William Worth

William Worth

1789-1878

One of the leading lawyers in Bourne during the early 19th century was William Worth although his reputation has become little more than a footnote to the career of his son Charles who, by the accident of his father's profligacy, left home when still a boy and achieved international fame in France.

William Worth was a successful solicitor but he had a flamboyant and irresponsible lifestyle, notably gambling, drinking and a penchant for speculative investments, all of which contributed to his downfall.

He was the son of William Worth (1737-1812) who originated from Horbling near Bourne, and married Ann Tyler there on 3rd July 1788. Their son, who they called William after his father, was born at Horbling and baptised there on 18th September 1789. The couple also had another son called Henry and a daughter, Elizabeth. William senior was an attorney at law with offices in North Street, Bourne, but in later years he took on a partner, Benjamin Smith (1776-1858), and although William Worth died on 11th January 1812 at the age of 75, the firm continued to be called Smith & Worth until 1822.

William junior joined the firm as a clerk but was soon in trouble because of his bad habits. Benjamin Smith kept diaries that record occasional glimpses of his conduct. On 12th May 1813, he wrote that William had become extremely drunk while attending the Folkingham fair when he lost all of his money and somehow ended up in Edinburgh from where he was rescued by his brother Henry who brought him back to Bourne where he was reinstated. There was further trouble after another drunken bout on 17th October 1817 but he was allowed to remain at the office as a clerk. He eventually qualified as a solicitor and subsequently took over the practice, married a local girl, Mary Ann Quincy on 2nd December 1816, and set up home at Wake House in North Street where his offices were also situated.

The couple had five children, William (1819), Harriet (1821), Sarah (1824) and Charles (1824) who died in infancy followed by another son, Charles Frederick, who was born on 13th October 1825 when the couple followed the practice that was usual at the time of giving him the same name and he was destined to become the Charles Worth of fashion history.

William Worth is mentioned as the legal adviser in many of the land and property transactions taking place in Bourne at that time. But his extravagant lifestyle continued and despite matrimony, he did not mend his ways and as the drinking, gambling and bad investments continued, the debts piled up and drove him into bankruptcy. He finally deserted his wife and children in 1836 after his affairs collapsed, leaving them homeless and destitute, and in desperation, Mrs Worth sought help from wealthy relatives living at Billingborough who employed her as a housekeeper while Charles was forced to leave school at the age of 11 and went to work at a local linen shop to help earn his keep and often delighted the ladies of the village by making them intricate lace caps.

After a while, he became apprenticed to a printer in Bourne and so ended any chance of him entering the legal profession as had been intended. It was an occupation that brought him no pleasure and a year later, he confessed his unhappiness to his mother and so it was arranged that he should go to London and be apprenticed to a draper and he was put on a stagecoach to the capital to start his new life. In later years, William Worth made an attempt to contact Charles but the approach was rebuffed and they never met or spoke again.

His exact whereabouts from then on is a mystery. When he left the town, he went to live in London. His impoverishment had cost him Wake House which he had been forced to sell and the new owner was William Darwin of Elston Hall in Nottinghamshire but it was later acquired by G W Willders, a solicitor, who had taken over Worth's practice. In 1853, two years after Willders died, the property was bought by the solicitor Mr Stephen Andrews.

Charles Worth, who had been born there, had gone on to an illustrious career in international fashion and a happy family life in France where he died in 1895. He had become one of the richest men in Paris, awarded the country's highest accolade, the Legion of Honour, and the president of the republic was among the 2,000 people who attended his funeral. Little however is known of his father's later years. William Worth came back to Lincolnshire and lived for while at Horbling where he again practised as a solicitor but he eventually retired and moved to Billingborough where he died in 1878, aged 90, although there is no record of where he is buried.