The theme for this week’s #52 Ancestors is Preservation and I have been stumped to come up with a blog for this subject. Nothing inspired me to write about Preservation until I suddenly had a thought 10 minutes ago, one person I associate with Preservation is my Granny, Edith Pilbeam. Grandad had a large back garden at Beechcroft, Punnetts Town and although the garden is a steep slope it is south facing and he grew quite a number of crops, including Christmas Trees when he was retired, but that’s another story! When I was a child I remember the garden being full of vegetables like potatoes, runner beans, purple sprouting broccoli and cabbages. He also had blackcurrant bushes and the old apple tree which is still in the garden now, giving my brother a good yearly crop. Yes but this is supposed to be about Preservation, I hear you cry! Well in the days before freezers, preservation of fruit and veg was generally done by bottling and salting and granny had a larder full of jars of bottled runner beans in particular, as I remember. They would come out through the winter, jar by jar to provide home grown vegetables before you could go to the freezer and pick out a bag of frozen peas. She also used to make her own jam and marmalade, although my memories of that is more hazy, I’ve never been a great lover of jam. This was an excellent way of using up soft fruits such as raspberries, strawberries, gooseberries and anything you could forage from the hedgerow such as blackberries and elderberries. I guess that is what the blackcurrants were grown for, blackcurrant jam. That would have been one of those jobs granny would have carried out in the late summer, autumn ready for the winter. I remember that she had regular jobs she did each day of the week, washing in the twin tub on one day, probably Monday, ironing the next, hoovering and dusting on another, the same as there were set meals; the remains of Sunday’s roast would be minced on Monday. Fish on Wednesday after the visit from the Fish man. And we think we have life hard in 2022!
I have tried my hand at jam making but never very successfully, it either comes out too runny, not enough pectin or too set, too much pectin. We have also bottled fruit such as our plums when there has been a glut at various times and also used a glut to make chutneys, I think we still have some at the back of the cupboard! What about you? Do you preserve fruit and veg or do you have memories of mums and grandmothers doing the same when you were a child? Do you think it is something which should be revived particularly at this current time of hardship?
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This week’s theme for #52Ancestors is Road Trip and I am taking a road trip to a more distant part of my ancestry, the Rhoads family from Lincolnshire. Smith Rhoades was my great x3 grandfather and he was born 1833 in Orby, Lincolnshire. His parents were William and Elizabeth Rhoades and he had 4 brothers; John born 1821, William born 1823, Charles born 1824 and Joseph born 1831 and 4 sisters; Betsey born 1826, Emma born 1829, Susannah born 1835 and Mary Ann born 1840. His father William was a farmer on land in Orby that he owned. If we follow Smith through the census returns it shows the following: 1841 living with his parents on the farm in the village of Orby 1851 Groom at Boothby in the parish of Welton Le Marsh, a tiny hamlet between Orby and Welton Le Marsh 1861 by this time he had married and moved to Hurstpierpoint in Sussex where he was a Farm Bailiff 1871 Farm Bailiff in Eastbourne, Sussex 1881 Farm Labourer in Eastbourne 1891 Farm Labourer in Eastbourne 1901 Foreman on a Farm at Upper Dicker, Sussex 1911 retired Farm Bailiff living in Hove He died in 1919 on 6 June in Aldrington, Hove, described as a Market Gardener and died of Senile Decay. I don’t know why he left Lincolnshire for Sussex although I can speculate he was following work. But how would I find any clues as to why he left; find out where he was working at the time he left Lincolnshire and were there any links with Sussex, look at wages and conditions for farming in Lincolnshire and compare with Sussex in the 1850s. I’m guessing this all because it may not have been work at all. He married Maria Lee whose ancestry, as far as I have traced it was in Lincolnshire. In fact they don’t seem to have moved very far and back to the early part of the 1600s were all that Wolds part of Lincolnshire. The Civil War seems to have caused a problem in going back further on all 4 lines of her grandparents. I keep searching! One of the biggest problems I have found with searching for the Rhoads family is the amount of different spellings, Rhoads, Rhoades Rhodes, Roads, Roades and Rodes have all been found so far and I am sure there are more to be found. Smith and Maria had 10 children including Alice who was my Great x 2 Grandmother who married James Cruse and brought her family to Hailsham.
