When researching family history, genealogists put great
emphasis on “proof”, and substantiating our conclusions. This establishes a
sound basis for objective aspects such as lineage, occupations, residence,
etc., but what about the more subjective aspects? For instance, why they moved
from A to B, or why so-and-so married so-and-so.
Although good research may yield clues to these questions,
we would be much less certain of a conclusion that tried to look into the mind
of an ancestor than a conclusion identifying, say, their parentage. Does that
mean we shouldn’t be asking those questions? No, of course not, but a focus on
rigour and proof may be steering us away from asking them, and so persuading us
that we shouldn’t be recording such notions lest they be considered mere
guesswork.
Interestingly, academic historians often do dig this deeply
and attempt to analyse why things happened the way they did. The point I’m
trying to make here is that searching for the context for why certain decisions
were taken may not yield anything concrete, but it is still worthwhile as it
provides a backdrop for the more substantiated details. As long as we don’t try
to elevate such conjecture beyond its supporting evidence, it can help to turn
a bunch of disparate facts into a readable narrative. In lucky situations, it
may even take you down unanticipated avenues of research and yield something
verifiable that might otherwise have been missed.
Every so often, we find an ancestor who travelled far afield
instead of remaining in the family village/town. Emigration is a common
instance, but my example case for this post involves a 19th Century ancestor
who travelled across parts of Britain from Suffolk to Henley, to Kensington, to
Burton-on-Trent, and to Derbyshire. I just had to ask myself why.
Henry Woods was born in the small rural Suffolk village of
Peasenhall in c1821 to George Woods and Elizabeth Calver
[1].
At some point between the baptism of their last child (William, c1827) and the
1841 census, George moved the whole family 150 miles to Remenham Hill in
Berkshire, near to Henley-on-Thames
[2].
In the 1841 census
[3], both
Henry and George are ‘Drillmen’, meaning they operated a
seed drill for planting
seed.
I lived in Suffolk for a while, not far from Peasenhall, and
was rather surprised to find an ancestor from that village, let alone from the
county of Suffolk. However, I realised how little local knowledge I had when I
recently found that Peasenhall was once world-famous for a new generation of
seed drills. James Smyth founded a company based on a new lever design in 1800,
and this lasted for about 160 years. Before that time, the only drills in use
were block drills, in which all the coulters were fixed in one transverse
wooden beam. These were “about the most unserviceable instrument of its kind
which could be conceived”. The lever drill had each coulter fixed to an
independent lever.
[4]
In a strange twist of serendipity, I had such a corn drill
in one of my outbuildings, here in Ireland. It was constructed in 1887 by R.
Hornsby & Son Ltd. of the Spittlegate Iron Works in Grantham, England.
Figure 1 - Corn Drill from
towbar
Figure 2 - Corn Drill from rear
Even stranger is that I also have the remains of a very old
block drill. A neighbour once commented that “That’s Stone Age, that is!”.
Remenham was famous for lavender crops:
About a mile and a half N by E.
from Henley, in the hundred of Beynhurst, county of Berks, is REMENHAM village
and parish, intersected by the river Thames. Park Place, in this parish, was
formerly the residence of General Lord Conway: The cultivation and distilling
of lavender was established here by this nobleman, and there is still much of
this fragrant plant grown in this neighbourhood.
[5]
I don’t believe that George and Henry were involved in this
since the planting of lavender was quite different from that of corn:
Park Place, near
Henley-on-Thames, is celebrated for its lavender plantations which occupy
between forty and fifty acres. ‘The plants are raised from cuttings which are
slipped off and prepared by women in the autumn, and bedded in, in rows, in any
spare piece of garden ground, where they remain for two years. The ground into
which they are to be transported, being prepared by shallow trenchings or
double ploughing, the plants are placed in rows four feet apart and at least
two feet distance in the rows’.
[6]
Their seed drills were most likely associated with the
planting of corn, which was certainly a product of that region and used for
malting
[7].
While looking for a connection between Peasenhall and
Remenham, I found some tantalising newspaper information. In 1831, a man called
Henry Pope was working in Wallingford, just 13 miles west of Remenham, and
capitalising on his association with Peasenhall to advertise a new and
specialised type of drill:
HENRY POPE, Drill-Man, from
Peasenhall, Suffolk, returns his sincere thanks to the Gentlemen and
Agriculturists for the great encouragement he has met with since he commenced
drilling in the neighbourhood of WALLINGFORD. and begs to inform them he is
coming up with A NEW CORN DRILL, so constructed as to sow Clover Seed at the
same time the Spring Corn is Drilled, ...
