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The Routledges of Brampton

By NMDEA

Robert and Mary Routledge ran a Grocer’s business in Brampton. Mary was referred to as Molly Calvert in the Brampton Parish Register when their children were baptised. They were baptised in nearby Lanercost, Mary 23 August 1766 and Robert 17 June 1760. They also married there 7 January 1796.[1]

Mary Routledge supplied goods to the poor of Brampton, but it is not known if this was a regular order that she had to supply them [2]

Mary (Calvert( Routledge Grocer's Bill for goods supplied in February 1820 to the poor of brampston
Mary (Calvert) Routledge March 9 1820. Bill for supplies to the poor PR60/21/13/7/8

A bill for goods supplied in February 1820 and settled promptly 9 March 1820 totals £2.1s.7 1/2d for the month. Items included being:-
1 lb candles, 10d
1 lb whitening 1d
1/2 lb starch 4d
1/2 stone soap 9d 5s. 3d
1 gill of sweet oil for weavers, 6d
1 stone salt, 4s 6d
2 oz black pepper, 6d
1lb treacle, 6d
2 oz coffee, 5d, 1/2 lb sugar, 5d 10d
Typically tea or coffee were itemised together along with the sugar.

Robert Routledge is listed in Jollie’s 1811 trade directory as a Grocer.{3].As occurred with other women Mary took over the business from her husband after his death 12 July 1815. At this time of their eight children 7 were still alive, Catherine (1808-1811) having died young. The oldest 18 years the youngest 3 years .[4]

Mary is listed in both the 1829 [5] and 1834 [6] trade directories. In 1834 at Front Street, Brampton where she is also a dealer in earthenware. Her business near fellow female Grocers, Elizabeth and Jane Tinniswood who also sold confectionery.

When Robert died he left a will (at this time unable to access), [7] which may reveal under what basis the business was left to Mary as well as other assets. After Mary’s death 21 May 1843 [8,9] the business continued with the two unmarried daughters, Margaret (1797-1880) and Ann (1807-1881) not the son’s.They continued to be listed in the trade directories [10] and on subsequent census up till 1871 as Grocers and China Dealers . When they [Margaret and Ann] died within 6 months of each other they both left reasonable healthy estates of just over £800 each. It is not known if any other family member took over from them.

Of their siblings eldest daughter Mary (1797-1881) married David Latimer in 1818. The son of David Latimer Cabinet Maker from whom a voucher also survives. [11] David was principally an agricultural labourer. He and Mary had a large family some of whom died at a young age.They remained in Brampton.

Eldest son John (1800-1859) was appointed High Constable in Brampton in 1834, where he may have gained additional income from the letting of a farm Kingwater near Lanercost.[12 ]. He was referred to in the Carlisle Journal as being known in Brampton as “Laird” Routledge . They also go on to say that when his house was demolished in Brampton a small bricked up window was found where as Relieving Officer in 1836 he would hand out relief to the poor.[13]

Two son’s Robert and William left Brampton.. Robert (1803-1861) was an Inland Revenue Supervisor in Manchester, while William (1804-1875) became a Clergyman and Schoolteacher in Devon.

Youngest son George (1812-1888) [14] served an apprenticeship with Charles Thurnam, Publisher in Carlisle from 1827 to 1833 before moving to London. Initially working for others and supplementing his income by working in the Tithe Office. He established his own Bookselling and Publishing business in London and New York . He returned to the place of his birth in later life; being a wealthy man he bought the land on which stood the cottage of his birth.as well as other estates once belonging to his forebears. Described by the local newspaper as a pioneer of cheap literature in this country, beginning life in a humble way and gaining distinction through energy and intelligence[15]. When he died 13 December 1888 his disposable estate was valued at £95.139.


