a history
Birth: 1920
Marriage: 1940
Spouse: Leonard John Simonds
Death: 2003
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0860
Grandfather: William Pinsent: 1860 – 1936
Grandmother: Lydia Florence Warren: 1854 – 1911
Father: Sidney Carton Pinsent: 1891 – 1961
Mother: Ida Ethel Mann: 1895 – 1940
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Birth: 1895
Marriage: N/A
Spouse: N/A
Death: 1895
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0859
Grandfather: Thomas Pinsent: 1834 – 1917
Grandmother: Mary Ann Gilley: 1839 – 1895
Father: Alfred John Pinsent: 1869 – 1939
Mother: Rosina Train: 1865 – 1947
Alfred John Pinsent: 1869 – 1939
William Thomas Pinsent: 1870 – 1871
Frederick William Pinsent: 1872 – 1912
John Thomas Pinsent: 1896 – 1958
Robert Cecil Pinsent: 1898 – 1920
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Birth: 1830
Marriage: N/A
Spouse: N/A
Death: 1832
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0926
Grandfather: Richard Pinson: 1745 – 1825
Grandmother: Elizabeth Gregory: 1748 – 1837
Father: John Pinsent: 1782 – 1849
Mother: Mary Follett: 1782 – 1859
Thomas Pinson: 1776 – xxxx
Richard Pinson: 1778 – 1868
Elizabeth Pinson: 1780 – xxxx
William Pinson: 1784 – xxxx
Mary Pinson: 1786 – 1873
Joseph Pinson: 1788 – xxxx
Abraham Pinson: 1787 – 1871
Rachael Pinson: 1796 – xxxx
Loyalty Pinson: 1799 – xxxx
William Pinsent: 1811 – 1879
John Pinsent: 1817 – 1819
Joseph Pinson: 1819 – 1881
John Pinsent: 1823 – 1902
James Pinsent: 1825 – 1886
Samuel Pinson: 1828 – 1833
Thomas Pinson: 1830 – 1832
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Thomas Pinsent: 1834 – 1917 GRO0834 (Printer & Compositor, Torquay, Devon)
Mary Ann Gilley: 1839 – 1895
Married: 1868: Newton Abbot, Devon
Children by Mary Ann Gilley:
Alfred John Pinsent: 1869 – 1939 (Married Rosina Train, 1893, Epping, Essex)
William Thomas Pinsent: 1870 – 1871
Frederick William Pinsent: 1872 – 1912
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0834
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Thomas Pinsent was the only (surviving) son of Abraham Pinsent by his wife, Anne (surname unknown). He was born in Chudleigh in 1834 and baptized in its Independent Chapel.
Thomas was living at home with his parents in 1851 but likely left to join the army shortly thereafter. He was based at Chatham and was considered the best shot in the garrison and he won first prize in a shooting contest held there in February 1859 (Morning Herald (London): Tuesday 8th February 1859). Thomas was a “Corporal” in the “2nd Battalion of the 17th Regiment of Foot” – which was based at Shorncliffe Camp, near Folkestone in Kent when the census was taken in 1861. The regiment also served in Dublin and Curragh (County Kildare) in Ireland (National Archives: WO/12/3487).
Thomas left the army some time in the 1860s and took up a job with a “printer” in West Teignmouth in Devon, which had been a growing community since the arrival of the railway. Thomas married Mary Ann Gilley, the daughter of a “deceased labourer” in Newton Abbot in May 1868 and they had three sons. Alfred John Pinsent Pinsent (the eldest) was born in Chudleigh, where his parents still lived, in 1869. Alfred’s brother William Thomas Pinsent was born there the following year – a matter of days before his grandmother died.
Thomas and Mary Ann moved to Torquay shortly afterwards. It was fast becoming a fashionable holiday destination for middle class “merchants” who, with the coming of the railway, were only to eager to abandon their smoky Midland cities for Devon’s relatively pristine southern shores. Thomas and Mary Ann were living on Cavern Road in Torquay when their second son died in 1871- a few days after his grandfather – and when their third, Frederick William Pinsent, was born in 1872 – a few days. The family was still living there when the census-takers made their rounds in 1881. By then, Thomas was “a printer-compositor” and his wife was a “dressmaker” – as well as being a housewife. Their two sons were, of course, “scholars.”
