Vital Statistics
James Pinsent: 1837 – 1912 GRO0447 (Green-grocer and Fruit Market Salesman, Hackney and Islingon, London, Middlesex)
Sarah Savage: 1839 – 1914
Married: London, Middlesex: 1858
Children by Sarah Savage:
George James Pinsent: 1859 – 1860
James Walter Pinsent: 1861 – 1948 (Married Hannah Brooks, 1882, London, Middlesex)
Sarah Lydia Pinsent: 1863 – 1942 (Married William Francis Stevens, 1889, London, Middlesex)
Joseph Benjamin Pinsent: 1865 – 1897 (Married Elizabeth Fanny Boulter, 1890, London, Middlesex)
Louisa Mary Pinsent: 1867 – xxxx (Married John Fluskey, 1884, London, Middlesex)
William John Pinsent: 1869 – 1918 (Married Rose Emeline Parsons, 1891, London, Middlesex)
Martha Elizabeth Pinsent*: 1871 – xxxx
Thomas Henry Pinsent: 1873 – 1910 (Married Bessie Ada Penn, 1892, London, Middlesex)
Georgina Frances Pinsent: 1875 – xxxx (Married Frederick Charles Rawlinson, 1897, London, Middlesex)
Albert Hibbard Pinsent: 1878 – 1878
Edward Charles Pinsent: 1878 – 1878
George Hibbard Pinsent: 1879 – 1953 (Married Amelia unknown, xxxx, xxxx, xxxx)
Alexander Sidney Pinsent: 1884 – 1911
*Martha’s illegitimate child: May Lilian Pinsent: 1892 – 1892
Family Branch: Tiverton
PinsentID: GRO0447
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James was the second eldest of Benjamin Pinsent (a “carpenter” and “cabinet-maker’s”) three surviving sons – Samuel Benjamin, James and Joseph – by his wife, Mira (née Burgoyne). He was probably the only one to have married and had children. James was born in Islington, in London, and grew up in the slums of Clerkenwell. He was a “general labourer” and “railway porter “ in 1858 when he married Sarah Savage, the daughter of “cooper” from St. Pancras. When the 1861 census was taken, they were living on Galway Street, in St. Luke’s parish. They had a large family (nine boys and four girls) over the next twenty-five years.
James graduated to being a “market porter” and when the census was taken a decade later he was living on Church Row in St. Luke’s parish with his wife and their three young sons (James, Joseph and William) and two daughters (Sarah and Louisa). The family moved from St. Luke’s to St. Leonard’s parish in nearby Hackney and when the next census was taken in 1871, James was described as being a “fruit dealer” living at 2a Witchampton Street. He was living there with his wife and nine children. The census refers to James’s eldest son as a “Thomas Pinsent” who was an “insurance collector”. This is probably wrong. The entry should refer to “James Walter Pinsent”. James’s second son Joseph was marked down as an “apprentice.” From what we can establish later, he was probably apprenticed to a jeweler. Sarah, James’s eldest daughter, was a “post card bander” – whatever that was. The other children were either scholars, youngsters or – in one case, not yet born!
In 1880, the British Government decreed that all children should go to school until the age of ten. This move certainly provided the younger members of the Pinsent family with more opportunities. James’s daughter Martha Elizabeth Pinsent attended “St. Luke’s (parish) public school” before her family moved to Witchampton Street. She was admitted to “Chatham Gardens School” in Hackney in October 1879, and to nearby “Church Street Temporary School” in November 1881 (London, England, School Admissions and Discharges, 1840-1911: Ancestry.com). Her younger brother Thomas Henry Pinsent was admitted to the “Church Street Temporary School” in October 1881 and her little sister, Georgina Frances Pinsent was admitted in 1883. Presumably their elder siblings received some education in St. Luke’s. At least the family was literate again and was able to take advantage of better employment opportunities.
James seems to have run his “fruit” business out of “Farringdon Market”. While working there in March 1888, he was sued for damages amounting to £19 1s 6d. The nature of the complaint is unstated (Commercial Gazette: Wednesday 21st March 1888).
The family moved to Woodville Road in Islington, Stoke Newington sometime n the early 1880s and it was there that James’s granddaughter Edith Hannah Pinsent (daughter of his son Walter James Pinsent by his wife, Hannah, nee Brooks) was probably born in 1885 and certainly died in 1887. The family was also living there when James’s eldest daughter, Sarah Lydia Pinsent, married William Francis Stephens, a “messenger,” in 1889 and when the census takers made their rounds a couple of years later. By then, two more of their children (Joseph Benjamin and Mary Louisa Pinsent) had married and left home; however, there had been one more arrival, Sarah (née Savage’s) last child, Alexander Sidney Pinsent who arrived on the scene in 1884.