One of my few families that didn’t originate from East Sussex and take me to a part of the country I know very little about, at the moment. Week 38 of #52 Ancestors and this week’s theme is New to You. I would like to introduce my first French ancestor – Louis Michel. I don’t know much about him at the moment, I’m still researching with the help of some new contacts but this is what has been found so far. Way back in February this year, I wrote a blog about his sons and how they emigrated around the world but at the time I didn’t have any confirmed information about Louis. Since then I have been contacted by another descendant who had found information confirming that Louis was baptised on 5 November 1782 in the chapel of St Aubin’s Church in St Brelade, Jersey, Channel Islands. It had been suggested he was born in Rouen in France but there was no evidence to confirm this. His father, Louis Michel was a Reverend and was appointed Perpetual Curate at St Brelade on 24 December 1781 and his signature as ‘Ministre Officiant’ appears on various Jersey, Church of England Registers for Baptisms, Marriages and Burials during the period 17 May 1782 to 16 December 1787. The Reverend Louis Michel is believed to have been born in Rouen but again not confirmed yet. He died in July 1801 in Gibraltar Walk, Bethnal Green, London. I am currently searching for those records that have been mentioned by the contact and need to look at the Reverend more closely. I downloaded from TNA from the UK, Death Duty Registers Index 1796-1811 a copy of an Abstract of Administration for the Reverend Louis Michel, Clerk of Gibraltar Walk in the parish of St Matthew, Bethnal Green which stated he was formerly of the Island of Jersey but late of St Matthew Bethnal Green and now deceased. He mentioned the Administrator as being the Guardian of Louis Michel, son of the deceased and a minor. If born 1782, then Louis was still just a minor and he was born in Jersey. I also, at last have found the marriage for Louis Michel to Elizabeth Watts in St Helier, Jersey which translated from French and reads: ‘Louis Michel & Elizabeth Watts both of the Parish of St Helier were married together on the twentyth of May in the year one thousand eight hundred and three’. However this needs more research, as a family document quoted by my contact said that Louis Michel snr disapproved of the marriage which is interesting as it is thought he died in 1801, confirmed by the above record! However Louis Jnr and Elizabeth Watts had their first son, Henry in 1802 so there may have been some disapproval of the marriage and possibility might explain why they went to Jersey to marry. Also I have not seen a copy of the so called family document and more inclined to believe an official record. The burial record for Reverend Louis Michel was found on Ancestry and records that Reverend Louis Michel was buried at St Matthews, Bethnal Green, Middlesex on 5 July 1801. Gibraltar Walk where he was reported as living on the Abstract mentioned above is just round the corner and looking on Google maps it looks like some of the original houses remain although much of the area is now under 20th century blocks of flats.