[8]
This was not an isolated case of making capital from the
association either. In 1839, a Thomas Teago of Peasenhall, “late apprentice in
the firm of Smyth & Son”, ran a very similar advertisement:
THOMAS TEAGO begs to return thanks
to Agriculturists in General, for the flattering encouragement he has received
in the manufacture of his
Improved Corn
lever Drill, …
[9]
By far the most unexpected connection appeared in 1843 in
the form of two consecutive advertisements for property sales: one from the Peasenhall
area (1000 acres of land for auction in Yoxford and Sibton, including parts of
Peasenhall) and one from the Remenham area (Fawley Court Estate. 4000 acres in
Henley, Oxfordshire, and Berks, including parts of Remenham). Both of these advertisements
were run by the same agents: Messrs Farebrother & Co.
[10]
Henry married a Sarah Roomes/Rooms/Roames in Feb 1843 in
Henley-on-Thames. Both were recorded as living in Turville, about 8 miles north
of Remenham. Sarah’s father, William, was recorded as a ‘Maltster’, and both
Henry and his father, George, were now ‘Drill makers’. An interesting
observation, here, is that the two witnesses were Charles Woods (Henry’s older
brother) and a Sarah Oxlade. Both of these had a marriage of their own recorded
in the same register entry, strongly pointing to a double wedding.
[11] A
clue to how Henry met Sarah can be found in the 1841 census, just two years
earlier. Sarah and Henry’s younger brother, John (b. c1826), were both working
as ‘Servants’ on the same farm in Cookham, Berkshire.
[12]
By the 1851 census, Henry had moved a few miles east to
Bisham, but his occupation was now that of a carpenter
[13].
My first thought here was that it was something to do with barges since the
Thames was an important trade route into London. However, the use of barges was
in decline due to the Great Western Railway (GWR), from London to Bristol, being
completed in 1841.
By 1849, toll
income from river traffic below Staines had fallen by 50%, and barge traffic
was gradually being replaced by pleasure boats. Henley even got its own GWR
branch line in 1857.
[14]
Henry’s fourth child, Jane, was born in Kensington, London,
in 1853. By the 1861 census, there were four children born in Kensington, and
Henry was still a carpenter
[15].
Although the River Thames is a dominant feature of London, Kensington would not
be well-placed for anything in connection with it. Locating the family in the
1871 census took a little longer than usual as the enumerator must have been in
a great hurry — the first initial of each person was used instead of their
given names, and all their places of birth were recorded simply as “England” —
but it showed that Henry was still in Kensington, and was still a carpenter
[16].
Kensington at that time was a mixture of both rich and poor,
and there were some awful slums in the area
[17]. In
trying to determine whether their addresses (see Table 1) were up-market or
slum, I found a couple of newspaper references suggesting they weren’t slums: a
mention of Francis Henry Tredle, 5 Ernest St, Cam(p)den Hill, Kensington, as “gentleman”
[18],
and a description of a house on Walmer Rd as “double-fronted house, detached,
with large yard and spacious workshops, ... suitable for a Builder's or other
manufacturing purposes"
[19]. This
assessment is confirmed by browsing the
Charles
Booth survey into life and labour in London (1886-1903). There were also some
local breweries, such as the Kensington Park Brewery, Clarendon Rd, Notting
Hill, owned by William Lake Woodman and Henry Woodman
[20],
and this was another possible link with the Henley-on-Thames area.
Henry’s wife, Sarah, died on
4 Sep
1872, aged just 51, of ‘Hemiplegia 5 months, Apoplexy 60 hours’[21];
basically partial paralysis following a stroke. He was remarried within six
months but had also moved 130 miles north to Burton-on-Trent. I can understand
the need to get away from Kensington, and the memories of a protracted demise,
but why Burton-on-Trent? His new wife was Jane Phillips, née Parker (b. c1829
in Bungay). It’s not clear how they met since in 1871 she was running a grocers
shop on the Staines Rd, Heston, Hounslow, about 10 miles west of Kensington. It
is clear, though, that they had several things in common: both had been
recently widowed; both were from villages in the north of Suffolk; Jane’s late
husband (William Phillips, b. c1829 in Bungay, d. 1870) was a ‘Master
carpenter’ in Brentford, and her father (Robert) was also a carpenter. They
were married in Burton on 9 Mar 1873[22].