Thomas and his family had moved to Hill Park Terrace in Paignton by 1891. The census that year shows that Alfred John Pinsent had followed his father into the printing business. He was a twenty-two years old “printer’s compositor”. The household included a resident “domestic cook,” Anne Train, who came from Hennock. She had her daughter, Rosina Train, a twenty-five years old “dressmaker” living with her and, true to script, Alfred John and Rosina married in 1893 (see elsewhere). Why they were in Epping in Essex when they did so, I have no idea!
Mary Ann (née Gilley) died in October 1895 and Thomas moved in with his son Alfred John and his then relatively recently acquired wife Rosina. He was with their growing family at Rosemont in Tormoham, in Torquay in 1901 and also, according to census data in 1911. Thomas Pinsent, a “letter press print worker” died in Torquay in 1917.
To the best of my knowledge, Thomas and Mary Anne’s third son, Frederick William Pinsent never married. According to the census records, he was living with his parents in Torquay in 1881 but had moved out by 1891. It is not entirely clear what happened to him; however, he likely took to the sea and became an “Able Seaman” in the “Merchant Service” based in Southampton.
I suspect that Frederick was a member of the crew of the Ship “Conquest” in 1899 when it lost its propeller (and thus means of propulsion) off the Shetland Islands thirteen days out from Quebec with a load of timber. Evidently, the “S.S. Benwick” tried to come to its aid, but the vessels lost touch with each other after three cables broke in bad weather. The “Conquest” was driven to the northeast and the crew abandoned ship when its supplies ran low after more than a month adrift. It headed for Norway in two lifeboats. The first lifeboat, which held Captain Garrod and F. W. Pinsent, was found at sea and its crew was landed at Christiansund on 21st November 1899. The Norwegians sent out a lifeboat to look for the second (Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette: Wednesday 22nd November 1899). Presumably they found it.
Frederick seems to have decided that he had had enough of Atlantic gales and that ships heading for Australia were fundamentally safer. He seems to have crewed on a number of White Star Line ships carrying immigrants out there in the early 1900s (Melbourne and Sydney). He went out on the “S.S. Tropic” in 1905, the “S.S. Medic” in 1906, the “Afric” in 1907 and 1908 and “Suevic” in 1909 (New South Wales, Unassisted Immigrant Passenger Lists: 1826 – 1922). He was not on the “S.S. Titanic” in 1912.
The census taken the previous years tells us that Frederick was “a seaman” lodging with a “marine fireman” and his family on Paton Street, in Kirkdale in Liverpool, in Lancashire in 1911. However, he was a “dock labourer” the following year when injured by a falling bale of hay. Unfortunately, it fractured his spine and he died in hospital in January 1912.
Grandfather: Richard Pinson: 1745 – 1825
Grandmother: Elizabeth Gregory: 1748 – 1837
Father: Abraham Pinsent: 1787 – 1871
Mother: Anne Unknown: 1795 – 1870
Thomas Pinson: 1776 – xxxx
Richard Pinson: 1778 – 1868
Elizabeth Pinson: 1780 – xxxx
John Pinson: 1782 – 1849
William Pinson: 1784 – xxxx
Mary Pinson: 1786 – 1873
Joseph Pinson: 1788 – xxxx
Rachael Pinson: 1796 – xxxx
Loyalty Pinson: 1799 – xxxx
Joseph Cook Pinsent: 1832 – xxxx
Thomas Pinsent: 1834 – 1917
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Birth: 1891
Spouse: Florence Maud Fisher (1920), Edith Emma Sussemilch (1933)
Death: 1967
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0830
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Thiery George Pinsent, or “George Pinsent” as he was commonly known, was the eldest son of William Henry Thiery Pinsent by his wife, Hannah Ann Cox . He was born in Corsham in Wiltshire and grew up there with an elder sister, Daisy Louise Pinsent, and a younger brother Walter Sidney Pinsent who died at the age of four.
Thiery George’s father was a “baker” who moved his family to Bath, in Somerset before the census was taken in 1911. Thiery was a single, young, man who lived at home on Coronation Avenue and worked as a “press-man” and “lithographer” at Pitman’s (?) Printing Works. His sister was also living at home. She was unmarried.