Sources
[1] England Select Marriages, 1538-1973 [accessed at ancestry.co.uk., 4 March 2020]
[2] Cumbria Archives, PR60/21/13/7/8, Brampton Overseers Voucher, 9 March 2020 or PR60/21/13/6/8 line 2-30
[3] F. Jollie, Jollies Cumberland Guide and Directory (Carlisle: 1811).
[4] findmypast.co.uk. [accessed 4 April 2020]
[5] Parson & White’s, Principle Inhabitants of Cumberland & Westmorland (1829).
[6] Pigot’s, Directory of Cumberland and Westmorland (1834)
[7] Cumbria Archives, Wills, PROB/1815/W614
[8] Cumbria Archives Wills, PROB/1843/W912
[9] Carlisle Journal, 27 May 1843, p. 3 col. g.
[10] Slater’s, Cumberland Directory, 1855.
[11] Cumbria Archives, PR60/21/13/5/11, Brampton Overseers Voucher, March 2 1815.
[12] Carlisle Journal, 11 December 1841, p.1 col. d.
[13] Carlisle Journal, 7 January 1898, p.5. col. d.
[14] England Births and Baptisms Parish Records, 1538-1955 accessed at findmypast.co.uk
[15] Carlisle Journal, 18 December 1888, p.2 col. d.

This is a work in progress subject to change with further research.

Wilkinson’s Griffin Inn, Penrith

By NMDEA

The Griffin Inn was one of the numerous inns in Penrith during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It was listed as being situated in the urban subdivision of Dockray and in later years the Corn Market. It was part of the social and commercial centre of the community, helping to promote the economy of the town, providing a venue for local officials, manufacturers and traders and those selling property. It was a place for social and cultural events providing accommodation for passing travellers, those on fishing excursions to Ullswater, and travelling performers as well as members of the Cumberland Militia that assembled and trained there in the early 1800s.[1] Grain was sold outside the various inns positioned round the Cornmarket; barley was sold from outside the Griffin.[2]

The Griffin Inn had been trading from at least 1779 when innkeeper Christopher Idle offered for lease a:-

Large and convenient dwelling house with a large hall or kitchen, parlour, back kitchen and brew house on the first floor, a large dining room, a small ditto, three lodging rooms for servants, three cellars, both dining room and lodging rooms have closets. Good stables for eighteen horses, common stables for fifty more, a byer for cows, roomy chambers for hay, three extraordinary good granaries, a pump, coal holes and every necessary convenience the whole situate within a large close yard. The stock and furniture to go with the premises it also a good seat in the Parish Church.[3]

One voucher from Threlkeld with no clear date has the letterhead ‘Wikinson’s the Griffn Inn’. Scribbled on the back are additions to the bill. It is probably dated from the end of the eighteenth century. It does give an brief insight into the business of the Griffin. Wilkinson supplied the customers with a range of alcoholic drinks, mainly ale and porter; luncheon and dinner, tobacco, beds, horses hay and corn along with the services of an ostler. The printed bill also shows the Griffin offered fruit, punch, tea and coffee, wine and negus, washing facilities, postage and paper as well as food and ale for servants. [4]

bill for Wilkinson's Griffin Inn items such as ale ,porter hay tobacco
Wilkinson’s Griffin Inn Penrith c 1800 SPC21/8-11 13 A and B

John Wilkinson and his wife Julia Harrison were married at Thorpe in the parish of Greystoke in 1789 but perhaps seeing a lucrative business opportunity moved and became the proprietors of the Griffin around the time of the birth of their second son, William in 1795. William did not survive beyond his first year, as was also the case with sibling John (b.1799).[5]

After John Wilkinson’s death in 1801, [6] it is not known if Julia had full control of the inn or a trustee was appointed. However, the lease of the Griffin was offered for nine years in February of that year. The Griffin being described as in the possession of Mrs Wilkinson.[7] Little can be found of the Griffin’s activities until 1811 when Jollie’s trade directory lists Julia Wilkinson as the Innkeeper.[8] She remained at the inn and was still there when her father Jonathan Harrison died in 1818[9] and when her daughter Mary married the Rev. John Ormandy the following year. [10] Mary died in a house fire on 27 December 1848 ,the suggestion in one local newspaper being that her being intoxicated was partly to blame.[11]

The General Wolfe inn near the Griffin, where Isaac Wilkinson was the innkeeper was continued by his only daughter Mary after his death in 1823.[12] She had married William Bolton a Sergeant Major in the Cumberland Militia in 1802. Widowed in 1824 she continued in business at the inn. [13] It may be that the two Wilkinson families were related.

