Letter From a ‘Lunatic’

The Poor Law Union Correspondence preserved in series MH 12 at the UK’s National Archives provides a fascinating window into social welfare and public health in the Victorian era. The records are focused on the busy administration and operations that went into providing ‘relief’ to the poorest members of their local communities, in particular through workhouses, but they’re also a treasure-trove of individual human stories.

The records span, roughly, two-thirds of a century — from 1834, when Poor Law was radically overhauled and the Poor Law Unions set up, to 1900. The series comprises nearly 17,000 volumes but only 200 have been fully catalogued. Partial indexes survive in companion series MH 15 — to learn how to use these series, you can refer to one of TNA’s own guides: ‘A Student’s Guide to: Researching nineteenth century public health at The National Archives’.

Back in 2021 I was searching through a few volumes for evidence of my ancestor Harriet Horlock, a nurse who worked for several London unions. Browsing through hundreds of official letters, receipts, posters, pamphlets and other records took me into the visceral physical world of Victorian London, from certificates issued to Bone Grinders and Dissolvers, to concerns about washhouses, vaccination guidelines and emergency responses to disease epidemics. In Poplar, 1881, there was such a surge of hospital admissions due to smallpox that the Union recruited four paupers from within the workhouse to work as Assistant Nurses in the smallpox wards (a female silk weaver whose child was being cared for by friends, a man formerly in ‘HM service’, a widowed laundress and a cabman). They would be paid a shilling per day in addition to the resident rations.

However, it was individual handwritten letters that particularly captured my sympathy and imagination. One of those was found in volume ‘Poplar 282A’ (MH 12/7697), which contains the correspondence of the Poplar Union from 1881-1882. The entire letter that caught my attention is shown and transcribed below …

Royal Courts of Justice

April 3d, 1882

My Lords —

Permit me to draw your attention to the Workhouses — On Saturday April 1st I left the Poplar Workhouse Female Lunatic Department after a wretched sojourn there of 12 days — I have not to complain of the Doctor — or other officials, they did what they could for me & sympathised — but what comfort can a poor lady have who is suffering from an internal strain, in a place where the beds are so narrow —  short & hard that one cannot even turn without falling out, as was my case the second night — The food is very well for workhouse fare, but was too coarse for me to digest. & the other patients cried & begged to go home — most miserable company
This Lunatic Ward is considered a Trial place to ascertain if persons are “lunatics” — It is a means for relations to get out of the way all those who are in their way — or who from any cause are indisposed — They thrust in anyone who is low-spirited — nervous. or excited, affirming these persons are suffering from “delusions” or wish “to commit suicide” —These unfortunate beings, who have simply the aches and pains common to human nature are detained whether willing or unwilling, & can be conveyed to a Lunatic Asylum & “put away” without anyone’s knowledge — This, as more than one patient said to me — enough to drive them mad —They sit still from morning to night & count the hours & cry. We all cried one morning.

May I ask if this is a free country? What right have such institutions to exist? 

What right have members of a free nation to be considered “lunatics” because they do not all think — feel — & do alike? 

What right have persons to be told they have “delusions” simply because they cannot prove all they assert? 
What right have persons to make their fellow creatures lives harder and bitterer than they even are?
I was told that at the regular Lunatic Asylums they beat the patients with wet cloths — so as to leave no mark
The more one sees of the English nations, the more one feels what brute creatures they naturally are
It ought to be made criminal for anyone to be called a “Lunatic” 
In many cases they give the patient something to excite or upset them and then say they are mad

I have the honour 
to remain your humble servant,

Catherine Bouchier Phillimore

I must also observe that as patients are admitted at all hours of the night — the wards are never quiet — Ought they to be admitted after 10pm?

This powerfully emotive letter was written by a woman whose voice — literate and self-assured — suggests a background of much greater education and comfort than would have been experienced by most workhouse inmates. The 1881 census for Poplar workhouse, transcribed by Peter Higginbotham, shows that the vast majority were working class labourers, craftspeople or servants. 

Catherine’s privilege comes across in her complaints about the beds and the ‘coarse’ food. Many of her fellow inmates would have been used to harsh sleeping arrangements and poor quality food (if they could afford to eat at all), and although the discomfort of the workhouse would have been extreme even to most of them, they would rarely have had the means, or the time, to complain about it. However, her privilege also empowered her to shine a light on unfair and cruel practices and to stand up for the rights of all those who had been in the same situation. In 2024, it seems obvious to us that people with mental health problems, including the ones ‘common to human nature’, such as depression and anxiety, will not thrive in conditions that are noisy and disruptive, or grim and austere. 