There are some records to look up and confirm with regard to Louis’s mother Elizabeth Tiquet such as her marriage in 1780 to Reverend Louis Michel in St Giles in the Field, Holborn and her birth is reported as 1737 in Spitalfields and she died in 1799 in Bethnal Green. She was also apparently married previously to Abraham Levesque who was also born in Spitalfields and John Willis who she married in 1771 in Spitalfields. I’d also like to follow up the Reverend and see if I can find CofE records for him, not an area I am familiar with at all, but I shall search. I also wonder if he was married before he married Elizabeth in 1780. I have found a remontrance on the Jersey Heritage website which I am currently translating from French, with the help of Google Translate, on behalf of Louis dated 1793. It is making for interesting reading, something about stealing a pew! The theme for this week’s #52Ancestors is High and Low and I thought I would look at some of the Highs and Lows of researching my family. Starting with the lows, one part of my research that always makes me really sad is the death of young children, and I have a couple of really sad families on my family tree: firstly my great x3 grandfather Thomas Cruse and his wife Ann Lander who lived in Chailey in Sussex. They married on 12 November 1843 at the Zion Baptist Chapel in Chailey. They had 12 children: Mary Ann CRUSE (1845-1859) William CRUSE (1848-1917) Elizabeth CRUSE (1849-1859) Samuel CRUSE (1851-1911) George CRUSE (1852-1852) Henry CRUSE (1852-1852) Richard CRUSE (1854- ) Alice CRUSE (1856-1856) James CRUSE (1857-1908) Charles CRUSE (1860-1860) Emily CRUSE (1862- ) Anne CRUSE (1867- ) As you can see at least 6 of these children died young. I researched the deaths of these children and discovered the following: Elizabeth died of diphtheria on 2 April 1859 followed exactly a month later on 2 May by Mary Ann. The other four children all died within the first year of life. George died 9 days after he was born and Henry who was his twin brother died 5 days after birth. Alice died aged 2 months old. Charles died about 8 months old. Thomas was an Agricultural Labourer and the most likely reasons for the early deaths of these children are poverty and the poor standard of hygiene that was general to the poor then. Diphtheria is a highly contagious bacterial infection affecting the nose and throat and it is likely that it in the middle of the 19th century without the knowledge we have today of how infections are spread that some of the other children also died of it. Death certificates will confirm or otherwise that when I can afford to buy them all. The second sad family is that of Sarah Baldwin and her husband Michael Madigan. Sarah and Michael married on 24 December 1843 in St Giles in the Field, Middlesex. They had 5 children in Middlesex. There is the possibility they moved to Ireland before 1861 when the census return for them in London is missing and had more children but that needs to be confirmed. Frances MADIGAN (1845-1845) Mary MADIGAN (1846- ) Edward MADIGAN (1848-1853) Sarah MADIGAN (1851-1851) Esther MADIGAN (1853-1853) Frances died aged 1 week old of convulsions, Edward aged 5 of Scarlet Fever, Sarah at 4 months of 16 days of diarrhoea and Esther at 8 months of Pneumonia. This probably suggests a family again living in poverty and squalid conditions. Michael was a Carpenter. I have not found his birth yet but the 1851 census suggests he was born in Ireland. However it suggests Sarah was also born in Ireland but if this is the correct Sarah and I believe it is, she was born in Middlesex in 1824 as Sarah Baldwin which the children’s birth certificates and the marriage certificate seem to point to. I need to look further at this family and prove if they really did move to Ireland and if things got any better for them there. So that is some of the lows, what about the highs of my research?
One recent high has to be getting an email out of the blue from Judie Ellis who had her DNA tested and asked if Reuben Baldwin appeared in my tree and when I told her that he had been my Great Grandfather she told me he had been her grandfather and she was an unknown cousin of my dad. There was me thinking I had researched everything and knew all I could about the tree. It turned out my dad’s Uncle Len had a long term relationship with Judie's mum and Judie had been born. Dad thinks he vaguely remembers it all being talked about but he was 15 at the time and not that interested in family gossip. Anyway we have a new cousin to get to know and another member of part of my family which I have not researched that much as there are so few members left to talk to. Mum and Dad and I met with Judie and her husband, Tony recently and are looking forward to getting to know them more. The moral of that story is Never think you know it all and finished researching, you never know what’s round the corner! And I have even more research to do! Roll on winter! Week 36 already of #52Ancestors and the theme this week is Exploration. I thought I would look at exploring a parish by visiting my ancestors who lived there. I decided to look at Warbleton parish which is large rural parish