Week 4 - Invite to Dinner

It's Week 4 of #52ancestors and this week's theme is 'Invite to Dinner'.  I'm not sure if this was an invite or if my great-great grandfather applied to attend but this event came to mind given this theme.
When I first started researching, I was lucky that my grandmother Muriel Nellie Braybrook (1915-2004), known as Gran-Gran, had been given a couple of letters by her mother which she passed on to me.  One of them talked of a banquet and it is this 'dinner' that I am writing about.
The letter is below and was written by John Garfoot (1846-1889), Muriel's grandfather, and was written to his wife Ann Garfoot (nee Harding) (1838-1915).  The letter was written from 4 Norman Road (which was their residence in Bow, London) on Monday 23 June 1879.  It is thought that Ann and her two daughters were staying with John's family in Rutland.

The letter wrote about his life in London:
Dear Wife,
I trust these few lines will find you and all at home quite well and enjoying yourselves, I am quite well, but _______________.  Tiger has been found dead in the street, it is supposed he was poisoned, there is a man in the street strongly suspected of the deed, for Mr. Unstead's other cat came home and died, and there are others as well.  The weather still keeps very unsettled, by the looks of the crops, I do not think the farmers will be over done with straw whatever they are with corn, there are some very good crops of peas about.  I was at Uncles yesterday they are quite well, and Lousia was to stay as long as she liked if her relations wished her to.  They had a letter from Tel - she was quite well but busy.
The paper I sent to father last Thursday contained the account of a banquet at the Bow & Bromley Institute, at which I had the honour of being present and the pleasure of hearing a most interesting speech from the lips of the Right Hon. Sir Stafford Northcote Chancellor of the Exchequer.  In Friday's news he would have the sad account of the death of the Prince Imperial, the only son of his mother and she a widow living in exile.  These unfortunate news touches the hearts of most Englishmen who have read and know anything of the history of the family.
I don't know that I have more to say this time hoping to hear that you and the children are getting on nicely.
Please give my love to dear Father & Mother and the rest kiss the dear children for me tell them they went without their pig and its going rotten.  Chicken all alive.
Love from your affect. Husband J Garfoot
Mr. Spink's ask to let another week's rent go.

The banquet that John Garfoot describes was written about in a number of newspapers that I have found at the British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk).
The first item from the East London Observer on Saturday 7 June 1879 was an advertisement for the banquet.

Image © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

The report of the event even reached Scotland as the Dundee Courier reported the event on Thursday 19 June 1879.

Image © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

It was clearly quite a privilege to attend and gives an interesting insight into life at that time.

In terms of the rest of the letter, 'Uncle' I think is George Reeve (who married John's aunt Marianne Garfoot (1827-1905)). He was a beer retailer at the Lock Tavern, York Road, Walworth which is an area of London south of the river.  Their daughter Louisa would have been 17 in 1879 and was clearly away with relations.  However I have not been able to work out who 'Tel' was.

I love how this letter gives a wonderful insight into the family's life and feel very lucky to have been given it so early in my research.

Week 3 - Longevity

The theme for Week 3 of #52ancestors is ‘Longevity’.  The obvious person to talk about this week is my 4x great grandmother Kezia Jenkins (nee Smith).  Her death certificate gave her age as 104 when she died on 20 February 1870 of ‘Natural Decay’.

This was accompanied by a number of newspaper articles.  The Hampshire Telegraph on 2 March 1870 stated (noting they got the death date wrong):

JENKINS – On 26th ult., at Gurnard, Cowes, Kezia, widow of the late Mr. James Jenkins, of Duke’s Farm, aged 104 years.

The Hampshire Advertiser on 26 February 1870 wrote the following item:

DEATH OF A CENTENARIAN.  On Sunday “old Mrs Jenkins”, as she was generally called, died at Gurnard, near this town, at the advanced age of 104.  Born in the year 1766, or six years after George III came to the Crown, she lived through his long and eventful reign, and saw the fourth George and the fourth William seated on the throne of England, and by the time she was 71 years of age our present Sovereign, Her most gracious Majesty, took the reins of power.  Another such a life would have taken us back almost to the days of Cromwell.  Such lives as these are very rare, but one cannot help thinking that if the old lady who is now gone and whom death seemed so long to have forgotten had only had the means of information we now have, how very entertaining a history would hers have been of incidents that had happened that she could recollect long before our fathers were born or our grandsires had emerged from boyhood.  Her recollections, from the sphere in which she lived, were, however, purely local, and as such were only of interest to those who were endeared to her by ties of relationship.