I’m not able to judge whether Catherine’s complaints about Poplar’s lunatic ward were justified. However, I learned that the ward was quite new, as an entirely new workhouse building had replaced the old one only a decade earlier¹. And the lunatic ward may not have been crowded, as in the 1881 census, only one inmate (male) was stated to be a lunatic, and eight were noted to be an ‘imbecile’. Nevertheless, Catherine’s letter indicates that many more might have been treated as suspected ‘lunatics’, like herself.

Despite having been considered insane, and, in her own words, ‘suffering from an internal strain’, she sounds like a voice of reason. I had to find out more about her!

Catherine Phillimore appears in several admissions and discharge registers. They reveal that her spell in the workhouse in March 1882 was neither the first nor the last time that she’d been admitted to an institution.

‘Bow Road Infirmary Admissions and Discharges’ show that she had been admitted to Bow Workhouse Infirmary on 11 October 1881 and discharged on 22 November 1881.² Within the same dates, she also appears in ‘Admissions and Discharges of Paupers’ for Homerton Workhouse and ‘Admissions and Discharges of Imbeciles & Lunatics in Bow’. These records show that she was then 40 years old (in fact she was 44), a single woman, had no ‘calling’ (occupation), and was not able-bodied (no more details are given about her disability). She was admitted by the order of J C Webb and had entered via the Casual Ward, but was discharged on her own request.

Then, on 13 May 1882, just six weeks after Catherine wrote the letter, she was admitted as a private (i.e., paying) patient to St Andrew’s Asylum in Northampton. Sadly, she remained there almost 20 years, until her death on 6 January 1902.

So who was Catherine Bouchier Phillimore and what had caused her to be taken to the workhouse lunatic ward, and then to an asylum?

Catherine had been registered at the workhouse as a pauper … but her father was Sir John Phillimore, a Naval Captain whose service in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars led to his knighthood in 1821. Sir John married at the age of almost 50 in 1830 to Catherine Harriet Baronin von Raigersfeld — daughter of a baron and granddaughter of the Austrian minister at the Court of St James’s. They rapidly had eight children; Catherine Bouchier, the sixth, was born at the family home, The Ray, at Cookham, Berkshire, on 30 September 1837.³ Several children had been given the middle name ‘Bouchier’, named after the Rev. Richard Bouchier, their neighbour and godparent, who left £15,000 to the six surviving Phillimore children. Sadly, Sir John Phillimore died in 1840⁴, two weeks before the birth of his eighth child, and Lady Catherine died in 1841, making Catherine an orphan at the age of four. In the will of Dame Catherine Harriet Phillimore, she left Catherine her topazes, her small watch, and all of the pictures hanging in their home except the portraits of Sir John. She appointed her brother in law, Dr Phillimore of Shiplake House (near Reading), and his son Robert Joseph Phillimore, as her children’s guardians as well as her executors. Another executor was Almeria Phillimore, daughter of her brother in law William Phillimore.⁵

William Phillimore was a barrister whose father-in-law was a director of the Bank of England. Dr Phillimore was Joseph, Sir John’s eldest brother, and a prominent ecclesiastical lawyer and MP. And his son Robert was also a barrister. By the time that Catherine wrote her ‘lunatic letter’ in 1882, Sir Robert Phillimore had become Judge of the High Court of Admiralty (the position also oversaw Probate and Divorce, and he was the last to hold that post after 400 years). Robert’s son Walter (later 1st Baron Phillimore) was also an eminent eccesiastical lawyer. These relations, and the family’s pre-eminence in Law, are central to Catherine’s story …

Newspapers reveal that as an adult, Catherine had a very strained relationship with several family members. In her late thirties, she lived with her unmarried sister Rebecca Bouchier Phillimore, who was one year older than Catherine. But in 1878 Catherine was summoned to court for assaulting and threatening Rebecca. She had approached Rebecca in a school quadrangle and, without provocation, hit her twice on the head with clenched fists, after which she said she regretted that due to wearing gloves, she didn’t hurt her as much as she’d hoped! She also told their landlady that the next time she saw her sister she would throttle her. Catherine wrote to the local Magistrate about her sister’s cruelty and spite, wishing that God would punish her, and she wrote to a vicar wishing that her sister would be struck by paralysis the next time she took Communion!