In 1819 local newspapers carried family notices suggesting that Julia Wilkinson had remarried. The notice in the Carlisle Patriot of 31 July read ‘At Greystoke Thursday Mr Isaac Hodgson of London Slop Merchant to Mrs Wilkinson late of the Griffin Inn Penrith’. [14] A slop merchant provided clothes and bedding to sailors; often they were cheap and of poor quality. Indignant at this announcement, the same paper retracted this two weeks later, claiming it a falsehood. The instigator was unknown.[15] Julia Wilkinson died sometime around 1824. [16]

In 1811 the Wilkinsons’ eldest surviving son, Harrison, became a surgeon in Hounslow, Middlesex. Prior to that he had been in the Royal Navy.[17] The other Wilkinson children didn’t follow their parents into the innkeeping trade. The Griffin was once again offered for lease, with the addition to its facilities being a garden. Particulars of the lease were to be had from Thomas Wilkinson [John and Julia’s son] of Thorpe House, Greystoke.[18]

The will of Harrison Wilkinson (1790-1830) identifies family members. Apart from some small bequests he instructed his trustees to divide most of his estate between his brother Thomas (1797-1860) and two sisters Mary (1791-1848) and Ann or Nanny (1800-1865). The Griffin made up part of his estate. Dorothy the eldest daughter of his sister Mary was to benefit from the profits of the Griffin independent of her parents or husband, then subsequently the female lineage [her sisters or daughters]. The female heirs were always to be preferred before the male. Youngest sister Ann named Smith in the will, later married James Rowntree, a successful gun maker of Penrith and Barnard Castle. She was resident in Penrith when she died in 1865. She, like her siblings benefitted from her brothers estates at Townhead, Penrith; and Thorpe and Field House, in Greystoke parish.

Perhaps mindful of his own endeavours to gain an education and the lack of a public library in his early life, Harrison added a codicil to his will. He asked for his books comprising his library, to go to the president and committee of the public library free of all legacy duty for the use of all the inhabitants of Penrith.[19] They went to the Mechanics Institute, the forerunner of the Public Library. [20]

Julia Wilkinson appears to have been the only female owner among the Griffin’s various hosts before it ceased trading in March 1893. Adam Barker, a farmer who had taken possession of the Inn in October 1892, was adjudged bankrupt the following year.[21] The General Wolfe fared better and continues in business.

General Wolfe Inn Little Dockray, Penrith .Griffin Inn was situated just around the corner until 1888
General Wolfe, Little Dockray, Penrith


sources.
[1] Ewanian (William Furness), History of Penrith from the Earliest Record to the Recent Time, (1894) Reprint Carlisle Bookcase, pp. 179-185. Michael Mullett, A New History of Penrith, Book V, Penrith in the Nineteenth Century. 1800-1901 (Carlisle, Carlisle Bookcase, 2020), pp. 46-49; Westmorland Advertiser and Kendal Chronicle 26 June 1813, p.3, col., d
[2] www.penrithtowntrials.co.uk http://www.penrithtowntrails.co.uk/downloads/cornmarket.pdf
[3] Cumberland Pacquet and Ware’s Whitehaven Advertiser, 8 June 1779, p.1, col. b.
[4] Cumbria Archives, Threlkeld Overseers’ Vouchers, SPC21/8-11 13A and 13B, no date
[5] www.ancestry.co.uk
[6] Cumbria Archives PROB/1801/A(44) John Wilkinson Innkeeper Penrith
[7] Carlisle Journal, 7 February 1801, p.1, col. d.
[8] Jollie, F. Cumberland Guide and Directory (Carlisle, 1811), p. xxxi.
[9] Cumberland Paquet and Whitehaven Ware’s Advertiser, 8 September 1818, p.3, col. a.
[10] Carlisle Patriot, 20 February 1819, p. col. d.
[11] Kendal Mercury ,6 January 1849 p.2, col., g
[12] Cumbria Archives, PROB/1823/W723, Isaac Wilkinson Innkeeper, Penrith, 1823, Cumberland Paquet and Ware’s Whitehaven Advertiser 17 February 1823, p.3, col. c.
[13 Pigot & Co., National Commercial Directory, Cumberland, Lancashire, and Westmorland 1828-9 (London and Manchester, J Pigot & Co., 1828).
[14] Carlisle Patriot, 31 July 1819, p. 3, col. d.
[15] Carlisle Patriot, 14 August 1819, p.3, col. d.
[16] Cumbria Archives, PROB/1824/A(25), Julia Wilkinson, widow of Thorpe. 1824.
[17] UK City and County Directories 1766-1946, 1811, London County Directory, p. 1566 [accessed at www.ancestry.co.uk, 25 August 2020].
[18] Carlisle Patriot, 17 December 1825, p.1, col. e.
[19] National Archives, Prerogative Court of Canterbury, PROB11/1792/175, 3 November 1831, Will of Harrison Wilkinson of Hounslow, Middlesex.
[20] Cumberland and Westmorland Herald, 20 January 1883, p.5 cols. a-b.
[21] Cumberland and Westmorland Herald, 11 March 1893, p.4 col. g.