In addition, a local book on Cowes (Cowes & Northwood Isle of Wight 1750-1914 Book 3 by Rosetta Brading) stated:

1870 – Grannie Jenkins of Gunnard died in her 106^th year.

Her burial was on 24 February 1870 at Northwood parish church near Cowes, Hampshire and again gave her age as 104 years.  If she was 104 when she died, she would have been born in 1765 or early 1766.

So the big question is, was she really as old as 104 which would have probably made her one of the oldest living person in the UK at that time?  The evidence I have for Kezia is limited however it does point to her having exaggerated her age over the years.

Unfortunately she (and the rest of her family) are missing from the 1861 census.  It was the year that enumerators were paid poorly and there is a high likelihood that they could not be bothered to walk up to the farm (Dukes Farm, Gunard, Isle of Wight, Hampshire) that she lived at with her son William (1820-1903) and his family.  None of the family nor an entry for Dukes Farm can be found despite a manual search through the census returns.

In the 1851 census, Kezia was recorded as being 80.  This would mean she was born in 1770 or 1771.

In the 1841 census, Kezia was recorded as being 75 – noting that the instruction was to round down your age, this would mean she was born between 1760 and 1766.

Kezia Smith was married in 1814 to James Jenkins at Saint Mary’s, Portsea, Hampshire.  If born in 1765, she have been 49 at her marriage – this is old to be married for the first time, noting she is given as a Spinster on the marriage record.

She then had three children James (baptised in 1814), Mary Ann (baptised in 1816 – she married Joseph Richards and was my 3xgreat grandmother) and William (baptised in 1820).  From census returns and other records, these dates of baptism are consistent with their dates of birth.  This would have made her between the ages of 49 and 55 when she had her children.  This seems very unlikely.

The only clue to Kezia’s place of birth is from the 1851 census.  Ancestry had transcribed her place of birth as Eversley, Wiltshire. Even though Eversley is in Hampshire, in my naivety, I trawled the parish registers for Eversley and could not find a Kezia Smith being baptised in the date range 1765 to 1790.  This was left as a brick wall for a number of years.  With much more experience, I returned to this brick wall and looked at the original image for her place of birth in detail.  So even though it looked correct at a first glance, it was then that I realised it was Everley without the ‘s’.  Everley, just over the border in Wiltshire, is normally spelt Everleigh but it is not uncommon to be heard by the enumerator and written down with either spelling.  This is also a better fit as in the 1841 census her place of birth is recorded as not in Hampshire (e.g. ‘N’ in ‘Born in County’ column).

I then did a search through the Everleigh parish registers for the same date range and found only one Kezia Smith who was baptised on 7 June 1780.  She had a sister Jemima who was baptised on the same day.  Her parents were John Smith and Repentence O’Briant (one of the most unusual family names) and they were married on 25 December 1773 in Collingbourne Kingston, Wiltshire.  They had two other children; Elizabeth baptised in 1775 and Thomas baptised in 1778.  This means it is unlikely Kezia was born any early than about 1779.

So assuming she was born in 1780 rather than 1765/6, she would have been 34 at her marriage and aged between 34 and 40 at the time her children were born.  This is older than most parents but is much more realistic.  It would have meant she was about 90 at her death which is still very old for 1870 but not quite so newsworthy as 104.

I continue to build up evidence for her life and look for further proof but I feel relatively sure I have found the correct Kezia.

Footnote: Kezia is related to me through my father, whose father Percy James Bennett was the subject of Week 1.  His mother was Florence Richards and her father was Joseph Richards.  His mother was Mary Ann Jenkins who was Kezia's daughter.

Week 2 - Favourite Photo

The theme this week (which is now last week) is 'Favourite Photo'.  The photo below is one of my favourite family history photos - kindly copied from the original held by my mum's cousin Ba.