Catherine’s defence attorney claimed that this was in response to ‘temper and excitement, and real or supposed injury’, which strongly suggests that Catherine was suffering with poor mental health. Rebecca had been advised by a close male relation (probably their cousin, Sir Robert) to take her sister to court, since Catherine had ‘pursued a system of annoyance to Miss Rebecca and and other members of her family, till it was thought she was not answerable for her acts’. Two medical men had examined Catherine, but had not agreed on whether or not she was compos mentis. Catherine had even signed a document stating that she would receive a guinea each week as long as she didn’t ‘molest’ her family, by word or deed. But she continued to harass them. At the outcome of this trial, she was bound over for £50 and had to provide a surety of £25 for three months of good behaviour.⁶ 

In November 1880, Catherine was in court again, but this time she was the plaintiff —suing her cousin Sir Robert. Not only was he a respected member of the establishment, but he had been one of her legal guardians. According to Catherine, Sir Robert had agreed in writing that she would receive a weekly allowance, which he hadn’t paid, and she was therefore owed 70 weeks of payments at £1 10s per week and 207 weeks at £1 1s per week. In Phillimore v. Phillimore, at the Court of Common Pleas, Catherine conducted her own case; she had not employed a counsel because she had ‘no money whatever’. She explained that she was the daughter of a distinguished naval officer who died when she was two, was a ward of the Admiralty, and had received a small pension of £14 per year from the Admiralty (about £1400 today).

Catherine had produced 43 subpoenas to summon people to court as witnesses, and she had hand-delivered many of them herself. Writs were served to her cousin, Rev. George Phillimore (a son of barrister William); sister Rebecca and cousin Almeria; Lord Northbrook, First Lord of the Admiralty; Lord Shaftesbury; Sir Francis Truscott, Lord Mayor of London; John Walter, MP for Berkshire; and Sir Robert’s lifelong friend — the Chancellor of the Exchequer and past and future prime minister, William E Gladstone! Unfortunately for Catherine, her most illustrious witnesses failed to show up and she was unable to provide even ‘a tittle’ of evidence that would prove the specific agreement she was suing for.

However, two documents were made available: the agreement, mentioned above, to pay ‘Kate’ a guinea a week, and another to pay her £52 1s a year, both contingent on her good behaviour. The latter had been drawn up by a family friend and signed by Kate in the presence of her cousin Almeria. However, it was revealed that she although she had received some of the money, she had invested it unwisely, and when she became threatening, they had withdrawn the allowance.

Presiding over this case was Lord Chief Justice of England, Lord Coleridge. In Catherine’s final statement she declared that she had been “hunted through the country like a dog.” When she attempted to also raise a complaint about her sister’s conduct, Lord Coleridge said, “I cannot try that case; it is as much as I can do to try this one, you see.” (Laughter). Catherine was unable to prove that Sir Robert owed her any money. Unsurprisingly, she lost the case. ⁷

In December 1880 Catherine brought an action against her cousin Mrs Almeria Lake, who had been one of her mother’s executors. Almeria’s barrister father William Phillimore had, incidentally, been a Commissioner in Lunacy and the ‘Chancellor’s Visitor of Lunatics for Middlesex and Hertfordshire’ — roles that oversaw the treatment of mentally ill people in county asylums. Almeria had taken the witness stand in the previous trial to explain that Catherine had agreed to ‘hold her tongue’ in order to receive an allowance. Phillimore v Lake returned to this contract, and to Catherine’s claim that her cousin had not made all of the payments. According to the newspaper report, Catherine talked at length about her family, sharing ‘extraneous details’. She even claimed that she had been assaulted while trying to secure witnesses for her case, but yet again, ‘the judge told her she had altogether failed in establishing any claim’.⁸

Two months before Catherine wrote the letter about her treatment at Poplar, she took her cousin Sir Robert to court again, this time for libel. By this time, Robert had been made a Baronet. Catherine’s grievance was that he had imputed that she was a lunatic and not a responsible person. It was evidently not her first appearance in court on this matter: ‘Miss Phillimore now appeared in person in support of one of her numerous applications in the cause’. The application in the case of Phillimore vs Phillimore, Bart. was dismissed for the third time, and she was discouraged from taking it further. Sir Robert’s lawyer (who had also represented him and Mrs Lake in 1880) asked ‘in kindness’ for her to pay the costs, to which she replied “I do not want any kindness. I have no money, but you do not know what powerful friends I have.”⁹