Research is ongoing and additional information may by gained accessing the following :-

DHOD/15/7, 1831-36, Estate of Harrison Wilkinson deceased and residue to Mrs Smith, Gosling Cottage, Carlisle.
DHOD/15/10 1830-38, Papers, estate of Dr Harrison Wilkinson, deceased.

The Brinkhurst family: paupers of East Hoathly parish

By Hilary Holt

In early 1782 Benjamin Brinkhurst died, leaving a widow and three children. Charles Vine charged the parish 12s 6d for making his coffin on 15th February. John Burgess supplied 4 quarts of beer “for the people at Brinkhursts”, which may have been part of the provisions for the funeral. Benjamin was buried on the 17th February.

Benjamin was originally from Wartling, and after moving to East Hoathly, worked as a labourer for John Vine, starting in September 1760. He married Ann Dalloway in April 1762 and gained the right of settlement in East Hoathly in 1769.

Benjamin and Ann had three surviving children: Benedicta (born 1771), William (1773) and John (1776). Two children born to the couple in 1763 and 1764 had died young. When Benjamin died Benedicta was eleven, and William and John nine and six respectively.

The family had received help from the parish prior to Benjamin’s death, but would be more reliant on its help after the death of the breadwinner. During the period immediately before and after her father’s death it was Benedicta who collected the family’s groceries from Thomas Turner’s store, perhaps because her mother was nursing Benjamin. Subsequently Widow Brinkhurst was usually named as the recipient by Turner in his invoices.

Turner supplied candles and soap to the family. He supplied foodstuffs: cheese (4 lbs at a time), butter and sugar, as well as condiments – salt and pepper. For flour the family went to Charles Fielder the miller, getting through 4 gallands (sic) every week to a fortnight. They ate mutton, which seems to have been the staple meat of the poor of the parish, and this Benedicta obtained weekly from the butcher, Richard Fuller. Fuller’s bill to the Parish for the first part of 1783 itemises weekly supplies of mutton to Benedicta from the 1st February to the 15th April.

In the bills which survive it is startling how often the Brinkhurst boys had their shoes mended, (in common with other children in the parish). In one of his bills Thomas Davy remarks plaintively that he had mended William’s shoes “several times”. There is only one instance of Benedicta’s shoes being mended in the surviving bills, in April 1782.

If the boys were provided with new shoes once or twice a year, their feet must soon have outgrown their footwear, and that, and the active life they led, would help to explain the frequent need for repair.

In December 1786 when Benedicta was fifteen, and the boys thirteen and ten, the children’s’ mother Ann died, and the record of her burial on 15 December was annotated “pauper” (not the case for her husband). She seems to have been ill for some time as Mr Paine the surgeon had supplied medicine worth 13 shillings the previous September.

After that the boys became “parish children”. They lodged with parishioners who fed and housed them, and the parish was billed for their keep. The Mr Turner, who was responsible for William may have been Thomas Turner himself.

At the beginning of February 1786 Benedicta received a new pair of shoes, costing 4s 6d. She was rising 16 at this date, and it seems quite old for a child at that time to be dependent, and not expected to be at work.

