how my branch of the Nelsons has got on.

Very curious. Very excited, actually.

This one?

I was hoping to meet them and chat with them a little bit.

There doesn't seem to be anyone home.

-What was that?

-Her mum's not well.

I was hoping to meet you.

-Tierney.

-Hello.

-Hi. I'm Alexandra.

I'm so pleased to meet you.

-Thank you for coming down.

-It's OK.

-Should we come in.

-Well...

Mum's not feeling too well at the moment.

I would let you come in, but she's still in bed.

-She's feeling poorly.

-Oh, I'm sorry.

-It's all right.

-Could we perhaps go for a cup of tea somewhere?

-Sure.

-Would that be all right?

-Yeah.

-Because I'd love to talk with you more if that was OK.

-Yeah.

Do you have any worries about, you know, life

and what might happen or things you've seen with your family

that you want to do differently or anything like that?

Whatever happens, happens.

I can't predict the future

and I don't know what's going to happen to me when I'm older.

I think Margaret's advice to Susan

about the, you know, having all these children

and no way to take care of them,

that's one way people get really stuck.

Just earning enough money to keep the family going

and not being able to go forward themselves.

-Yeah.

-That's a really tough situation to be in.

I'm more focusing on, like, having some support behind me

before I make a decision whether or not I want to have kids.

I need to think about who I'm going to have them with,

marriage or not.

I don't want someone to just be there for two seconds

-and then just leave.

-Right.

-I want a stable family.

How would you feel if you had to live on benefits?

Most of my family are on benefits, so, like, when I see them

and they complain about not having enough money, and for this and that,

it kind of just gives me an insight.

It's like, I don't want to be like that.

So I'm going to try and make my own money, for myself

I have a feeling you're going to do really well.

I would be delighted to help you.

-Oh, I appreciate that.

-No, my pleasure.

-Take care, OK?

-You, too.

All the best. And I will write.

-Yeah, I'll write, too.

-OK. Bye-bye.

-See you.

LAUGHTER

Oh, I've lost it now.

-Yeah, on the way back.

-On the way back.

-You'll get no promotion.

-That's it.

# This side of the ocean

# So cheer up, my lass, bless 'em all. #

Bless 'em all.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

We have all come long way, I think, when you think of all trauma

that Susan went through and that, you know.

Oh, yeah. It's a great achievement, it is.

I bet them other Nelsons have drunk this place dry!

Yes. Yes!

I mean, I'm not being funny, but now

if you had a dozen children with a dozen different men,

you would still be able to claim benefits.

I don't mean that being...

But, you know, wouldn't you, though?

-He can't see us!

-SHE LAUGHS

Thank you. Oh, hello, Tone.

Oh, it's all windy!

Things have been put in place in, I would say,

in a fairer manner than they were then.

It's there for us at times when we really need it.

Dad...

this is Nathaniel's son, Roy.

-Hello, Nathaniel.

-How are you?

-No, it's Roy.

-Oh, you're Roy.

-I'm Roy.

-Yes.

-Alfred's my grandad.

-Yeah.

He's the brother of Charlotte.

-Yes. So we are, yes.

-We're cousins

-We're cousins.

-Yes.

I lost contact with Dad when I was 20

and we were reunited yesterday.

Oh!

-Quite emotional.

-Yes!

It is really great how many...

Like, the different people you have.

So you're following the Nelson tradition of big families?

-My dad had five, as well.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I decided two was enough, actually.

If the benefits are providing a sufficiently comfortable

lifestyle for people that they don't need to try

and escape from the benefit system, how do we get them out?

Getting that right is very difficult.

Your dad come up in his Army uniform

and he took me down to see your nan, Susan.

She'd sit in a chair, blanket round her.

-You know the old clay pipes?

-That's it.

She had one but the stem had broken. She had about that much stem.

BLEEP thing was right under her nose, the bowl.

Underneath her trumpet.

Can I ask you all to raise a glass

to the women that's made this all possible today? Granny Nelson.

-ALL:

-Hooray!

So many kids and no money, and having to do everything

and look after our kids.

It's called stress.

I've got five kids and it's called stress.

So you have to carry on and get on with it.

So, yeah. I don't think she's bad, at all.

We won't get out of here, you know.

Right, straight at the camera again

and I need to hear your family name again as loud as you possibly can.

ALL: Nelsons!

-# Bless 'em all

-# Bless 'em all

-# Bless 'em all

-# Bless 'em all

# The long and the short and the tall

# Bless all the sergeants and WO1's

# Bless all the corporals and their blinkin' sons

# Cos we're saying goodbye to them all

# As back to their billets they crawl

# You'll get no promotion this side of the ocean

# So cheer up, my lads, bless 'em all. #