G. T. Pinsent enlisted as a private in the “Northumberland Fusiliers” [Regimental #86338] in March 1916 (“British Army WWI Medal Rolls:” Ancestry.com). Perhaps surprisingly, does not seem to have seen front-line active service. His service records seem to show that he was stationed in England throughout the war, and that he was based in Peckham Rye, in Dulwich, in 1918 (London, England, Electoral Register 1847-1965). He was discharged for reason of “sickness” in York, in February 1919 “U.K. Silver War Badge Records (1914 – 1920).” One has to wonder if he caught the influenza bug that caused so much damage that year.
“Thiery George” seems to have gone by the name of “George” throughout the war – and it certainly became his name of choice thereafter. Perhaps, he felt his grandfather’s foreign-sounding name was a bit of a liability. George returned to printing after war and was a “printer” when he married Florence Maud Fisher, the daughter of “gardener” in Westbury on Trym parish Church in December 1920. According to the census taken the following year, he was a “printer’s machinist” employed by “Sir J. Pitman & Sons, Publishers”, in Tiverton; however, at that time he was out of work. Florence, meanwhile, was occupied by “home duties.” They lived on Bridge Road at Twerton. Sadly, a local paper records that: “Florence Maud, the treasured wife of George Pinsent, late of Bath” died in Bristol in August 1925 (Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette: Saturday 22nd August 1925). They had no children.
For the next few years (1925 to 1930) George lived on his own at Coalpit Heath north east of Bristol, and then at Wick-Wick, near Winterbourne in the same parish (Gloucestershire, England, Electoral Register 1832 – 1974). He was determined to remarry and he set his sights on a Miss Lily May Jefferey, a “waitress” at the Victory Café in Fishponds, in Bristol. Sadly, the match was not to be. His hopes were dashed when she dropped him as a prospective husband after hearing slanderous statements from a so-called “friend” (or rival?).
Ronald Francombe told Lily that George could have saved his first wife’s life if he cared to, but had not and that he periodically took off for London with lady-friends … Not something any prospective spouse wishes to hear. Lily never thought to question the allegations. She dropped him and moved on. When he discovered the deception, George took Ronald to court claiming “alienation of affection”. Mr. Justice Rowlatt, who was in charge of the case, was sympathetic. He said that George had been very badly served but, as the couple were not actually contracted or engaged at the time of the slander, there was no contract broken. He dismissed case and George had to eat the costs (Western Daily Press: Thursday 7th June 1928). By then, Miss Jefferey had other suitors.
Still, George pressed on and in December 1933 he married Edith Emma Sussemilch, the daughter of a “wheelwright” in Foxley Parish Church, near Marmlesbury in Wiltshire. She may have worked in a village shop as George quickly settled into Foxley and became the “manager” of the village store. George and Edith were present at the funeral of the village “post-mistress” in 1937 (Western Daily Press: Saturday 30th January 1937). After her demise, George seems to have added her postal duties to his own, and he become an unofficial “postmaster”. The England and Wales Register compiled in 1939 shows that he was a “post master and grocer (shop keeper) and master gardener.” Gardening must have come naturally given his predecessors. George and Edith were living with one of her relations, Florence Lilian Sussemilch at the time.
George and Edith seem to have retired to Brinkworth, near Swindon, by 1959 and moved to Katifer Lane in nearby Malmesbury by 1967, before George died. George had made plans for a big funeral: He had arranged for his numerous and various legatees to receive sealed envelopes that they were to hand to the “undertaker” at his funeral service at the “Congregational Church” in Malmesbury. The letters were to be proof of attendance. The undertaker was instructed to pass them on to George’s “solicitor”, who was instructed to withhold legacies (which ranged from £10 to in excess of £150) from anyone who failed to attend. He received thirty envelopes – from friends and villagers, and also from representatives of social service agencies such as the “Salvation Army” and “British Legion”. One of the legatees was reported as saying (presumably in bewilderment): “I am sure most of us would have been here in any case” (Daily Mirror: Thursday 21st September 1967) – Perhaps. George’s estate was valued at approximately £10,000 (Calendar: Index of Wills and Administration: 1967 – 1995).