Just a few days later, Catherine significantly upped the ante, bringing a case against the Admiralty! Catherine appeared at the Queen’s Bench in the case of Phillimore vs. Northbrook and Others, in front of a Special Jury, claiming that the Admiralty had illegally detained pension papers belonging to her (perhaps the ones she had been unable to locate for the previous hearing). Senior members of the Admiralty were called as witnesses, as was the Lord Chief Justice! Sir Robert said that he didn’t know what papers she was referring to, while Mr W H Smith (former First Lord of the Admiralty and the second generation of the famous stationer’s business), said he had seen no papers of hers, but that he had ordered his secretary to ‘write to the plaintiff to the effect that she had no moral or legal right against her relations, and to beg that he and his family should not be subjected to voluminous correspondence, which must at once cease’. Catherine then said she would like to call ‘Mr Justice Bowen, Sir Edmund Henderson, the Chief of Police, who had caused her great annoyance, and all the defendants.’ However, when asked if she could provide any evidence, ‘she said she thought not, as the documents had been torn up.’ So, once again, the judge found in favour of the defendants.¹⁰

Although we don’t hear from Catherine herself through the newspaper accounts, the descriptions of her speech and actions suggest that she was probably not, to use an antiquated term, ‘in sound mind’. About three weeks after losing her case against the Admiralty, Catherine found herself in Poplar’s female lunatic ward.

Having learned more about Catherine’s behaviour leading up to this event, the picture I now have of her is much more complex, and it is hard to sympathise with her actions. Her social status, and her knowledge of the legal system, enabled her to take personal grievances to the highest courts, but based on the newspaper accounts, she had no real cases to bring. She was self-important and was clearly a relentless letter writer, and had hounded a leading politician and his family with ‘voluminous’ correspondence. What’s more, if her family is to be believed, she was physically and verbally abusive towards them.

On the other hand, there are many reasons to sympathise with Catherine as a person. She’d been orphaned at a very young age and may not have had a happy childhood under the guardianship of her uncle and cousin. In adulthood, despite her ostensibly elevated position in society, and her remaining unmarried, she was not financially independent. Her family made her allowance contingent on her submissive behaviour, and withheld money from her when she didn’t comply. We also know that she wasn’t fully able-bodied, which would have further limited her independence. And it must have been frustrating to be an intelligent and dynamic woman in a family full of male high-achievers who had a wealth of opportunities not available to her. She couldn’t go to university, become a barrister, join the Navy or participate in politics and governance. Her insistence on taking her enemies to court could be viewed as impaired judgment but also suggests that she was trying to gain some power, control and respect.

It’s interesting to compare her case with that of another indignant letter-writer in the family — her cousin, the Rev. George Phillimore. While travelling first-class by train in 1838, he’d been ‘collared’ by a train employee and policeman, who accused him of not having a valid ticket, and fined him seven shillings. He penned numerous letters to the railway company, but was dissatisfied with their response, and threatened to take them to court. However, in the end, rather than litigation, he sent bombastic letters about his experience to The Times. His public letter was met with popular support and an editorial in the Northampton Herald that portrayed him as a gentleman-hero. It’s true that he had more genuine cause for complaint than Catherine did when she took her relations to court, but as a man, a gentleman, and a clergyman, he was given a mouthpiece for an individual complaint and then applauded for making a mountain out of a molehill.

So, Catherine faced disadvantages despite her family’s titles. But I also sympathise with her because she was suffering from mental illness in an era where this was only just beginning to be understood. And rather than finding a safe and comfortable place for her where she could do no harm to herself or others her family chose to place her in a paupers’ asylum. Why?

Newspaper accounts make frequent reference to her relationships to celebrated men in her family, including a powerful judge (her cousin), a Naval hero of the Napoleonic wars (her father), and a lauded Naval Captain (her brother, Rear-Admiral Henry Bouchier Phillimore). However, within the family, there had also been scandals: Catherine’s oldest brother, John Bouchier Phillimore, had been bound to keep the peace after threatening a fisherman with a gun, and in 1865 was murdered while collecting rent. And a generation earlier, her uncle George Phillimore, a Lieutenant on HMS Polyphemus, had been mortally wounded in a duel with Lieutenant John Medlicott.¹¹ These events must have been mortifying for the family.