I know of no family connection
with Burton-on-Trent for either of them, or for their former spouses. At that
time, Burton was very well known for the brewing of ale, so the above theory
may hold some weight. The following (lengthy) transcription is from a trade
directory of 1874; the year after they were married:
BURTON-UPON-TRENT. In a broad
trough of the Trent valley, in the county of Stafford, surrounded by meadows
and bright green islands formed by numerous arms of the river, and standing
upon masses and veins of gypsum, triassic rocks, sandstone, and arinaceous
limestone, lies the town of Burton. It is 25 miles E. of Stafford, 11 S.E. from
Derby, 33 N.E. from Birmingham, and 126 N.W. from London. Burton and pale ale
seem to the world synonymous terms, and it will not be deemed amiss to premise
our short description with a few broad facts anent the famous liquid staple of
the town upon the Trent. Its twenty-seven breweries, belonging to the like
number of firms, in addition to malt houses, cooperages, and other erections,
cover nearly 300 acres of land. The history of ale brewing in Burton dates back
at least to 1295, as in a document of that date yet extant Matilda, daughter of
Nicholas de Milindale, leases to the Abbot or convent of Burton certain
tenements for "two white loaves from the Monastery, and 11 gallons of
Conventual beer, or cider, and one penny; together with seven gallons of beere
for the men, and one sextary of hay”, &c. In 1777 Mr. William Bass
established the brewery which was the germ of the gigantic business of his
grandson Mr. M. T. Bass. At the close of the last century there seems to have
been nine brewers only in Burton. Among these appear the names of Michael Bass,
William Worthington, and Benjamin Wilson, the daughter of the last named being
married to Samuel Allsopp. Mr. Wilson’s brewery, now the old brewery on the
east side of High street, was then one of one of the largest in the town. Much
of the success of the Burton ale trade was due to the manufacture of a peculiar
liquid which was first introduced into the market from this town about 1823,
under the name of India or Bombay beer, which then gradually assumed the
position long and tenaciously held before by Hodgson’s pale ale.
[23]
In 1880, Henry acquired the licence for the Pool Inn, Church
Gresley, about 6 miles S.E. of Burton
[24]. By
this time, he may have been getting a little old for carpentry (59) and this
could have been his dream of retirement. When Henry moved to Church Gresley,
the youngest children by Sarah (Emma and John) came with them, and also his
second son, George Henry. The others remained in Burton-on-Trent. The prior
children of his second wife, Jane, remained in the W. London area and never
moved north, except for Jane’s grandson,
Charles
Henry Florence, who is with her in the 1891 census after his mother— also Jane
— had died in 1889.
The following table summarises the various locations of the
family. I am assuming that Henry was at the same locations for the births of
his children.
Date
|
Place
|
Notes
|
Until 9 Dec 1827
|
Peasenhall, Suffolk
|
Baptism of youngest brother, William
|
6 Jun 1841
|
Remenham Hill, Berks
|
1841 Census. Occ: Drillman
|
6 Feb 1843
|
Turville, Bucks
|
Marriage to Sarah Roomes. Occ: Drill maker
|
c1844
|
Camberwell, Surrey
|
Birth of Lavinia Woods
|
c1847
|
Princes Risborough, Bucks
|
Birth of George Henry Woods
|
c1849
|
Remenham, Berks
|
Birth of William Woods
|
30 Mar 1851
|
Bisham, Berks (Bisham St)
|
1851 Census. Occ: Carpenter
|
1851
|
Cookham, Berks
|
Birth of Jane Sarah Woods
|
c1853
|
Kensington, W. London
|
Birth of Elizabeth Woods
|
c1855
|
Kensington, W. London
|
Birth of Henry Woods
|
21 Nov 1859
|
Kensington, W. London (Ernest St)
|
Birth of Sarah Ellen Woods
|
7 Apr 1861
|
Kensington, W. London (Ernest St)
|
1861 Census. Occ: Carpenter
|
8 Feb 1862
|
Kensington, W. London (Ernest St)
|
Birth of Emma Woods
|
c1865
|
Kensington, W. London
|
Birth of John Woods
|
2 Apr 1871
|
Kensington, W. London (Nutbourne Terrace)
|
1871 Census. Occ: Carpenter
|
4 Sep 1872
|
Kensington, W. London (Walmer Rd)
|
Death of wife, Sarah. Occ: Carpenter
|
9 Mar 1873
|
Burton-on-Trent, Staffs
|
Marriage to Jane Phillips. Occ: Carpenter
|
5 Aug 1880
|
Church Gresley, S. Derbys
|
Taking over Pool Inn
|
3 Apr 1881
|
Church Gresley, S. Derbys
|
1881 Census. Occ: Beer House Keeper
|
6 Aug 1884
|
Church Gresley, S. Derbys
|
Death of Henry
|
Table 1 – Where was Henry Woods?