Another quirk of the will that caused considerable amusement at the time was its stipulation that, Edith, George’s widow, was only to inherit her share – “provided she chose not to live closer than 90 miles out from London,” as “he thought it was a wicked city” (Winnipeg Free Press, Manitoba, Canada: 10th February 1968). She happily agreed to the limitation and, as Malmesbury was deemed to be 95 miles from London, stayed on – safely out of the forbidden zone! She died in Malmsbury in 1971 and probate of her will was granted in Winchester in February 1972. There were no children from the marriage.
Grandfather: William Henry John Pinsent: 1841 – 1923
Grandmother: Louisa Broad: 1837 – 1926
Father: William Henry Thiery Pinsent: 1865 – 1915
Mother: Hannah Ann Cox: 1865 – 1922
Louisa Pinsent: 1867 – 1936
Edwin John Pinsent: 1868 – 1949
George Pinsent: 1870 – 1890
Alfred James Pinsent: 1872 – 1873
Emilie Marie Eugenie Pinsent: 1873 – 1959
Josephine Pinsent: 1876 – 1952
Lana Florence Mary Pinsent: 1878 – 1879
Alfred Louie Pinsent: 1880 – 1944
Beatrice Rose Pinsent: 1882 – 1959
Sidney Pinsent: 1883 – 1947
Walter Sidney Pinsent: 1893 – 1898
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Birth: 1924
Marriage: 1943
Spouse: Alan Kenneth Smith
Death: N/A
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0827
Grandfather: Edwin John Pinsent: 1868 – 1949
Grandmother: Emily Mary Vowles: 1877 – 1912
Father: Eric Henry Edwin Pinsent: 1896 – 1959
Mother: Catherine Ann Coles: 1897 – 1992
Eric Henry Edwin Pinsent: 1896 – 1959
Josephine Louisa Pinsent: 1899 – 1975
Leslie Donald Pinsent: 1900 – 1972
Pauline Rose Pinsent: 1903 – 1979
Samuel Claude Pinsent: 1904 – 1988
Alfred Edwin Hope Pinsent: 1906 – 1907
Doris Irene Pinsent: 1920 – 1920
Joyce Pauline Emilie Pinsent: 1921 – xxxx
Gladys Clara Pinsent: 1922 – xxxx
Gwendolyn Ruth Pinsent: 1924 – xxxx
Ronald Leslie Pinsent: 1926 – 2007
Cyril Edwin Pinsent: 1928 – 2003
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Sydney John Pinsent: 1891 – 1968 GRO0807
Beatrice Mary Drew: 1894 – 1963
Married: 1919: Uplowman, Tiverton, Devon
Children by Beatrice Mary Drew:
Ernest John Pinsent: 1920 – 2011 (Married Muriel Unknown, xxxx, xxxx, xxxx)
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0807
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Sydney John Pinsent was the only surviving son of Laura Ann Pinsent who was the eldest daughter of John Pinsent by his wife Ann Paddon. His mother was a “lathe treader” in a pottery factory and he was born near her workplace at Coldeast in Ilsington parish. Sydney was Laura’s only surviving illegitimate son. Her three other illegitimate children died before she settled down and married Charles Heath in June 1900.
The census taken the following year (1901) shows that Sydney was living with his grandparents at “#16 South View” in Bovey Tracey. It is not clear why he was not living with his mother and her new husband; perhaps they were both working, or perhaps it was more to do with his schooling. However, he later rejoined them. Sydney was living in Chudleigh Knighton, in Hennock with his mother and five young half-siblings when the next census was taken, in 1911. By then he was a “brickyard labourer” working alongside his step-father.
Sydney did not stay at the brick works for long, however; in October 1913 he signed on for twelve years of service in the “Royal Navy” and he was included in a list of Chudleigh and District men who had signed up for war service in the South Devon Weekly Express on 1st January 1915. He, off course, had no idea that he was soon to be at war when he signed up. According to his official records (National Archives: ADM 188/908); he was 5 ft. 4 ½ in. tall, had a chest expansion from 23 ½ to 37 in., a “fresh” complexion, brown hair and hazel eyes. Added to this, he had a mole over one clavicle and a birthmark on his left shoulder – to say nothing of a selection of tattoos, including clasped hands, a head and a female figure on his arms. Sydney signed on as a “Stoker, 2nd Class” [K20896] but was raised to “Stoker 1st Class” in October 1914, at the outbreak of the “First World War.” He was a “Leading Stoker” when it ended in November 1918. Stokers were much in demand when ships were powered by steam. Sydney served on a number of British warships, separated by stints at “H.M.S. Vivid II” – one of the Navy’s many “stone frigates” or Naval shore stations.