Village inhabitants were usually provided with a set of clothes prior to looking for a position. That there is no record of Benedicta being outfitted other than with shoes may be because the records have not been transcribed or are incomplete. In contrast, there are bills for a waistcoat for Benedicta’s brother John in the spring of 1790, followed by a hat and hose later in the year, and in 1791 when he reached the age of 15 he was provided with a pair of shoes and nails, presumably a preliminary to starting to look for work.

Benedicta may have left the village to find work, but the boys stayed on in East Hoathly as parish children, continuing to provide the shoe menders with work.

Benedicta re-surfaces in the records at the age of twenty four, living in Lewes. In July 1795 her marriage banns were read in the parish of All Saints Lewes. Benedicta married Stapley Ade, a cordwainer, of St Michael’s Parish Lewes, on 26 July 1795. Her husband was forty eight years old to Benedicta’s twenty, which makes one wonder how she met him. Maybe he had been her employer prior to their marriage (although they were recorded as living in separate parishes). Their first child Ruth was born on December 25th in the same year, which indicates that Benedicta was already pregnant when the couple married.

The couple had five children: Ruth (born 1795), George (1797), Mary (1801), and John (1803) and Alfred (1808). Only the oldest two lived beyond infancy. The fifth child, Alfred Stapley Ade, was baptised in September 1808, and buried on 5 March 1809. Shortly after, on April 16 1809 there is a burial record for Benedicta, whose age was recorded as thirty six years, although her birth in 1771 would make her thirty eight.

Sources

www.Familysearch.org accessed 18 January 2019

PAR378/31/3/8 for settlement examination of Benjamin Brinkhurst

PAR 378/1/1 Early registers (1560-1812)

PAR378/31/3/19, PAR378/31/3/20, PAR378/31/3/21, PAR378/31/3/22

Thomas Burn, (c.1776-1848) Assistant Overseer for the Townships of Greystoke.

By NMDEA

Thomas Burn was appointed the Assistant Overseer serving the Townships of Greystoke , Johnby, Little Blencow, Motherby and Gill at a meeting of the Vestry 16 May 1823. His appointment, to start on 4 August 1823, was for three successive years for a yearly stipend of twelve pounds and twelve shillings. Previously in 1820 he had been Overseer along with Joseph Stagg, Joseph Guardhouse, Joseph Todhunter and Thomas Arnott. [1] It might be wondered why he moved from the position of overseer to assistant overseer. Some might see this as a demotion, but by the 1820s the position of assistant overseer had become an official salaried post whereas an overseer continued to be unpaid.

Thomas Burn was a yeoman. He married Elizabeth Hawell on 30 March 1802 and they had one daughter, Jane, baptised at Mungrisedale on 28 April 1803 then again a week later 5 May at Greystoke.[2] Jane later married Joseph Mattinson on 19 November 1825 but died 31 December 1831 aged 28 years.[3]

Mention of Thomas Burn in newspapers is limited. In February 1828 it is reported in several newspapers that a hive of bees belonging to him had swarmed and were thriving. Comment is made of the mild weather for the place and season.[4] The abundance of reports on bees at the time was a reflection of the regard for their productive ways and perfect society. [5] Thomas Burn probably kept them to supplement his income from farming. In 1831 the Cumberland Pacquet and Ware’s Whitehaven Advertiser refers to a presentation to him of a silver teapot by the rate payers of the Parish in recognition of his conduct during his long service as Assistant Overseer. [6]

During his time as Assistant Overseer letters survive that were sent to him in relation to his office. The letters came from a wide range of places some from the adjacent parishes within walking distance, others from further away. [7] One came from Wolsingham, County Durham, concerning William Miller, a besom maker and his family struggling to make a living and coping with family sickness. [8] Another came from a poor widow Alice Lowden in Liverpool. [9]

In 1835 Thomas Burn gave notice of his intention to leave the office of Assistant Overseer giving up all money, books and papers belonging to the parish 15 April 1835.