Given the importance to the family of their public reputation, their decisions to take her to court for assault, and to a workhouse rather than straight to a private asylum, are surprising. Perhaps a public demonstration of her mental instability helped them to reinforce the claim that she was not capable of managing her own affairs (or, by implication, to inherit money). And perhaps admitting her to a workhouse lunatic ward was meant to punish and cow her after she had launched acts of public litigation against a high-profile family member and the Admiralty. It’s also probable that Catherine was truly penniless, and that for a time, her family was unwilling to provide any financial assistance. Catherine found herself powerless to prevent her family from forcing her into an asylum (a place where “relations … get out of the way all those who are in their way“). But despite her harrowing experience at the pauper lunatic ward, Catherine did spend her final years in a private asylum that had been founded to provide ‘‘humane’ care to the mentally ill‘. St Andrew’s hospital was within an elegant 106 acre estate, with a chapel designed by Sir Gilbert Scott (whose son later became a patient).

It was very interesting to discover that Catherine’s sister Rebecca also spent time in asylums, but only, as far as I know, received private care. She had been admitted to Peckham House as a private patient in August 1882, just a few months after Catherine had been admitted to St Andrew’s, and she was discharged from that institution in May 1883.¹¹ She died in another private asylum (the cutting-edge Barnwood House Hospital in Gloucester) in 1902, only six months after Catherine. Unlike Catherine, Rebecca made a will. Her executor was the author of a book about the Phillimore family, which describes Rebecca’s devotion to church work but only gives the briefest mention of Catherine’s life.

It seems that Catherine was an embarrassment to her family, and has been almost written out of her family history, but her letter, tucked within one of 70,000 volumes of correspondence, still resonates with fiery intelligence and a passion for justice. Catherine addressed the letter about her treatment at Poplar to the Lords at the Royal Courts of Justice. It’s unlikely that they saw it before it ended up in the files of Poplar Union, or that any action was taken in response to her valid critiques. Nevertheless, the document was initialled by several people, who might not have given an impassioned letter from a less distinguished person as much of their attention (the irony is not lost on me that I have also focused my attention on a letter from an unusually wealthy workhouse resident).

Her father, who she never really knew, was said to be ‘generous’, ‘gentle and just’, with a ‘love of truth’. His ear was always open to the ‘poor and unfriended’, and he was the first person to suggest street refuges (writing to The Times with his recommendation). Catherine had her own axe to grind, but I think she also genuinely hoped to make a difference for people like her, at all levels of society, who were being treated so inhumanely. “What right have members of a free nation to be considered “lunatics” because they do not all think — feel — & do alike?”

How many more people’s stories can be found in the fascinating Poor Law Union Correspondence … still waiting to be told?

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Updates:

1. As I was putting the final touches to this blog I discovered that Catherine’s letter is part of TNA’s online classroom resources on workhouse women. You can view it along with seven other letters that highlight the treatment of women here. 
2. A few weeks after posting this blog, I was contacted by Catherine’s great nephew, Edmund Phillimore, a grandson of her brother Henry Bouchier Phillimore. Edmund very kindly shared with me a detailed account he has written of Catherine’s life, as well as his transcriptions of family letters and diaries. So, here follows some ‘bonus material’ …

I learned that although on paper, Joseph and Robert Phillimore were the guardians of Catherine and her siblings, the children seem to have been raised by their uncle and aunt, William and Almeria Phillimore. Catherine lived with them until the age of 21 (except when she was away at school). William and Almeria’s eight children were adults when Catherine was orphaned. The eldest of their children was Catherine’s cousin Almeria, who features in my article. Edmund believes that Almeria took a close and life-long interest in the welfare of her orphaned cousins.

Catherine and Rebecca attended school together in Hadley Green (from at least 1848-1851) and they lived together in 1861. However, later in life, before being admitted to asylums, they lived apart. Edmund told me that ‘Rebecca was closely involved with one of the Maidenhead Churches, whereas my impression is that Catherine did not share Rebecca’s zeal!’

A collection of Henry Bouchier’s letters is in Hampshire Archives. In these letters he refers to his sisters with affection, including ‘Kate’. However, as Edmund writes:

From HBP’s letters it is evident that during the subsequent decade [after 1861], Kate upset a number of relatives and friends. She seems to have increasingly sorry for herself, imagining that as the daughter of a distinguished Naval Officer and grand daughter of a Baron she deserved to be better supported by the Admiralty, relatives and friends than she was. I suspect that having lost both her parents and the security of their love before she was 5 years old, Kate craved attention and looked for status.
Living in London she might have become envious of her elder cousins who were prosperous and were well established in society?