Most of Sydney’s “First World War” was spent on assignment to the battleship “H.M.S. Conqueror” where he was on board shoveling coal during the battle of Jutland, off Denmark, in May/June 1916. This was one of the most serious naval engagement of the war. “H.M.S Conqueror” may have (somewhat embarrassingly) had a problem with its engines at the time as it was under-powered during the battle. It fired off a few salvos without causing any apparent damage on the enemy. The British took more casualties than the Germans at Jutland but succeeded in deterring the German fleet from making any other serious sallies into the North Sea – which counted as a win. The “Conqueror” spent the rest of the war training crew and patrolling the North Sea. It was decommissioned in 1919. Sydney was eligible for the “Star”, “Victory” and “British War” medals (U.K. Naval Medal and Award Rolls: 1793 -1972: Ancestry.com)
After spending a few months at “H.M.S. Vivid II”, Sydney moved to another battleship, “H.M.S. Warspite.” He served on it (except when home on leave, of course) from April 1920 until August 1924. When the census takers visited William Drew in Uplowman, in Devon, in 1921 they found he had visitors: his married daughter Beatrice Mary Pinsent, her husband Sydney (a “leading stoker on H.M.S. Warspite”) and their son, Ernest John Pinsent who was less than a year old.
Sydney had another shore-break before being posted to “H.M.S. Empress of India” in December 1924. He was on its manifest until December 1927. From there, he was returned to shore before receiving several short-term placements on light cruisers such as the “H.M.S. Frobisher”, “H.M.S. Caradoc” and “H.M.S. Caledon” in the 1930s. In his later years, he was invariably described as having a “V.G.” character and “Supr” level of efficiency.
It is not clear what Sydney did after being pensioned off in his mid-forties, in October 1935. However, he shows up at a well-attend whist drive in Uplowman in November 1938. He must have played cards on board and he did well and was one of the winning “gentlemen” (Exeter and Plymouth Gazette: Friday 11th November 1938). He made a good showing in February the following year too (Western Times: Friday 10th February 1939). Sydney seems to have rejoined the navy at the outset of the “Second World War”. He served as a “Leading Stoker” at “H.M.S. Drake” and at other shore stations between the 24th August 1939 and the 16th August 1945 (Royal Navy Register of Seamens’ Services: 1848-1939: and National Archives: ADM 188/908). It is not clear how much time he spent at sea.
Sydney was awarded a “Royal Navy Long Service and Good Conduct Medal” while serving on “H.M.S. Frobisher” in December 1928 (U.K. Naval Medal and Award Rolls: 1793 – 1972: Ancestry.com) and, better still, we find that “Leading Stoker Sydney John Pinsent of H.M.S. Carlisle was awarded a Distinguished Service Medal in 1942.” He received the decoration from the King as his wife and son looked on in November that year (Western Times: Friday 27th November 1942). The “Carlisle” was an old cruiser that had been returned to service in an anti-aircraft role during the “Second World War”. It spent much of it’s time on naval support and escort duties in the Mediterranean and helped escort a critical supply convoy into Malta in March 1942.
After the “First World War”, Sydney found time to marry Beatrice Mary Drew. They married in Uplowman, near Tiverton in Devon in 1919 – which explains why he was living there in the 1930s. They had a son, Ernest John Pinsent in 1920. How much Ernest saw of his father, I cannot say. The Electoral Rolls show that the family – or at least Beatrice and her son, lived at “Greengate” in Uplowman from 1921 to at least 1931. They also show that Sydney John was (almost invariably) on the “Absentee Voters list”.
Sydney was away from home – presumably back with the “Senior Service” when the England and Wales Register was compiled in 1939. His wife, Beatrice, was, however, living at “Shapcott Cottage”, in Tiverton. she probably had her son living with her; however, his name has been redacted. Beatrice’s mother Alice Drew died in Uplowman in 1940 and Beatrice and Ernest John were listed among the chief mourners. Her husband was once again, presumably, at sea (Western Times: Friday 26th April 1940).
