Weaste Cemetery

Biographies of people buried between 1940 & 49

Sarah Alice Kenyon (1871 - 1941)


 

Sarah was the youngest daughter of a family Butcher of Derby Road, Salford. She did not marry and appears to have had a comfortable life with two of her spinster sisters. However, she committed suicide in 1941 in a most peculiar way.

 

She was born on 29th January 1871 at Liverpool Road, Manchester, and was baptised on 26th February 1871 in Manchester. Her father was John Kenyon (born 1821 in Manchester) who was a Family Butcher and her mother was Susannah (nee Ridgway) Kenyon (born 1828 in Manchester). They were married in 1853 at Manchester Cathedral. Sarah's siblings all born in Manchester, were: Caroline Matilda (born 1854), John (born 1856), Louisa (born 1858) James (born 1860), Emily (born 1862) and Alfred (1867). In 1871 they lived at Liverpool Road, Manchester, in 1881 and 1891, they lived at 38 Derby Street Salford. In April 1895 father John Kenyon died and was buried at Weaste Cemetery, grave AA10/CE/2393 and in September 1904, Susannah died and was re-united with her husband at Weaste Cemetery.

 

In 1921 Sarah Alice (aged 50) lived with her sister Caroline Matilda (aged 65) at 893, Chester Road, Stretford, Manchester. Caroline Matilda died on 23rd June 1929, aged 74, and was buried at Weaste Cemetery, grave A5/DISS/46 on 27th June. In the 1939 Register, Sarah Alice (aged 68), was living with her sister Emily (aged 76) at 893, Chester Road, Stretford, Manchester. Two years later, on 7th March 1941, Emily died at Chester Road, aged 77 and was buried with her older sister Caroline at Weaste Cemetery grave A5/DISS/46. And sadly 8 days later, on 15th March 1941, Sarah Alice could not cope and committed suicide in the Bridgewater Canal at Sale, Cheshire, aged 70. She was initially buried at Sale Cemetery by Home Office Order, but then was exhumed and was buried with her sisters Caroline and Emily at Weaste Cemetery grave A5/DISS/46 on 25th July 1945.

 

The Manchester Evening News of 27th March 1941 had the headline "Woman with Knife Wounds Slid into the Canal." It followed with "Before drowning herself in the Bridgewater Canal at Sale, an elderly Stretford Woman appeared to have inflicted wounds on her body with knives at her home, it was stated at an Inquest in Sale today. The woman was identified as Sarah Alice Kenyon, aged 70, of Chester Road, Stretford. Dr Davidson said he had been treating Miss Kenyon for nervous depression, and she had made good progress, until her sister, with whom she lived, died on March 7th. Police Constable Harper said he broke into the house on Monday and found an assortment of bloodstained knives on the kitchen table. Mrs Irene Adshead of Lynn Avenue, Sale, said from her window, which overlooked the canal, she saw an elderly woman take off her hat, sit down on the bank, and slide gradually into the water. The Coroner said there were wounds on her wrist and neck and below her heart. Which could have been self-inflicted, and concluded that she took her own life whilst of unsound mind. Verdict: asphyxia due to drowning, whilst of unsound mind."

 

A notice appeared in the Guardian of 8th Nov. 1941 for selling the First Freehold Chief Rents of Sarah Ann Kenyon for 107 houses and 12 shops, for a gross estimate of £3,322 per annum. Another notice advertised an auction to sell her valuable jewellery.