Joseph Benjamin Pinsent married Mary Boulter, the daughter of a “carpenter” and Mary Louisa married, John Flusky, a “coachman” who was son of a “horse dealer”. Interestingly, the Pinsents still seems to have been a Baptist family and Mary Louisa was not formally baptized until November 1885, after her marriage (London, England, Births & Baptisms 1813-1906 (Ancestry.com). Her younger brother, William John Pinsent, was a “market porter” (probably working for his father). He married Rose Emmeline Parsons, the daughter of a “bootmaker” a few months after the census was taken in 1891.
Martha Elizabeth had an illegitimate daughter, May Lilian Pinsent in July 1892. She was living with her sister Mrs. Stevens (Sarah Lydia, née Pinsent) at the time. Martha’s “Poor Law Removal and Settlement Record” (Ancestry.com) says that she told the magistrates that she was living at home with her parents “until I got into trouble …”. After her confinement, she took the child back to her parent’s house in Woodville Road but it died a few months later. Martha Elizabeth married a “sailor,” Thomas Hefferman, in August 1893. Whether he had been the cause of her earlier predicament, I have no idea.
London’s Electoral Registers show that James and his family were still living at 31 Woodville Road (which was probably also his shop) in 1898 and 1899, and the 1901 census tells us that he was a “fruit salesman operating on his own account” who was living with his wife and their two remaining sons. The elder of the two, George (Hibbard) was a “clerk in a hardware store”, and the younger, Alexander (Sidney) was an “auctioneer’s clerk”. George would later become a Baptist Missionary in Canada. He left Liverpool bound for Montreal and points west on the “S.S. Victorian” on the 17th May 1907. He married while in Canada and settled in Lloydminster in Saskatchewan. Alexander Sidney, meanwhile, stayed home with his parents. George’s elder sister Georgina Frances Pinsent married Frederick Charles Rawlinson in 1897 and they too went out to Canada. Presumably they went out to join up George and his family. They became Canadian Citizens in 1910 and were living in Battleford, (near Lloydminster) in Saskatchewan in 1916 (Canada Census of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta: 1916).
The Electoral Registers confirm that James and Sarah (née Savage) lived on Woodville Road up to 1908; however, by 1910, they had moved into a house on Mildmay Road in Islington with their youngest son Alexander Sidney and one of their daughters. When the 1911 Census was taken, James was a (presumably retired?) “fruit-market salesman.” London’s Electoral Registers also show that James was the head of the household. However, he shared the house with his daughter Sarah Lydia and her husband William Francis Stevens (who was a “printer’s warehouseman”) – and with one of their children. James told the census takers in 1911 that he had been married to his wife Sarah for fifty-three years and that they had had thirteen children. Eight were then still alive. Sadly, Alexander Sidney Pinsent died unmarried later that year.
James Pinsent was living on Brighton Road in Hackney when he died in 1912. Sarah stayed on in the same house and she too died there, in 1914. They had no less that five sons (James Walter; Joseph Benjamin, William John, Thomas Henry and George Hibbard Pinsent) who grew up and married and had children. Their lives are described elsewhere.
Family Tree
GRANDPARENTS
Grandfather: Benjamin Pinsent: 1776 – 1819
Grandmother: Esther Best: 1773 – 1868
PARENTS
Father: Benjamin Pinsent: 1808 – xxxx
Mother: Myra Burgoyne: 1815 – 1869
FATHER’S SIBLINGS (AUNTS, UNCLES)
Samuel Benjamin Pinsent: 1794 – xxxx
William Pinsent: 1795 – xxxx
Ann Pinsent: 1797 – xxxx
William Pinsent: 1799 – xxxx
Sarah Lucy Pinsent: 1800 – xxxx
Esther Pinsent: 1805 – xxxx
Benjamin Pinsent: 1805 – xxxx
Benjamin Pinsent: 1808 – xxxx
William Pinsent: 1812 – 1893
Emily Pinsent: 1815 – xxxx
Amelia Pinsent: 1818 – xxxx
MALE SIBLINGS (BROTHERS)
Samuel Benjamin Pinsent: 1833 – xxxx
James Pinsent: 1837 – 1912
Joseph Pinsent: 1840 – 1841
Edward Brand Pinsent: 1845 – 1846
George Henry Pinsent: 1847 – 1849
John Pinsent: 1850 – 1856
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