in East Sussex and includes a number of villages such as Warbleton, Punnetts Town, Rushlake Green and Bodle Street Green and hamlets like Three Cups Corner and Turners Green. I can explore my genealogy in this parish, firstly by looking at census returns and for instance if I take 1871 I find that my great x 3 grandmother Elizabeth Harriet Message was married to her second husband James White and they were running The Three Cups Inn where her children were also living with them. Little Rigford Farm as it was known then was where Sarah Pilbeam was living, she was a widow and her son William, my great x2 grandfather helped her run the farm along with his sister, Harriet and her husband James Martin, who later farmed at Ebenezer Farm in Punnetts Town. Down the road towards Battle at Earls Down, Dadds Farm, which now appears to be Ades Farm was where James Winchester farmed with his sons Gaius and Ernest. Gaius was my great x2 grandfather. Gaius is recorded there in later census returns. Jesse Oliver (younger brother of Hannah Oliver, my great x4 grandmother) and his second wife Eliza were at Bunces at Rushlake Green. He was a market gardener and his son John was a poulterer. In the village of Rushlake Green itself my great x2 grandmother, Naomi Vincent was living with her brother, Nathan who was the Police Constable. All these families are on my Pilbeam family tree and as the families mixed and interacted the marriages occurred, such as that of Gaius Winchester and Naomi Vincent. I like to wonder about whether Gaius needed the services of the village policeman and met his sister while visiting the Police House, or more to the point did they all worship at the same chapel, I know that it is likely that William Pilbeam worshipped at the ‘White Chapel’ near Cade Street but did the Winchesters too?
I can follow the families progress by checking where they were every 10 years on the census returns. For instance William Pilbeam; in 1861 he was living with his parents James and Sarah at Tye House Cottages in Herstmonceux where James was a Bailiff and William and his siblings were Ag Labs. By 1871 Sarah was widowed and owned the farm at Little Rigford with William. William and then his sons and grandsons farmed at Little Rigford, later Rushford Farm until it was sold in 2006 to a saddlery business. This puts the Pilbeam family in the area for over 100 years and I can also trace where George, son of William went to when he retired in the 1930s. He moved into a bungalow, Beechcroft in Punnetts Town and his sons Sydney and Ron took over the running of the farm, Ron living in next door bungalow, Avondale where my mum lived when she was born during the war. Ron, my grandad eventually moved to Beechcroft after George died and my brother lives there now nearly 100 years later. Of course other documents can add to this picture we can build of our ancestors and their presence in a place; obvious ones such as births, marriages and deaths and then others such as deeds and mortgage documents, newspaper articles which show them living in a place, marrying from a place, old photos if you are lucky enough to have them and any documents with reference to the properties they lived in. I also have a number of families that I know were in Warbleton parish earlier than census returns give information for. I can tell this by baptisms and burials that were carried out at Warbleton parish church. Unfortunately though it is not so easy to tell whereabouts these people lived within the parish. Old documents where available might tell me, but most of mine were Ag labs and there is very little documentation for them. Tithe maps give an excellent picture of the early 1840s showing who owned or who resided in properties and documents relating to properties and showing tenancy are very useful as are wills where they are available. Happy Research! This week’s theme for #52Ancestors is Free Space and I thought I would continue the story of John Thorp, my ancestor whose story I first blogged in March 2020. This blog is about their residency of Hedgecourt, and a number of documents that I transcribed on a visit to The Keep where East Sussex hold their historical archive which involved John and his son, Thomas. Records from The Keep show that in 1562 there was no iron works in the manor of Hedgecourt at Felbridge where John was the farmer, and he repaired a building and the mill and bank at a cost of £64 which is a high cost so this must have been work on a large scale. The manor of Hedgecourt was leased by Sir Edward Gage to John Thorpe, yeoman of Horne, for 21 years at £40. I read a number of documents that described this land and included the demesne lands of the manor of Hedgecourt in Sussex and Surrey and lands called the park of Hedgecourt; Coddinglighe Park, Sharnowrs, Gages Meades, Cowpers Hill, Tanners, Smythforde Courte, The Tylt, Honneys, Warnars Crofts and the Myllwood, with all barns, stables, stalls and other buildings in the park, mills and mill dams in Godstone, Horne, Tandridge, Grinstead and Worth. The lease specifically excluded the furnace or iron works, houses and buildings lately built upon lands called Myllwood and Coddingligh Park by