Henry died 6 Aug 1884 in Church
Gresley, aged 62, of ‘Morbus Cordis Syncope'[25]
(i.e. a heart attack), and Jane continued to run the Pool Inn until she died in
1894 aged 66.
So, was Henry connected with the brewing trade after
switching from seed drills in the Henley-on-Thames area? A barrel or cask maker
would have been described as a “cooper” so there’s not much evidence for that. How
much richer is the picture, though, when it includes some context rather than a
mere list of facts such as those in Table 1?
[1] "England Births and Christenings, 1538-1975", index, FamilySearch
(https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/JQD2-RMB : accessed 2 Mar 2014), Henry,
18 Nov 1821.
[2] Henley-on-Thames is
actually in Oxfordshire but near its boundaries with Berkshire and
Buckinghamshire.
[3] "1841 England, Wales & Scotland Census", database, FindMyPast (www.findmypast.org.uk : accessed 2 Mar 2014), household of George Woods (age 50); citing HO 107/11, book 12, folio 12, page 19; The National Archives of the UK (TNA).
[5] Pigot & Co.'s Directory
of Berks, Bucks ... , 1844. [Part 2: Hants to Wilts, & Wales], p.18 (image 173 of 531),
online PDF, University of Leicester, compiler, Historical Directories (http://www.historicaldirectories.org/hd/index.asp
: accessed 2 Mar 2014), “Henley on Thames”.
[6] “Monthly Literature:
lavender”, Reading Mercury (Monday 12
Dec 1836): p.2, col.4.
[8] "To Farmers", Reading
Mercury (Monday 15 Aug 1831): p.1, col.5.
[9] “THOMAS
TEAGO”,
Huntingdon,
Bedford & Peterborough Gazette (Saturday 3
Aug 1839): p.1, col.4.
[10] “Public Sales”, London
Standard (Saturday 22 Jul 1843): p.1, col.3.
[11] England, marriage certificate for Henry Woods and Sarah Roames
[Roomes], married 6 Feb 1843; citing 6/511/21, registered Wycombe 1843/Mar
[Q1]; General Register Office (GRO), Southport.
[12] "1841 England, Wales & Scotland Census", database, FindMyPast (www.findmypast.org.uk : accessed 4 Mar 2014), household of William Peto (age 65); citing HO 107/11, book 12, folio 12, page 19; TNA.
[13] "1851 England, Wales & Scotland Census", database, FindMyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk : accessed 2 Mar 2014), household of Henry Woods (age 30); citing HO 107/1694, folio 265, page 5; TNA.
[15] "1861 England, Wales & Scotland Census", database, FindMyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk : accessed 2 Mar 2014), household of Henry Woods (age 40); citing RG 9/17, folio 107, page 37; TNA.
[16] "1871 England, Wales & Scotland Census", database, FindMyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk : accessed 2 Mar 2014); household of H. Woods (age 51); citing RG 10/41, folio 127, page 67; TNA.
[18] "Copy of Returns:
The Provincial Banking Corporation", Reading Mercury (Saturday 24 Feb
1866): p.7, col.3.
[19] "Kensington Park, Notting Hill", Cambridge Independent Press (Saturday 17 Nov 1860): p.4, col.3.
[20] "Local news: Embezzlement", West Middlesex Advertiser and Family Journal (Saturday 09 Jul
1859): p.2, col.2. "Partnerships Dissolved", Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser (Thursday 24
May 1866): p.4, col.7.
[21] England, death certificate for Sarah Woods, died 4 Sep
1872; citing 1a/86/498, registered Kensington 1872/Sep [Q3]; GRO.
[22] England, marriage certificate for Henry Woods and Jane Phillips,
married 9 Mar 1873; citing 6b/464/259, registered Burton 1873/Mar [Q1]; GRO.
[24] "Swadlincote", Derby
Daily Telegraph (Thursday 5 Aug 1880): p.4, col.2.
[25] England, death certificate for Henry Woods, died 6 Aug
1884; citing 6b/217/53, registered Burton 1884/Sep [Q3]; GRO.