When Sydney finally retired, he settled in Uplowman, and they were still there when Beatrice died at “Whitnage Cottage” in February 1963. Probate was granted to her husband, Sydney (England and Wales, National Probate Calendar, 1858-1966 (Ancestr.com). He died there in 1968 and both are buried in the local churchyard.
Their son, Ernest John Pinsent, married Muriel Helen England either sometime during or soon after the “Second World War”. In 1996, the “Daily Mail” newspaper ran an article on the first inhabitants of a row of council houses that had been built in Uplowman in 1946. Ernest, who was one of the oldest long-time resident of the village at the time, lived in one of them. He explained how he had joined the army and had fought with the “31st Tank Brigade” in Belgium, Holland and France, and then spent fourteen months convalescing in Italy after inadvertently drinking water from a well contaminated with the bodies of two dead German soldiers! He went on to say that he met his wife while he was assigned to work on a runway at Bristol. Evidently his “digs” there were bombed and he was, fortuitously, reassigned to the house next door to his wife-to-be, Muriel. For thirty-five years “Muriel worked as a domestic at the village school. In the forties and fifties Uplowman would be blanketed thickly in snow, Mr. Pinsent recalls, but in recent decades the winters have been warmer. The Pinsents are philosophical about never having children. “You can’t have everything,” says Mr. Pinsent. “In other ways we have had wonderful lives.” His wife says: “I was always baby-sitting for the others. I was bit like a surrogate mother really.” Their neighbours told similar tales and all described the primitive nature of their houses when they first moved in (Daily Mail: 28th March 1996).
Ernest “Ernie” Pinsent was an electrical engineer in the 1980s. He died, aged 90 years, in September 2011 and he was buried in the local churchyard. The Electoral Rolls show that Muriel was living in the same council house at “5, Crossways”, in Tiverton as recently as 2020.
Grandfather: John Pinsent: 1852 – 1917
Grandmother: Ann Paddon: 1849 – 1922
Father: Unknown: xxxx – xxxx
Mother: Laura Ann Pinsent: 1874 – 1940
Wallace Pinsent: 1877 – 1955
Ada Pinsent: 1880 – 1959
Albert John Pinsent: 1882 – 1928
Florence Annie Pinsent: 1885 – 1918
Lily Blanche Pinsent: 1887 – 1949
Beatrice May Pinsent: 1894 – 1894
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Sidney Carton Pinsent: 1891 – 1961 GRO0808 (House decorator in Romford and Chelmsford, Essex)
Ethel Ida Mann: 1895 – 1940
Married: 1915: Romford, Essex
Children by Ethel Ida Mann:
Vera Irene Pinsent: 1920 – 2003 (Married Leonard John Simonds, Romford, Essex, 1940)
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0808
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Sidney was the only son of William Pinsent by his wife Lydia Florence Warren. He was born in Greenwich on the south bank of the Thames near London in 1891, and later moved to Ilford, in Essex where his father was a “baker” and “confectioner” in the 1890s.
Sidney was reported to be a “soldier” from Gorleston in Suffolk when he married Ethel Ida Mann, the daughter of a printer’s “compositor” in Romford (Essex) in July 1915. However, I have yet to locate his “First World War” army records. He settled in Romford after the war and became a “house decorator”. Ethel had a daughter, Vera, in 1920.
The family was living with Glady’s grandfather, Thomas Mann, on Marks Road when the census was taken in 1921. He was a widower living with three of this grandchildren, Sidney Pinsent, a “painter” employed by a “Mr. Crabb,” a builder in Richmond; Gladys Mann, a“shop assistant” working for “Sanders Bros.” in Romford High Street and Ida Pinsent, Sidney’s wife, who was at home looking after their eighteen month old daughter Vera Pinsent. The household also included a lodger, Frederick Taylor, who was also “painter” for “Mr. Crabb.”
Thomas Mann likely died sometime in the 1920s 0r 1930s and Sidney and Ida moved to Hillfoot Road, in Romford. He was still a “house painter” and “decorator” and she was still doing house work when the England and Wales Register was compiled in 1939. There was a third person with them at the time. The entry has been redacted but it is probably Vera. She would have been around nineteen years old and as yet unmarried.