John Fawkener & John Frenche which were granted in a separate lease. John Thorpe was living at Hedgecourt Farm, just north of Hedgecourt Lake on the west side of Stubpond Lane. He was born in the 1530s or thereabouts and had been living in the parish of Newdigate. He married Alice Bowett about 1560 and had seven children, his third son Thomas baptised 1567 in East Grinstead, becoming his heir. In 1568, Sir Edward Gage died and his heir was his son John Gage. In 1578 John Thorpe extended his existing lease of Hedgecourt, which ended in 1589, by a further 40 years which was after John Thorpe’s death. Thomas took on the lease after his father’s death. The lease was the same as that of 1567 still excluding the Myllwood furnace, however it included a clause allowing John Thorpe to occupy the furnace should the iron works close during the term of the lease. In 1594 John Gage sold timber to John Thorpe from trees on land occupied by Thomas Humfrey, living in one tenement in the park of Hedgecourt adjoining Newe Chappell; a parcel of trees adjoining the last sale made in Thorne Park and divided by an old bank of old trees lying northwards from the bank to the pale, through which piece of ground the mill way goes to Burstow; 1000 decaying stubs in various places in the manor of Hedgecourt, already marked out by John Gage’s servant Henry Collins, to be cut down, coaled and carried away within ten years. John Gage died on 10th October 1598 and in Sussex was holding an Iron Mill (Furnace Mill) and windmill (on Crawley Down) and two parcels of wood and land called Millwood and Cuddingly in Worth. In Surrey he was holding the manors of Burstow and Hedgecourt. He had married twice but had no issue and so his estate passed to his nephew John Gage who was the son of Thomas Gage. Following the death of the first John Gage, John Thorpe and his son Thomas entered into the lands of Millwood and Cuddinglye and cut down and uprooted most of the woods. They were fined £3000 and a further £1000 for the decayed stubs remaining from 2000 great and sound trees. This was at a time of competing demands for wood, a growing population needed wood for houses, the Navy needed wood for shipbuilding and much of the Weald was being destroyed by the demands on timber. In 1573, a Royal commission reported of the Wealden area: ‘Besides these furnaces aforesaid, there are not so few as a hundred furnaces and Iron Mylles in Sussex, Surrey and Kent, which is greatly to the decaie, spoile and overthrowe of woods and principle tymber, with a great decaye also of tillage for that they are continuallie employed in carrying furniture for the said workes, and likewise a great decaie of the highways because they carrie all the wyntertyme’. As a result of this, regulations were passed prohibiting the making of charcoal from mature wood, allowing only coppice to be used, this superseded previous regulations that had been introduced earlier in the 1500’s that ensured a dozen standard trees were left to an acre of clear felling so that regeneration through seed might follow. In 1581 and 1585, Queen Elizabeth I passed two Acts of Parliament to control the activities of ironmasters in the Southeast area, the objective being to preserve the larger timber, whilst permitting the production of charcoal from coppice or underwood (small trees and shrubs). Fines were high, as John Thorpe and his son Thomas found out. Charcoal production became problematic in the Wealden area and eventually the industry was moved to other parts of the country where a new fuel had been discovered – coke. This fuel did not depend on timber with all its other needs. Timber became more expensive and the production of charcoal was expensive and time consuming compared to using coke. John Thorp died in 1607 and was followed swiftly by his heir, Thomas in 1608. Thomas left Hedgecourt to his eldest son Richard. The lease was renewed in 1629 by Richard Thorp, gent. The lease was eventually sold in 1651 by Richard’s son, Richard to pay off a debt and so ended the long association between the Thorp family and Hedgecourt. I would like to acknowledge the Felbridge & District History Group for the map above and for a really useful website when it came to my research into Hedgecourt. Check out their website Week 34 of #52 Ancestors already and the theme is Timeline. Individual timelines are something I am starting to look at for my ancestors. I have lots of newspaper reports, probate records and other documents that have been downloaded for many of them and it was only recently whilst I was wondering how to note them so I remember their existence, that I realised I could add them to my family tree on Family Historian 7 as Facts and then they would appear in the timeline for that person. Another item for the To do list! I recently did this for a client report and it added more interesting information over and above the usual BMD dates and census returns. An example timeline which does not include any extra facts and highlights some of which might be sought is as follows: Phillis FUNNELL (1849-1947)
It includes timeline for close relatives, ie parents, spouse and children or I can choose to not include them.
