William Weston (1794-1862) and Sarah Bailey (1802-1884).
My 4th great-grand uncle and aunt.
William Weston was born on 22 March 1794 and baptised on 29 March at St Mary’s in Banham, Norfolk. His parents were John Weston and Esther Bailey.
He married Sarah Bailey in Banham on 27 May 1828. She too came from the village, where she was born on 3 December 1802 to parents James and Sarah Bailey – although in future census returns she always took about five years off her real age. Bizarrely, Sarah is also my 1st cousin six times removed. William and Sarah raised a large family in Banham, where he worked as a shoemaker.
The 21 October 1854 edition of the Norwich Mercury reported that William had been stabbed in the stomach by a man called Tollemache Bloomfield, who had been drinking with him at home, causing an injury that left him in bed for four days. The incident happened after William had suggested Bloomfield get some rest and had taken his hand to guide him upstairs, whereupon the attacker aimed a blow at his lower stomach. However, it was only upon getting upstairs that William discovered the wound. Bloomfield, who the court heard had previously been in an asylum, ran away. William was treated by a doctor. The Norfolk Quarter Sessions heard that Bloomfield had admitted that he had not felt well on the day of the incident and the day before. He was acquitted by the jury but confined at Her Majesty’s Pleasure.
By the 1861 Census William and his family had moved to the nearby village of Kenninghall. Something of his character emerged in a County Court case heard at Attleborough and reported in the Norfolk News of 20 July 1861, in which he was claiming 12s 11d for boots that he’d supplied to a widow called Elizabeth Blazey. The reporter noted: “Weston is a curiosity in his way, giving utterance to all manner of anomalies which now and then convulsed the audience and the Court in laughter.” In particular his book-keeping baffled onlookers, turning subtractions into additions and additions into subtractions, and pointing to figures that he claimed were at times invisible. William could give no explanation for his odd way of accounting, other than that was the way he ran his business! The defendant, despite her “dogged wordy resistance” to William’s claims and going at her defence with “a volubility perfectly alarming”, lost and was ordered to pay the debt.
William died not long after the case in Kenninghall on 24 May 1862. His widow Sarah later moved to Yorkshire, where the 1871 and 1881 census returns listed her in the Sheffield suburb of Attercliffe cum Durnall. In 1871 she was working as a housekeeper for a coal miner and living there with her daughter Sarah and Sarah’s illegitimate child. Ten years later she was staying with daughter Emma and her family. She died in 1884 and was buried in the Durnall Municipal Cemetery on 27 July.
William and Sarah’s children:
- Godfrey Weston (1828-1875) was baptised in Banham on 27 August 1828 and followed his father in becoming a shoemaker. He married Caroline Edwards in her home village of Kenninghall on 25 August 1861 and together they settled there and had a large family. He had a few run-ins with the law for poaching and was fined £3 7s 3d in 1868 for one-such incident in Banham (Norfolk Chronicle 1 February 1868). He died in the Union Workhouse at Kenninghall, perhaps because he needed medical treatment in the infirmary, and was buried in Kenninghall on 7 December 1875. Caroline remarried in 1879, moving to Burnley in Lancashire with her new husband, Cumberland-born cotton weaver Joseph Sharpe. How they met is unknown. She died in Burnley in 1912.
- Mary Weston (1833-????) was born on 9 September 1833 and baptised on 6 October in Banham. She married widowed bricklayer Jonathan Jessup in Kenninghall on 30 May 1863. He was more than 40 years her senior. The fact that Mary had had an illegitimate daughter, Ada, in 1858 may well have made her less desirable as a bride in those unforgiving Victorian times. Still, they had at least one daughter together. Jonathan died in 1876 and was buried in Kenninghall on 17 December that year. I suspect, but cannot yet prove, that she then married senior citizen William Oxer in 1878.
- Sarah Weston (1834-????) was born on 31 July 1834 and baptised in Banham on 26 March 1837. She was living with her widowed mother in Yorkshire in 1871, when the census listed her in the Sheffield suburb of Attercliffe cum Durnall with a two-year-old illegitimate child called Matilda. I suspect she died there in 1878 but have yet to confirm that it was her.