Ethel died in the “Chelsea Hospital” in London in June 1940, five weeks before her daughter Vera Irene married a government official. Sidney continued on as a “house decorator” but he had retired by the time he died in Chelmsford in February 1961. He was buried in Havering on 1st March 1961 (U.K. Burial and Cremation Index: 1576-2014).
Grandfather: John Pinsent: 1823 – 1902
Grandmother: Elizabeth Loveys: 1817 – 1884
Father: William Pinsent: 1860 – 1936
Mother: Lydia Florence Warren: 1854 – 1911
Emily Pinsent: 1850 – 1857
John Pinsent: 1852 – 1917
Elizabeth Pinsent: 1854 – xxxx
Anne Pinsent: 1856 – 1857
Anne Pinsent: 1858 – xxxx
William Pinsent: 1860 – xxxx
Laura Emily Pinsent: 1863 – 1868
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Birth: 1883
Marriage: N/A
Spouse: N/A
Death: 1947
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0806
Grandfather: William Pinsent: 1811 – 1879
Grandmother: Harriet Morgan: 1813 – 1890
Father: William Henry John Pinsent: 1841 – 1923
Mother: Louisa Broad: 1837 – 1926
Emily Pinsent: 1843 – 1848
Sidney Pinsent: 1846 – 1880
Alfred James Pinsent: 1847 – 1848
Laura Emily Pinsent: 1852 – 1906
Edwin John Pinsent: 1868 – 1949
George Pinsent: 1870 – 1890
Alfred James Pinsent: 1872 – 1873
Alfred Louie Pinsent: 1880 – 1944
Sidney Pinsent: 1883 – 1947
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Sidney Pinsent: 1846 – 1880 GRO0805 (Solicitor’s Clerk, Wrington, Somersetshire)
Anna Clark: 1844 – 1905
Married: 1871: Newton Abbot, Devon
Children by Anna Clark:
Eunice Bell Pinsent: 1872 – 1898
William Edward Sidney Pinsent: 1876 – 1911
Family Branch: Bristol
PinsentID: GRO0805
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Sidney Pinsent was the second son of William Pinsent by his probable second (?) wife Harriet (née Morgan). He was born in Ilsington, in Devon in 1846 and grew up there. He had an elder brother, William Henry John Pinsent who was born in Somerset and a sister Laura Emily Pinsent who arrived in Devon six years later. There were also two other children from the marriage (Emily and Alfred James Pinsent); however, they died young. William and his family lived at Trumpeter Cottage just to the north of Ilsington village on the road from Bovey Tracey to Widdecombe. The Census data tell us that William was a “farm labourer” in 1841 and a (probably alluvial) “tin miner” a decade later.
William’s wife, Harriet and her brother John Morgan were both from Dursley, in Gloucestershire and the two of them stayed in touch after Harriet moved down to Devon with her husband. In 1861, when the census-makers made their rounds, they found that William’s two younger children, Sidney and Laura Emily were both school-children who were living with their uncle, John Morgan, the “toll collector” at the New Turnpike Gate at Winscombe, in Somersetshire. Their elder brother William Henry John Pinsent was, meanwhile, a 20-year old “coachman” living near Churchill, in Somerset with three other servants employed by Ann Elizabeth Grant, a fund-holder from the West Indies. The centre of gravity of the family was moving north.
The 1871 Census refers to William as being an “agricultural labourer” living at Smokey Houses in Ilsington; however, he was said to be a “grocer” when his son Sidney married Anna Clarke who was the daughter of a “gentleman” later that same summer. Sidney was a “clerk.” The couple married in St. Paul’s Church in Wolborough (Newton Abbot). Anna came from Jersey in the Channel Islands. It may be a coincidence, but Sidney’s father William Pinsent probably had an early marriage to Sarah Earles (see elsewhere) and had a son by her, Thomas James Pinsent who married in Jersey, in 1856. Thomas James Pinsent founded what is now known as the AUSTRALIA Branch of the family.
Sidney died in Bristol at the age of thirty-four years (Western Times: Saturday 25th September 1880). He was a “solicitor’s clerk” by then. Perhaps his father-in-law had managed to find him a good position. Sidney and Anna had had two children: a daughter Eunice Bell Pinsent born in 1872 and a son, William Edward Sidney Pinsent, born in 1876. They had both been born in Wrington, near Axbridge, in Gloucestershire. Sidney’s widow, Anna, was granted probate of his estate (PCC Will and Administration Summaries).