In two of HBP’s letters written in November 1876, Cate has been upsetting people and bothering Augustus at his office (Eventually Admiral Sir Augustus Phillimore, HBP’s first cousin). On his return from the West Indies in 1873, HBP had found that she was making free use of the names of two Admiralty Board members, Mr Goschen and Admiral Sir Alexander Milne. HBP had spoken to both of them. While Mr Goschen was not pleased, Admiral Milne had been more understanding, having pity for both Kate and her younger sister Fanny. In the second of these letters HBP assures Augustus that that he has written to Kate telling her “that unless she kept her promise to Admiral Drew more strictly, she would force me to discontinue my weekly guinea.” He has received £101.2.0 for her support from relatives and friends. My guess is that this is Admiral Andrew Drew, who had served under Sir John and wrote the fullest biography of him that I have. HBP discusses Cate’s support in a letter written from Dublin in 1879. He has arranged an overdraft of £50 with Stillwells, his agent in London. But does not wish to inflict Cate’s affairs on his agent. Cate has recently received a legacy from Lady George Gordon, but he does not know how much.

Writing from Somerset in August 1880 he refers to Cate’s law suit scheduled for November. He details the contributions he has received towards her support, but has ceased to send her money partly because of a conversation with his cousin Charles and partly because Kate had threatened to put the law in force against him. It seems that Kate had become increasingly alienated from her closest relatives.

The letters also reveal that Henry’s three unmarried sisters were costing him some £320 annually. His annual salary was £600, and he had his own wife and children to support, so this was a huge financial responsibility. Many other family members contributed to ease the burden on Henry. Edmund believes that it would have been Henry who had Catherine admitted to an asylum. However, he states that Henry took the responsibility of caring for his sisters seriously. And until coming across my blog he was not aware that she had been in a pauper asylum.

I was delighted that Edmund was able to share photographs of Catherine and Rebecca. The lead image in this blog is now a portrait of Catherine.

With sincere thanks to Edmund Phillimore for his gracious contributions to my blog post about his fascinating ancestor.

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References:

1. Poplar workhouse, Workhouses.org
2. London Metropolitan Archives; London, England; London Poor Law Hospital Registers; Roll Number: CBG/323/001
3. Morning Post, 4 October 1837, p4
4. A eulogy-like announcement of his death can be found in the Reading Mercury, S28 March 1840, p3
5. Will of Dame Catherine Harriet Phillimore, The National Archives; Kew, Surrey, England; Records of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Series PROB 11; Class: PROB 11; Piece: 1958
6. ‘Contending Sisters’, Brief, 15 November 1878, p13; Western Gazette, 22 November 1878, p2; and ‘Extraordinary Conduct of a Lady’, Western Gazette, 22 November 1878, p6
7.  ‘An Extraordinary Case’, Dublin Evening Telegraph, 17 November 1880, p4; ‘Remarkable Action against Sir R Phillimore’, Manchester Times, 20 November 1880, p7; and ‘Phillimore v. Phillimore’, The Times (date and page unknown; transcription from Edmund Phillimore).
   Note: Gladstone is only named as ‘Mr Gladstone’; Catherine had handed a subpoena to his private secretary. Given the high status of other witnesses, and William E Gladstone’s close friendship with Sir Robert Phillimore, I believe this must have been the future PM.
8. London Daily Chronicle, 3 December 1880, p3
9. ‘Action against Sir R Phillimore by his sister’ (family relationships are frequently incorrect in news coverage of Catherine), Manchester Evening News , 18 February 1882, px and Weekly Dispatch (London), 19 February 1882, p10
10.  ‘Action against the Admiralty’, Globe, 23 February 1882, p5 and ‘The Phillimore Claim against the Admiralty’, St James’s Gazette, 23 February 1882, p9
11. The National Archives of the UK; Commissioners in Lunacy, 1845–1913. Lunacy Patients Admission Registers, Series MH 94; Piece: 5

Further Sources:

In addition to the embedded links and footnotes, I have learned about the Phillimore family from the following online resources:

• Genealogy of the Family of Phillimore (see family tree on p. 392)
• Sir John Phillimore, The Peerage
• The Phillimore Estate in Kensington, British History Online
• Sir John Phillimore Memorial, Imperial War Museums
• The Lunacy Commission: Chancery Visitors, Middlesex University
• FindAGrave entry for Rebecca Bouchier Phillimore
• WALTER GEORGE FRANK PHILLIMORE, BARONET, BARON PHILLIMORE OF SHIPLAKE (1845 – 1929), The Commercial Court of England and Wales
• The Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage of the British Empire Part 2, 1883 (see below)

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Additional research could look at the records of her legal cases, and the records of the asylum where she spent the last twenty years of her life.