Angel's pet theory about Mrs Riddle and Tom

[Angel Moules]

No: HPFGUIDX 86828

This has been posted on Le Cafe Dangereux, and alludes to some things on 
Red Hen Publications (brilliant site, worth the effort to find the essays).

I read the bit about the Vauxhall Road, and thought nothing of it, until 
I happened to visit the old Bedlam Hospital, now known as the Imperial 
War Museum, which is in the right sort of vicinity and it struck me. 
What if the riddles had decided to make use of their money, and put 
Tom's mum (Thomasina for the purposes of this) into Bedlam, it being the 
most famous Psychiatric institution in the world, because they thought 
she was utterly mad for saying she was a witch. When Tom was born, he 
was moved to the nearest orphanage, which would have been used to taking 
in such orphans, and perhaps a nurse from the hospital happened to catch 
up with him occasionally, and let slip how he'd come to be there.
I can see his father possibly giving a pittance to the orphanage, in 
order to keep it quiet, and that's how Tom found out, ironic really. The 
money stops for a while, because of the depression, and then starts 
again when britain re-arms.

As for the family riddle - I posit Little Hangleton as being based on 
one of the pit villages around Durham - Pity Me is probably my favourite 
choice. It's run down and decrepit. The area is famous for Coal (thus 
heavy industry and arms manufacture/ship building) and for the Tyne, and 
for outstanding natural Beauty. It wouldn't surprise me if the Riddle 
family had made their money in weapons manufacturing in the nineteenth 
century - originally a family of philanthropists, that became more 
selfish as the years went on, or else were publicly philanthropic and 
privately horrible. (c.f. The Blind Assassin, by Margaret Atwood - I 
know it's Canadian).
They bought a plot of land at the nice end of the village, and built a 
posh place that had stunning views over the local area. I'm wondering if 
Riddle had two sons - leaving LV with a muggle uncle that may have tried 
to take care of him and thomasina.
"The Hanged Man" suggests to me that the area might have been part of 
the 19th Century riots that gripped the countryside as farming was 
mordernised (c.f. Ulverton, by Adam Thorpe). It suggests a particular 
hanging, perhaps one where the locals were in sympathy with the criminal 
rather than the  victim.

I'd love to see JKR write the Riddle family history as a saga, 
completely Muggle of course.

Angel