Wanted Assistant Overseer Greystoke Feb 2 1835 PR5/53 15-1
Wanted Assistant Overseer February 2 1835 PR5/53-15-1 Greystoke Overseers’ Vouchers

Thomas Burn corresponded with his successor John Cockburn 12 August 1835 concerning pay due.

Burn wrote:

Sir , My Stipend being due the fourth of this month. I now expect you to pay me the sum of sixteen pounds before Saturday first, if not an action for the recovery without further notice. Yours etc; Thos Burn. [10]

Mr Cockburn replied:

Sir , In reply to your note of the 12th inst I have respectfully to inform you that your demand of £16 your full years salary cannot be complied with but I can at the same time inform you that the sum due for the time you were in office £11.2s.8d will be paid on demand. Aug 15 1835. Yours John Cockburn. [11]


Thomas Burn remained in the Greystoke area farming and hopefully keeping his industrious bees. He died on 8 January 1848 and his wife on Elizabeth 23 July 1849. [12]

The British Bee Hive George Cruikshank 1840 (1867)
The British Bee Hive George Cruikshank 1840 (1867) The British Museum

Sources
[1] Cumbria Archives, PR5/47, Poor Account Book, 1820-1837
[2] Cumbria Archives, PR 5/5, Greystoke, St Andrews, Baptism and Burial Register, 1757-1809; PR 5/9, Greystoke St Andrews, Marriage Register, 1813-1837.
[3] findmypast.uk [accessed 30 March 2020]
[4] Carlisle Patriot, 2 February 1828, p. 2.
[5] Ellis Hattie, Sweetness & Light, mysterious History of the Honey Bee (2004)

[6] Cumberland Pacquet and Whitehaven Ware’s Advertiser, 15 November 1831, p. 3 col, b
[ 7] Cumbria Archives, PR5/63, 22 letters to out relief, 1800-1837.
[8] Cumbria Archives, PR5/67/H 1, Greystoke Overseers’ Voucher, 5 May 1834.
[9] Cumbria Archives, PR5/67-H 21, Greystoke Overseers’ Voucher, 15 September 1835.
[10] Cumbria Archives, PR5/67-K 57, Greystoke Overseers’ Voucher, 12 August 1835.
[11] Cumbria Archives, PR5/67-K 55, Greystoke Overseers’ Voucher, 15 August 1835.
[12] Carlisle Journal, 27 July 1829 p.3 col. g.

This is a work in progress

Nathan Arnison (1796-1886), Linen and Woollen Draper, Penrith

By NMDEA

Nathan Arnison can be found in a trade directory of 1829 at Nether End, near Penrith, as a linen and woollen draper. [1 ] He moved the business to Market Place Penrith around 1831. He bought the shop from a William James who had purchased it from Christopher Crackenthorpe, a member of the Wordsworth family. The shop once was the home of William Cookson silk mercer and draper, and the maternal Grandfather of the poet William Wordsworth and his sister the diarist Dorothy Wordsworth.

Plaque re the former owners of Drapers on the site of N Arnison business, Penrith


A small bill amongst the Greystoke overseers’ vouchers, is headed ‘Bought of N. Arnison Linen and Woollen Drapers, Family Mourning and Funeral Furnishing’, and dated 27 April 1836. The four items, totalling 11s 1/2d, inclued the versatile fabric of cotton calico, priced at 1s. 6d, and 1 pair of sheets at 4s. 4d. [2] It is not apparent from the bill who might be the recipients of these items. Eight years later as well as a small bill for £1.17.6 a larger bill from N Arnison exists.[3] To the Executors of the late John de Whelpdale it is for his funeral expenses in June 1844 for £123.7s.6d Among the 63 different textiles supplied are black and slate calico, ribbon, black mourning silk, crepe, silk and Barcelona handkerchiefs. [4]

N Arnison Linen and Woollen Draper Penrith PR5/67-K

Nathan Arnison, the son of George Arnison (1744-1833) and Elizabeth Topping (1752-1831) of High Hareskeugh (sic) was baptised 1 January 1796 at Kirkoswald .[5] His father a yeoman and victualler of the Horse Heads Inn, Haresceugh [6]. Nathan married Ruth Barra (1799-1870) in 1827. Two sons joined the business: George (1829-1883) and Thomas Bell (1833-1888). N Arnison and Sons appear in subsequent Trade Directories. Robert (1836-1916) was a draper in Sheffield. The other sons William Barras (1830-1896) and Charles Nathan (1840-1911) were principally solicitors. [7] Nathan and Ruth also had two daughters: Isabella Ruth (1838-1914) and Elizabeth who married Hamilton Woods, an engineer.