I can see many uses of this timeline in the pursuit of my family tree: What bits of information are missing from a person’s timeline? What other useful information might be available for an ancestor? It will also highlight areas an ancestor might have lived when dealing with gaps in census records for example or when trying to find where somebody was married when there is as so often, more than one choice. If producing reports for family members it just makes it more interesting reading too. Back in May I wrote a blog about Cotton Weavers in the Salford area and one of these was John Thelwell. This week’s theme is Service and John Thelwell took part in the Napoleonic War. John Thelwell was born in Gorton, Lancashire and enlisted in the Royal Horse Artillery in 1813 aged 20. He joined the most famous troop of horse artillery in the British army: “A” Troop, otherwise known as “The Chestnut Troop”, raised in 1793 and named after its chestnut-coloured horses with which it had served with distinction through the Peninsula War. In the year that John Thelwell joined the Troop it was in its fourth year of fighting its way from Portugal, through Spain, to southern France. On 21st June 1813 it fought at the key battle of Vitoria, which effectively won the war in Spain for Wellington. The ensuing pursuit of the French army back to and over the Pyrenees saw the Troop in action at engagements at San Marcos, La Rhune, Nivelle, Nive, St Pierre de Grube, Gave d’Oleron, Orthez, and La Reole. An end to the relentless fighting finally came in April 1814 with Napoleon’s abdication and exile to Elba. But with Napoleon’s escape, “A” Troop found itself back with Wellington’s army in Flanders and was in the thick of the fighting at Waterloo. On the morning of the 18th June this Troop was posted with two guns on the Brussels road looking down towards an abatis (a pile of wood blocking the road) next to the farmhouse of La Haye Sainte, a key position in the battle of Waterloo. The other four guns were placed to the right of the Brussels road, on the ridge, with a deep hollow way to their rear. This sunken lane was clogged with the limbers and horses of the Troop. At Waterloo the Troop had a nominal strength of 167 men: Captain Sir Hew Dalrymple Ross and four other officers 2 Staff Serjeants 3 Serjeants 3 Corporals 5 Bombardiers (the artillery equivalent to a Lance Corporal in the infantry) 81 Gunners – these men loaded and fired the guns 57 Drivers – these men rode and held the horses which pulled the guns and limbers. 6 Artificers (farriers, saddlesmiths, etc.) 1 Trumpeter The Drivers did not fire the guns but waited with the limbers which pulled the guns, this would
have been Driver Thelwell’s job. They needed to be ready to withdraw the guns at a moment’s notice and to also bring up more ammunition when needed. Each limber was pulled by 3 pairs of horses, each pair having one driver. John Thelwell would have worn the distinctive Tarleton helmet of the Royal Horse Artillery, carried a light cavalry sword slung from a belt, carried a short whip to control the horses, and worn a special boot reinforced with iron rods to stop his leg being crushed should his pair of horses come together. The Troop had 6 guns and as well as the 36 horses needed to pull these, there would also have been at least another 36 for the ammunition wagons, plus numerous other horses as spares and for various other wagons for the artificers’ equipment etc. As noted above, at Waterloo the Troop’s limbers and carts were tightly crammed into the sunken lane at the rear of the guns. This, then, is probably where John Thelwell was stationed for the battle. Upon La Haye Sainte falling to the French, the Troop came