I have been living with the dead lately, as we have been doing a lot of research concerning some of our ancestors, and I have become acquainted with more bout them and their lives. I have developed a love for them.

March 27, 1882 in South Normanton, Derbyshire, England, my great grandmother, Alice Hames Godber, age 35 was being buried. She had been suffering terribly from the effects of typhoid fever for twenty-nine days. She had given birth to eight lovely children, of whom seven had died. Only her precious nearly three-year old baby girl, my grandmother was living. Can we even think of her thoughts as she knew she was dying and leaving this little girl alone. He father was in the United States, trying to find land that his wife had dreamed they might own. Little Mabel Alice was taken into her aunt's and uncles home, and lovingly cared for until her father returned to England.

Tragedy was not new to this family. Fourteen years earlier, in August 1868, a son,Willie had been born. In October, 1869, Willie died, a little over two years of age.

• Dec, 1869 - Ernest was born, who died in June 1870, at six months of age.
• May 1871 - saw the birth if Mary Hannah, who lived until Sept 1871. at four months of age.
• Oct 1872 - Arthur Edwin was born. Arthur lived for nine years, and died two months before his mother, probably from typhoid.
• Oct 1874 - Edith Jessie was born only to die a month later in November.
• March 1875 - Drusilla was born and lived two months, dying in May.
• October, 1877- James named after his father, was born and died two days later.
• August 11, 1880 My grandmother, Mabel Alice was born. She alone of all those children lived until adulthood.

I have often wondered about those young deaths. Could it have been something like the RH factor that used to kill babies, that can easily be taken care of today? Certainly it wasn't neglect, as their mother was a lovely and caring person. It could have been diseases that were common in those years, but we simply don't know.

It wasn't unusual for families to lose children especially in earlier years in England, when there was no sanitary systems, even open cesspools and garbage thrown into streets and gutters. The rich lived well, but many of the poor lived in small, often windowless shacks with little ventilation, and often were very crowded. There was no general immunizations, and disease was rampant...smallpox, typhus, typhoid, dysentery, cholera, measles, tuberculosis, and others. Death was commonplace, and those who could not afford graves were laid in common ones, often left barely covered until a trench was filled. Rats, fleas and other vermin were uncontrolled and spread diseases.

Diets were insufficient and monotonous. A typical diet for laborers in the 1700s could include a pudding for breakfast, which sounds better than it was, just flour mixed with water and boiled, and tea. For the nooon meal, bread and tea, for the evening meal, oatmeal, maybe a little meat for the husvand, and maybe some turnips and cabbage. Milk and meat was expensive, and the milk was watered down and un refrigerated. Wheat flour was only for the rich, and the bread for the poor was made of barley and rye.

In the cities, the air was polluted by the smoke from coal fires, and chemicals from factories. 50% of babies died under the age of two, and 11% died before age five. This was many years before my great grandmother lost her babies.

There were no child labor laws, and children about age six or seven started working to help support families. Only rich children went to school. One of my great grandfathers was sent into the coal mines when he was seven. Small boys could fit into small, cramped areas too narrow for bigger men, or pushed coal cars through dark passageways. Small children were used as chimney sweeps, a horrible life spending days in sooty chimneys, usually contracting early lung disease.

In 1842, in Manchester, 1 tenth of the population lived in cellars. !2,000 families were on charity. Work was for 14-16 hours per day six days a week. There were no unions until 1835 when The Factory Act restricted children to not more than 48 hours of work per week, and that they had to spend two days in school. In 1842, the Mines Act stopped the employment of boys under the age of ten from working in the coal mines. One of my great grandmothers was sixteen when employed as a servant in a wealthy person's home, and had only Sunday afternoons off. Most of the money she earned, went to her family.

Just compare our lives today with those of people living just over one hundred years ago. Which of the marvelous inventions and advancements we enjoy, would we give up?

When those of our ancestors came to earth knowing they would never enjoy what we have, nor know the gospel, I believe they sacrificed that much, in the hopes that we would find their names, and know as much as we can about them. That as their hearts turned to us in the pre-existence, our hearts would turn to them in our time. We owe that to them.