When Nathan Arnison died 27 February 1886 he left a well established businesss. [8] Those living in the Penrith area will be familiar with the shop that remains in the same place in the centre of Penrith today.

Sources

[1] Parson and White, Directory of Cumberland and Westmorland Furness and Cartmel (1829).
[2] Cumbria Archives, PR5/67- K 8, Greystoke Overseers’ Voucher, 27 April 1836.
[3] Cumbria Archives, DX 8/1/15, N Arnison Account, 1843.
[4] Cumbria Archives, DHUD/17/60, John de Whelpdale deceased, N. Arnison, Penrith, draper, 29 June 1844.
[5] J.J. Thornley, Penrith Ancient Church Registers of the Parish of Kirkoswald.
[6] Parson and White, Directory of Cumberland and Westmorland, Furness and Cartmel (1829)
[7] M Harrison & Co., Directory and Gazetteer County of Cumberland (1861).

[8] Cumbria Archives, PROB/1886/W570, Will of Nathan Arnison.

A Hastings gentleman takes parish office

By Alannah Tomkins

In December 1827, the parish of St Clements in Hastings decided that it was ‘absolutely necessary’ to appoint an assistant overseer. This salaried official would be asked to take over all of the day-to-day drudgery associated with relieving the poor, namely to relieve all paupers, pay all bills, superintend the management of the poorhouse under the governor, removal all paupers and do all the other duties of a managing overseer. This freed the annually-elected overseers to do the really important work of collecting the poor rates.

Candidates for the office wrote to the parish in early April asking to be considered, but they had been pipped to the post by the interim ‘internal’ candidate. Mr Solomon Bevill had been provisionally appointed in January 1828. He remained in post subject to annual reappointments until 1833 when (presumably) declining health prompted him to retire. Bevill died in 1834, leaving goods and property to his children and grandchildren.

East Sussex Record Office, PAR 367/37/2/17

Thus far, Bevill’s story fits with the outline for a number of assistant overseers around the country. Men of apparently declining fortunes or towards the end of life secured this sort of post to provide an income in otherwise lean years. What is surprising is the additional detail we can glean from genealogical and other sources about the career that was coming to an end in Bevill’s case.

He had been born in the mid-eighteenth century and was therefore in his late 70s when he took on the parish job. Solomon Bevill was married to Lydia Blackman in 1775. In their early lives, the family members were sufficiently poor to warrant the attention of parish officers: Solomon, Lydia and their daughter Elizabeth were the subject of a settlement certificate issued in 1777. Thereafter their fortunes lifted: Solomon Bevill the elder acquired property in Hastings, and either he or his son, Solomon Bevill the younger, became Comptroller of the Port of Hastings. Most intriguing of all, one of the Solomons (I’m assuming the elder) can be found listed as the commander of a privateer in 1812, during the war against America. A letter of marque was made out to this name as the Commander of the ship Eclips out of Hastings, owned by Thomas Mannington.

The Beach at Hastings, c1812-1815

Elderly though he may have been, Bevill certainly brought something of a swashbuckling approach to parish affairs. At first appointment, and without asking the vestry, he summarily pulled down the wash house attached to the parish poor house and began rebuilding it with contractors of his choice. The tone of the vestry minutes in recording this realisation is, though, quite conciliatory rather than reproachful or outraged. Presumably Bevill’s long history in the town, or his age, conferred a protective veneer.

Sources: The Keep, East Sussex Record Office: PAR 367/12/2/8, Hastings St Clement Minutes of the Vestry concerning the poor 1827-33; PAR 367/12/5 Hastings St Clement vestry minute book 1823-58; PBT 1/1/78/562; National Archives HCA 25/206.