The 1881 census records tell us that she took her children to live with her widowed mother and her, as yet unmarried, sister Horatia Clark, in Cleveland, in Somerset. Sidney had managed to leave Anna financially secure and the records show that she was an “an annuitant born in Jersey.” She never remarried. Anna and Eunice moved back to Bristol and the family was living on Argyle Terrace at the time of the next census. Eunice, unfortunately, died (unmarried) in 1898 and Anna was living with her son, William, on Coney Hill in Gloucester in 1901. She died there, in October 1905.
William Edward Sidney Pinsent was commonly called “Edward.” He grew up with his elder sister in Wrington and had started an apprenticeship with a Mr. Hobday, who was a “watch-maker, jeweler and gold-smith” in Clevedon, by 1891 (Census data). Mr. Hobday had two young nieces living with him and Edward may have had trouble growing up with them. In fact, he seems to have abandoned his apprenticeship and run away to sea! The 1901 Census shows that William E. S. Pinsent was a “merchant seaman (able seaman)” living with his mother in Gloucester.
In June 1901, Edward Sidney Pinsent “a respectably dressed young fellow, living with his widowed mother on Coney Hill was charged with indecent behaviour “ at the Police Court in Gloucester. His defense was that he was at home with his mother on the evening in question – and besides – he was “a seafaring youth” and had had an attack of malaria on his last voyage that had left him physically weak and not always responsible for his actions… . The magistrates were not impressed – particularly as it transpired that he had been fined £2 for a similar offence in a park in Bristol in 1898. The prosecuting barrister said there were many charges of a similar nature that could be brought against the prisoner but “he did not propose to go into them.” Perhaps that is just as well. Edward was sentenced to a month in prison with hard labour as a “rogue and a vagabond” (Gloucester Journal: Saturday 1st June 1901).
According to the prison records, Edward Sidney was a twenty-five years old 5 ft .6 ½ in. tall “seaman” with brown hair who belonged to the Anglican Church. He was remanded on 27th May and discharged on 28th June 1901 (Gloucestershire, England Prison Records: 1728 – 1914 [Ancestry.com]). His mother died in 1905.
Edward was back in Court on a similar charge in February the following year. This time, it was a “licensed victualler” from Cheltenham who witnessed the offence being committed on Chester Walk, near The Royal Crescent. Edward denied any intent to insult anyone. He said he was a “jeweler” and he admitted to having previous convictions. The Magistrates sentenced him to three months for being an “incorrigible rogue and vagabond” (Gloucester Citizen: Monday 19th February 1906).
On getting out of jail, Edward became a “timber-man” but he had still to learn how to control his impulses. He “conducted himself in a most disgraceful manner” in front of three little girls in Pontypridd (north of Cardiff, in Glamorganshire) on Boxing Day in 1906. Afterwards, he explained that he was drunk; however, given his record the Chief Magistrate said that he “only wished that the bench could commit the defendant to the assizes, as he thoroughly deserved ‘the cat.’“ Instead, he received the maximum penalty of yet another three months imprisonment (Evening Express: 27th December, 1906). He was a troubled man.
William Edward Sidney Pinsent never married. He died in the Stapleton Workhouse Infirmary, in Bristol, in January 1911.
Grandfather: John Pinson: 1782 – 1849
Grandmother: Mary Follett: 1782 – 1859
Father: William Pinsent: 1811 – 1879
Mother: Harriet Morgan: 1813 – 1890
Ann Pinson: 1809 – 1862
Elizabeth Pinson: 1814 – xxxx
John Pinsent: 1817 – 1819
Joseph Pinson: 1819 – 1881
Sarah Pinson: 1821 – 1886
John Pinsent: 1823 – 1902
James Pinsent: 1825 – 1886
Samuel Pinson: 1828 – 1833
Thomas Pinson: 1830 – 1832
William Henry John Pinsent: 1841 – 1923
Sidney Pinsent: 1846 – 1880
Alfred James Pinsent: 1847 – 1848
Thomas James Pinsent: 1833 – 1915
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