Harriet Stokes
Harriet Stokes (✦???? - †1859) was a female who lived as a male bricklayer in 19th century England.
Harriet Stokes appeared in the village of Whitby, near Doncaster, England in the early 19th century. She was about 8 years old at the time and said that she had run away from home. She went to see the local bricklayer and offered her services. The bricklayer took her as a boy and she gave her name as Harry.
Harry Stokes kept living as a man for years afterward. He even married but his first wife left him after the wedding night with a comment that "he was not a man". So he lived with a widow that kept a pub.
1820s and 1830s
In the 1820s and 30s Harry Stokes built up a successful bricklaying firm in Manchester. At its peak, he employed eight men and an apprentice, with his wife keeping the company accounts. He was a well-respected tradesman specializing in chimney and flue construction.
From 1824 he is listed in Manchester trade directories as a bricklayer. The 1824 Pigot & Dean's Manchester and Salford Directory lists Henry Stokes living at 13 Potter Street. From 1828 to 1830 he lived at 11 Cumberland Street, and from 1832 to 1838 at 21 Cumberland Street. The area where Harry and his wife lived is now Spinningfields– Cumberland Street was on the site where The Avenue is today.
In the late 1820s and early 1830s, Harry worked shifts as a special constable policing events where there were large gatherings of people with the potential for trouble, such as protest marches and demonstrations.
In the Public Officials section of the 1829 Pigot's trade directory, Harry is listed as a Special Constable for the 13th District of Manchester, the Old Quay District. Then in the 1832 Pigot's Manchester Directory, he is registered as a Special Constable for the 11th District, St. Peter's District.
1838 press reports and ballads
In April 1838, after twenty-two years of marriage, Harry's wife approached a lawyer for advice on getting a formal separation and a maintenance settlement as he was withholding housekeeping money, getting drunk and ill-treating her. She advised the shocked lawyer that her husband was not a man, but a woman, and "also stated, that she accidentally made the discovery of the sex of her husband as much as two or three years back; but that she had kept the secret till the present time." Harry Stokes was examined by a police surgeon who "gave a certificate declaring that the individual in question was a woman". The Manchester Guardian stated "This woman-man, who, for probably more than five-and-twenty years, has succeeded in concealing her sex, and in pursuing a trade of more than ordinarily masculine and hazardous description, with a degree of skill and ability which had led to her establishment of a good business in this town". Although news articles stated that "her real name is believed to be Harriet Stoakes", there is no evidence that Stokes ever confirmed his name assigned at birth to be Harriet.
Harry Stokes's gender became the subject of gossip and ridicule around Manchester. Ballads were composed about him and sung in the streets. There is some evidence that the ballads told the tale of an ill-fated, one-day marriage to a barmaid called Betsy. On the wedding day, Harry managed to play the part of a groom well enough, but on the wedding night there was a terrible row and he was charged with assault and sentenced to two months in jail. At his court hearing, Betsy declared that she wouldn't live with her husband because he was really a woman.
Stokes became a master brick setter and built chimneys and fire grates. During the Chartist riots, he became a special constable and a captain of his company. However, in his later years, his business faltered.
In October 1859 he was found dead in River Irwell, standing upright in the water, hat still on his head. His body was taken to a nearby pub where he was officially recognized. The coroner was ready to declare the death a simple suicide when one of the locals remembered the words of Stoke's first wife. He sent two women to confirm the fact that Harry Stokes was physically a female.
The case was recorded in half a column in the Manchester Weekly Advertiser.
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