under musket fire from the farm and the four gun section was moved further along the ridge to the right. These guns were then charged by French Cuirassiers and the gun crews ran to the hollow way to escape or threw themselves under the guns for shelter. Around this time both the guns on the Brussels road were disabled. Of the four remaining guns three were also disabled later by artillery fire, leaving the Troop with just one serviceable gun. The Troop lost 8 men killed (plus an unknown number wounded), and 27 horses killed or lost. In 1816 all soldiers of the British Army at Waterloo were awarded the Waterloo Medal, the first of its kind in that it was awarded to all ranks. “Waterloo Men” were also rewarded by being credited with an extra 2 years of service (which was beneficial in terms of pay and pension). This information was provided to me by Martin Aaron of Waterloomen.com John was based in Ringmer at the Barracks during 1818 when he met Phillis Funnell my Great x 4 Grandmother and her son John was born 6 November 1818. By 1821 he had left the Army and married his first wife Nancy Potts back in Lancashire. I am now researching his life back in Lancashire. The theme for #52Ancestors this week is Help and once again I can’t think of an ancestor that fits this theme. But one of the greatest helps to me in my family history research that I have recently been using a lot is the British Newspapers on Findmypast. In a previous blog I wrote about the newspaper reports about the Pilbeam siblings’s marriages and in another blog about the suicide of Ruth Sturt’s second husband. But that is not all I’ve found about my ancestors in newspapers. In 1928 I have a report of a Sunday School Treat that was held at Rushford Farm by Mr Pilbeam who was the Superintendent. That would be George Charles Pilbeam, my great grandfather. It mentions all the helpers and the children who won the races including Girls Flat race (under 7’s) won by Joan Pilbeam, his daughter. The other children include some well known names from the area; Porter, Fox, Funnell and Cornford. This article helps to put my family into the wider context, possible other members of the Brethren Chapel they belonged to and who were their friends. On 27 March 1855 in the Sussex Advertiser and Surrey Gazette there is a report of housebreaking in Warbleton in amongst reports from Constantinople and Balaclava and reports of what the royals were up to. This gives me a picture of what was going on in the world on this date. One Thomas Clout was taken before George Darby accused of breaking and entering the house of Jesse Oliver of Warbleton. He stole 7lbs cheese, 2 1/2 lbs butter, five loaves of bread and a pair of Cossack boots. Joseph Oliver his son was also interviewed. This Jesse is likely to be my great x4 great uncle and his son who were living at Rushlake Green. The boots produced at the hearing were identified as the ones in question by the pad made out of an old hat put in the bottom by Joseph who was the owner. I also have a number of newspaper reports of poultry show winners which include the Oliver family; 17 November 1866, Shoreham Poultry Show. Joseph Oliver of Warbleton was commended for Ducks, class 24, for the best drake and duck of any age. Sussex Advertiser. 17 August 1867, Hastings and St Leonards Poultry Show. Joseph Oliver won highly commended and commended for White Aylesbury Ducks. Sussex Advertiser. This is during a time when Warbleton was at the centre of a local Chicken Cramming industry and Jesse and Joseph were both Higlers on the 1861 census, so presumably involved in carrying the poultry to the station at Heathfield once they had collected them from the farms where they were fattened.