- Nathaniel Weston (1836-1906) was born on 19 July 1836 and baptised in Banham on 26 March 1837. He followed his father in becoming a shoemaker but the 1861 Census recorded him as a prisoner in the county gaol at Norwich. He married his cousin Martha Barker in Banham on 14 February 1865, but just a few months later was in trouble again, fined £5 at the Norfolk Assizes in Norwich on 28 June 1865 for assaulting a policeman in Kenninghall (Norwich Mercury 1 July 1865). His brother William was fined £2 for the same offence. The official record at this point noted that Nathanield had 12 previous convictions for a variety of misdemeanours. Nathaniel and Martha moved around Norfolk in the coming years, recorded in Redenhall in 1871 with their son and Outwell with more children in 1881. Martha died in 1884 and was buried in Outwell on 19 March. Nathaniel settled in Stickney, Lincolnshire, where he was recorded in the 1891 Census. He married Lincolnshire native Betsy Taylor in 1895. The Lincoln, Rutland and Stamford Mercury of 22 September 1899 reported another £5 fine for aggravated assault, this time on his wife. A separation order was granted at the same time but they were back together at the 1901 Census and remained in the Stickney area. A quick perusal of the newspaper archives wherever Nathaniel lived showed he was often before the magistrates for a range of petty and more serious crimes over and above those reported here, including assault, poaching and using obscene and threatening language. He died on 9 January 1906. Betsey died in 1938.
- Matilda Weston (1838-1838) was born on 29 March 1838, baptised in Banham on 11 April and buried there on 14 April 1838.
- Matilda Weston (1839-1889). Born in Banham in 1839, Matilda married coal miner Thomas Bradley on 3 October 1864 in Sheffield, Yorkshire. They were living in Attercliffe cum Darnall at the 1871 Census and Handsworth in 1881 and had children. She died in March 1889. Thomas remained in the area and he may have died in 1907 but I’ve yet to find conclusive proof.
- Emma Weston (1842-1913). Born in Banham, Emma grew up locally and was registered as a dressmaker with her family in Kenninghall at the 1861 Census. She married labourer John Potter in his home village of Kenninghall on 2 December 1866 and had several children there but they too moved to Attercliffe cum Darnall in Yorkshire, where they were listed from 1871. By 1891, still residing there, John was recorded as a coal miner. At the 1911 Census he was described as an invalid. He died later in the year, on 24 December 1911. Emma died on 8 April 1913.
- William Weston (1841-1926) was born in Banham and followed his father in becoming a shoemaker, practising his trade in Kenninghall. He was often in trouble with the law – in 1861 he was committed to prison for six months and three months for not paying two fines of £5 relating to poaching and for assaulting two police officers (9 November 1861 Norwich Mercury). In 1865 he was fined £2 for assaulting a policeman in Kenninghall (Norwich Mercury 1 July 1865) and the following year he was again sentenced for poaching, ordered to either pay a fine and costs or face two months in prison (Norwich Mercury 3 February 1866). There were other cases too including drunken behaviour and assault. William married Esther Ward in her home village of Kenninghall on 20 April 1872 and settled there with their children but by the 1891 Census William had become an agricultural labourer. Esther died in 1909 and was buried in Kenninghall on 2 December that year. William remained in the village and died in 1926.
- Ursula Maria Weston (1845-1871). Born in Banham in 1845, Ursula also moved to Yorkshire. She married Hull-born brickmaker Mark Ashley on 23 August 1868 in Sheffield and settled in Attercliffe, just like several of her siblings. She had a son but died young in 1871 and was buried in Sheffield on 22 December that year. Mark remarried, remained in Yorkshire and died in 1922.
Sources:
Birth, marriage, death and burial records including civil registrations from the General Register Office, census returns, wills and other records at Ancestry.co.uk, Findmypast.co.uk and Norfolk Family History Society.
British Newspaper Archive, titles in text.