Ambling around Beacon Edge cemetery a few weeks ago (visiting family graves, and taking photos of others to upload to FindaGrave), I chanced upon a Celtic cross with a faded inscription:
Countess Boris OSSALINSKY, daughter of Edward JACKSON of
Armboth, died at 30 Pembridge Square, London, W. 28th
January 1902, 81 years.
A countess, with an eastern European or Russian surname, but clearly of Cumbrian origin – what was she doing buried on the hillside above Penrith?
The answer turned out to be so fantastic that someone has written a whole book about her. It is called Countess Ossalinsky & the Thirlmere Dam, by Ian Hall, and can be bought from good old Amazon here:
Having downloaded a copy, there is nothing I can add to its contents. But, ‘spoiler alert’ (!), I will tell a little of the countess’ story, to accompany the photo of her grave.
Who was the Countess Ossalinsky?
Well for a start, ‘Boris’ was, of course, her husband’s name. Possibly. If he was actually Count Ossalinsky. Which is far from certain.
The lady’s name was Mary. And she was the daughter of Edward Washington Jackson, a solicitor, and his wife Mary, née Banks.
She sadly died in 1821, when ‘our’ Mary was still a baby. Edward died just four years later, joining his wife in the Jackson family vault at Crosthwaite Church.
And leaving little Mary to be brought up by her grandparents, Wilson and Sarah Jackson, of Armboth House.
Armboth House
A ‘to let’ notice in 1849 describes it thus:
LAKE RESIDENCE TO LET. ARMBOTH HOUSE. TO LET, for Seven or more Years, —That delightful Country Residence, ARMBOTH HOUSE, situate in the sweetest Nook of one of the most Picturesque Vales of the Lake District, being near the Foot of Thirlmere Lake, and about Six Miles from Keswick, and near the Coach Road to Ambleside.
The Mansion consists of Dining and Drawing Rooms, Library, Servants Hall, Kitchen, Dairy, &c., on the Ground Floor, with numerous Rooms and comfortable Attics above; along with Coach House, Stables, and other requisites; Garden, Lawn, and with or without about Thirty Acres of Iand, surrounding the Premises, all having been in the Possession of the late W. Jackson, Esq., till recently.
Mr. Adam Wilkinson, on the place, will show the Premises.
Armboth had reportedly been the home of the Jacksons ‘for centuries’.
It was to let, as Sarah Jackson had died the year before, her husband Wilson Jackson having died, aged 89, in 1844.
Wealthy heiress
In 1834, Wilson’s uncle John Jackson died at Armboth, aged 93 and with no family bar his nephew. It was reported that:
In early life, he visited the metropolis and met employment with a mercantile house… retired with a very large fortune to his native vale.
Wilson’s son Edward had pre-deceased him. His second so, John, likewise. There were other relations: an Eliza Hardy, ‘youngest daughter the late Robt Jackson of Armboth House,’ died near Whitehaven in 1846.
But Wilson’s heir was granddaughter Mary.
And everyone, in advance, knew that.
Count Ossalinsky
The man who called himself Count Boris Ossalinsky caused quite a stir in Keswick society in the 1830s. A polyglot, he claimed to be from a noble Polish family, forced to flee after the 1830/31 Polish rebellion against Russian rule. This went down well in Keswick, as did his ‘high character’ and erudition. He could converse on educated topics and was an enthusiastic amateur chemist. In the staid world of 1830s Cumbria, it’s hardly surprising he was welcomed by ‘the best society’.
And in 1839, when Mary Jackson was still only 19, and the count 29, there were “great rejoicings” when she married him.
The children
The happy couple lived at Chestnut Hill, with half a dozen servants. A son, Wladimir Boris Jackson Ossalinksy, was born in 1840. Daughters followed in 1841 and 1842, but the June quarter that year shows the deaths of both Nathalia Borisowna Ludwina Henrietta, and Olga Borisowna Theodoria Nathalia.
With ‘Nathalia’ clearly an important name to Boris, a final child, Nathalia Olga, arrived in 1843.
She was to survive, and in 1862 marry a man called William Harrison. (He died in 1878).
Wladimir was to change his name to Wladimir Boris Jackson Ossalinksy Jackson. He was to attain the rank of Captain, serving in the Royal Cumberland Militia.
The trouble starts
By the time Wilson Jackson died, in February 1844, the shine had faded from Count Boris Ossalinsky. The impoverished count had, before his marriage, relied on others to fund his lifestyle, and continued to rack up large debts he had no means of paying.
Wilson Jackson sought to have him declared banktrupt in 1843. And rewrote his will specifically to exclude Boris from any further access to his fortune. His estate was tied in knots that were to keep lawyers busy for at least six decades!
Whether it was because he realised the Jackson fortune was not coming to him (as husband of Mary), or whether he felt he’d outlasted his credit (in both senses) in Keswick, but he didn’t stick around. He left for France, and died overseas in 1859.
Countess Ossalinsky
Mary lived at Armboth for a few years, till he1848, when her grandmother Sarah died. Whatever she thought of her absent husband, she continued to go by the name Countess Ossalinsky.
The 1851 census shows her living in Middlegate, Penrith, with Nathalie (sic), a nurse, a cook and a groom. Young Wladimir was away at school, but, aged 20, was back with them in 1861.
1871 puts her address as 28 Middlegate: Mary Ossalinsky, a visitor called Louise Raffeul, and a different cook, housemaid and groom.
1881 lists her for the first time as Countess Mary Ossalinsky, and the address as Musgrave Hall. A year later, she was to move, with Nathalie, to Kensington, London. 1891 shows them at 30 Pembridge Square, with seven domestic servants.
Thirlmere reservoir
Carlisle Archives contains six boxes of documents relating to Ossalinsky v Manchester Corporation. The short version is that in the 1870s, Manchester needed drinking water, decided to flood Thirlmere to make a resevoir, and ran up against Mary.
The reservoir was, of course, built. But the corporation had to pay Mary £70,000 for the Armboth estate, having initially offered her £25,000.
The end
Countess Ossalinsky died on January 28, 1902, at the home of her daughter Nathalie Harrison, in London. But interestingly, rather than London or Crosthwaite, she returned one last time to Penrith, to Beacon Edge.