In the Sussex Advertiser on 15 September 1866 there is the report of an inquest held into the sad death of Stephen Oliver, son of Hannah Oliver. His death was caused by a fall over a hedge whilst in a state of intoxication. He had spent the previous afternoon at the Horse and Groom, Rushlake Green with a farmer, Thomas Hayward, and was known to him for 25 years. They were both a little drunk by the time they left the pub. They had gone back to Hayward’s house before Oliver eventually left for his own home, across the fields. The surgeon reported he found a slight mark on his forehead, he had fallen in a field on his way home in the dark. He was of the opinion he had died of concussion. Jury returned the verdict he died of concussion caused by a fall while intoxicated. The Coroner remarked that this sad affair might have been averted had the witness, Hayward seen him home instead of letting him go alone in the dark. Just from those few examples I have learnt valuable information about my ancestors, their lives and the places they lived. I have a lot more families to search for so more research needed. The theme for this week’s #52Ancestors is Teams. I don’t have any famous team players in my family, or even infamous ones. As I was struggling about this week’s subject I realised that every team, football teams anyway, have 11 members. How many families do I have on my tree that are a team with 11 members? I have 42 families that had 9 children, mostly those of the 19th century but some in the 18th century too and most were agricultural labouring families in Sussex. I decided to pick one such family to look more closely at. I picked my Great x4 grandfather George Pilbeam and his first wife, Anne Weston. George Pilbeam was born in 1784 baptised on 10 November 1784. His parents were Thomas Pilbeam and Hannah Eastwood and Thomas was a Shoemaker in Burwash. There were many families of Pilbeams in Burwash at that time and George would have grown up with many cousins from both sides, the Eastwoods were numerous in Burwash too. Anne Weston was born 1783, baptised on 3 February 1783 also in Burwash. Her parents were John Weston and Ann Mabb. In 1806, Ann gave birth to a baby girl, Celia who was baptised at Burwash on 26 July 1806. George and Anne were married on 21 November 1807 in Burwash Church. George left his mark but Ann signed the register witnessed by Hannah Pilbeam and Barbara Weston. Barbara was likely to be Anne’s sister. The children born to George and Ann were: Hannah baptised 18 April 1808 at Burwash George baptised on 1 July 1810 at Burwash James, my great x3 grandfather, was baptised at Burwash on 2 February 1812 and married Sarah Simmons John baptised 22 Jan 1814 at Burwash, and died in March 1820 William baptised on 11 June 1815 at Burwash, William married Mary Ann Isted and they farmed at Brickells Farm in Hellingly near Hailsham. Ann baptised on 22 March 1818 at Burwash and died November 1836 Harriet was baptised at Burwash on 15 October 1820. Harriet married Thomas Simmons who was brother of Sarah Simmons. Thomas was baptised on 4 May 1823 at Burwash and lastly Robert was baptised at Burwash on 8 January 1826. George is recorded from the 1813 onward baptisms as a Labourer, presumably an Agricultural Labourer as by 1841 (as we know from my previous blog dated 22 February 2022 about George my Landed Ancestor) he was a Farmer. It looks very much as if he worked his way up and ended up renting Battenhurst Farm near Ticehurst with 120 acres according to the 1851 census.
I’ve not yet found out exactly when George moved to Woodsell where he was farming in 1841. Woodsell is at Dallington, down the road from Burwash and we know he was there in 1840 when Anne died, as she was buried at Burwash although her abode was noted as Dallington. I imagine him farming alongside at least some of his children. At least 4 of his sons, George, James, Thomas and William followed in his footsteps and on various census returns are found farming in different parts of the area. I imagine some of the girls living at home till they married and helping on the farm too, it would have been all hands on deck at certain times of the year. What of Celia, Anne’s illegitimate child? It looks like she was an accepted member of the team, the 1841, 1851 census have her living with George even after her mother’s early death. In 1861 after George’s death she is in Peasmarsh and marked as a confirmed Invalid. She died in 1864 and was buried as Celia Pilbeam in Burwash. Robert, the youngest child died in 1860 leaving no wife or issue. Most of the other children married and had large families of their own, mostly farming and staying in the area. Another family for my ‘more research needed’ pile. I have not managed to find a marriage for either Hannah or George the two oldest children yet. |
AuthorKerry Baldwin Archives
June 2023
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