This wedding day photo was taken on 1 February 1899 in Fletton, Peterborough, Northamptonshire.  The wedding was between John George Braybrook (1877-1917) and Emma Elizabeth Garfoot (1874-1949).  They were my great grandparents on my mother's side.  They had nine children including Muriel Nellie (my grandmother) and Evelyn Ruth (Ba and Gill's mother).

I have been able to identify a number of the people in the photo but there are still mysteries.  I have an idea of who would have attended but have not managed to find a report of the wedding that may include names of who attended.

To the right of the bride (looking at the photo) is her uncle William Springthorpe Garfoot (1859-1945).  I suspect that he gave away the bride as Emma's father had died ten years earlier following an accident in the railway yards in 1889.  I think his elder daughter Bessie Garfoot (1891-1973) is the girl in white on the left at the front.  His younger daughter Florence was only 1 year old so is not there.  His wife Hannah Hollis (1854-1917) may be in the photo but no idea who.

The bride's mother Ann Garfoot (nee Harding, 1838-1915) is on the second row from the front on the right hand side almost looking tucked away.  The bride's eldest sister Mary Ann Thompson (1871-1941) known as Polly is on the back row, sixth from the left.  I think her daughter Annie Francis Helen Thompson (1893-1981) known as Nell is the other girl in white on the front row.  Polly's husband had died in 1894.  The bride's grandfather Robert Jarvis Garfoot (1824-1902) is on the back row on the far right I think.

The groom's parents George Braybrook (1845-1916) and Elizabeth Ann Coley (1845-1914) are on the back row seventh and eighth from the left respectively.

These are the main relations that I have easily identified.  There are a few more that I suspect who they are but I am really hoping that at some point a newspaper article about the wedding will be found that will help identify who was there on the day.  If anyone knows who any of the other people are, I would welcome ideas.

One of the reasons I love this photo is that on first glance it looks quite a posh location.  However, when looking carefully you can see the corrugated iron building behind the backing cloth as well as hay on the ground.  

Week 1 - Start

I have decided to challenge myself and take part in the 52 Ancestors Challenge. This involves writing about an ancestor each week along a theme set by the fabulous Amy Johnson Crow (https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/52-ancestors-in-52-weeks/). You can follow other people's inputs via #52ancestors on social media.

This first week the theme is 'Start' and, as I am regularly asked how I got started doing family history, I am going to start with Percy James Bennett (1912-2003). Percy was my grandfather and was affectionately know as Brud (his sisters couldn't say brother when he was born). To me, he was Gramps.

On Boxing Day 1994, I sat down with him and asked him about his family. I still have the scribbled notes and, although some of the dates and names proved to be slightly wrong, it provided an excellent basis to start my research. In fact, many years later I revisited the notes again and cracked a brick wall. I had been struggling to find my great great grandparents' deaths. They had lived on the Isle of Wight and had the common names of Joseph and Ellen Richards but there was no sign of deaths on Isle of Wight. There in the original notes was the statement 'retired to Boscombe'. It was then a quick job to find their deaths in Dorset and fill another part of my ancestor stories.  It certainly taught me the importance of revisiting sources.

Back to Brud, he had an interesting life. He wrote many of his memoirs down and I will share them on the blog sometime soon. His career included working with Frank Whittle on the design of the first jet engine which was installed in the Gloster Meteor plane (Gloster Meteor speed record website). Here are the test pilots with Brud (2nd from left on back row).  

Brud was a great sportsman. He met his wife Joan Ethel Blanche Leggatt (1914-1993) at the local tennis club. He was also an avid cricketer (3rd from left on front row) and later in life scorer for the local cricket team. In his latter years, I remember him watching Wimbledon and other sports matches via his Sky box!

He loved his family and was a regular church goer. Having grown up with Wesleyan Methodist parents, he was involved with the CoE church in Barkston, Lincolnshire during his retirement. He had a close relationship with his two sisters Chris and Fodge and her daughter Elizabeth. He also got on well with his sister in law Kath (who remains the oldest member of the family still alive at 94)!

So each week will be different with some recent ancestors and some much older ones but hopefully all with interesting stories.