Vital Statistics
John Pinsent: 1745 – 1804 GRO1391 (Soap boiler, Plymouth, Devon)
Anne Heard: xxxx – 1780
Married: 1768: Moretonhampstead, Devon
Children by Anne Heard:
Thomas Heard Pinsent: 1769 – 1794
Mary Pinsent: 1773 – 1828 (Married William Tucker, 1806; Had children with Pinsent in their name)
John Pinsent: 1773 – xxxx
Sarah Pinsent: 1775 – 1812 (Married John Germon, 1805; Had children with Pinsent in their name)
Elizabeth Pinsent: 1777 – 1809 (Married 1800; second wife of Joseph Pinsent, Ship Broker of London and Lettaford, North Bovey)
Anne Pinsent: 1779 – 1790
Family Branch: Devonport
PinsentID: GRO1391
References
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John Pinsent was the eldest son of Mr. John Pinsent by his wife, Elizabeth (née Puddicombe). He was born in Moretonhampstead and brought up in-and-around his father’s “tallow” and “soap boiling” operation. He learnt the trade and, his father set him up in his own business in Plymouth in 1768, when he married Anne Heard. John and Anne had six children (two boys and four girls) over ten years or so, and had them baptized in Batter Street Presbyterian Chapel in Plymouth. Sadly, Anne “wife of John Pinsent, Junior” died in 1780, while the children were still young. There is no indication that John ever remarried and it is not clear who looked after them during their childhood. John’s first-born son, Thomas Heard Pinsent died at the age of 24 years, before he married. The second son, another John Pinsent, was baptized in 1773 and probably died young. Had he been alive in 1800, he would almost certainly have been mentioned in his grandfather’s will. This twig on the “DEVONPORT” Pinsent branch appears to have ended – at least on the male side.
John Pinsent and Anne (née Heard) eldest, Mary Pinsent, was baptized in 1773. She lived with her father until he died in 1804 and then, two years later, married William Tucker, a local “Grammar School Teacher”. According to the marriage record, one of the witnesses was called Ann Tucker. She was probably William Tucker’s sister and also the lady who married Joseph Pinsent (from the “HENNOCK” branch of the family) in Drewsteighton in 1809.
Ann Tucker became Joseph’s third wife. He was a “ship’s broker” in London and also a “farmer” near Chagford on Dartmoor. They had children. Joseph has the distinction of marrying not one but two of Mr. John Pinsent’s granddaughters (in addition to Ann Tucker). He first married Anna Thomasin Crout Pinsent – the daughter of John’s son Thomas Pinsent, in 1799 and, after she died childless later that year, her cousin Elizabeth Pinsent. was John “junior’s” third daughter. That marriage took place in Moretonhampstead in June 1800, shortly before the family patriarch Mr. John Pinsent died. They had children. Elizabeth, sadly, died of “a lingering sickness which she bore with great resignation” in 1809 (Exeter Flying Post: March 16th 1809) and so Joseph married Ann Tucker. Joseph Pinsent’s life – and the lives of his descendants are described elsewhere.
John and Anne’s second daughter Sarah Pinsent was baptized in 1775. She also lived with her father until he died in 1804. She married John Germon, an officer in the “Moretonhampstead Volunteers” (a militia unit raised to defend the homeland during the Napoleonic Wars) the following year. They married in East Teignmouth. Interestingly, an Exeter law firm, “R. T. & H. Campion” appealed to the public for a copy of their marriage certificate through an advertisement in the Exeter and Plymouth Gazette on 3rd March 1905, a century later. Perhaps there was an inheritance at stake! John’s daughters, Mary and Sarah both used “Pinsent” as a Christian name for their children. For instance, Mary had a daughter Elizabeth Pinsent Satterly Tucker who was born in Moretonhampstead in December 1809 (Parish Records), and Sarah had a son, John Pinsent Germon who became a Lieutenant in the “Indian Army” in Madras (IOR/LMIL/11/053). The youngest sister, Elizabeth, had no need to include the name! She married Joseph Pinsent. John and Anne (née Heard) had a fourth daughter, Anne Pinsent baptized in Plymouth in 1797; however, she too probably died young, as she does not seem to have been around in the early 1800s.
John Pinsent “junior” was (like his father) a Baptist and, in 1780, the year his wife died, he subscribed to a poem entitled “Life Review’d” (reflections upon the silent inhabitants of the Chuchyard at Truro, Cornwall) by Elizabeth Smith. The subscription (purchaser) list calls him a “soap boiler from Plymouth”. Unfortunately, his business failed. The London Gazette (22nd February 1785) tells us that the “Commission of Bankruptcy” was to hold meetings at the Prince George Inn, in Fox-hole Street, Plymouth on the 1st, 3rd and 9th April to establish his assets, examine his creditors claims, and come to an equitable financial arrangement. A fortnight later, the local newspapers advertised the forthcoming sale of John’s “household furniture, stock in trade and utensils … at his dwelling house in Old Town Plymouth”. The Stock and utensils consist of (among other items) “six iron furnaces, several beams and scales one of which will weigh off a ton at an end, several soap frames, about a ton and half of ‘barilla’ (either the salt-rich plant or the ash from it RHP), a quantity of rock salt, about 300 tons soda ashes, a quantity of lees, a pound to break ‘barilla’ in, two good cart horses, a good hackney horse, two carts and harnesses etc.” (The Exeter Flying Post: 21st April 1785).
John’s father was in his sixties by then, and John appears to have taken his family back to Moretonhamstead to help him with his, presumably more successful, “soap” and “tallow” boiling operation. When Mr. John Pinsent “senior” died in 1800 he left his utensils to his son “for as long as he might have need of them”. After that, they were to be put to the use and benefit of his granddaughters — John’s daughters — Mary, Sarah and Elizabeth. One of John’s erstwhile apprentices bought the business.
Sylvester Treleaven left a diary describing life in Moretonhampstead at around this time, and tells us that the business was nearly destroyed by fire in May 1803 when a boy went into a room full of wick and cotton yarn and, accidentally, started a blaze. Fortunately , it was quickly extinguished. Nevertheless, John Pinsent (“junior” as he was still called) had had enough. In the absence of a suitable male heir, he conveyed the “soap and tallow” business to George Harvey in March 1804. John and his unmarried daughters Mary and Sarah moved to “Court House” shortly thereafter and he died there a couple of weeks later. That August, the girls downsized still further. According to Mr. Treleaven, they left “Court House” and moved into to a smaller house on Court Street. Presumably this was because their grandfather had left “Court House” and most of his other property in Moretonhampstead to their cousin Thomas Pinsent.
Family Tree
Grandparents
Grandfather: John Pinsent: 1690 – 1737
Grandmother: Margaret Luscombe: xxxx – xxxx
Parents
Father: John Pinsent: 1723 – 1800
Mother: Elizabeth Puddicombe: 1719 – 1795
Father’s Siblings (Aunts, Uncles)
Sarah Pinsent: 1721 – 1805
John Pinsent: 1723 – 1800 ✔️
Thomas Pinsent: 1726 – 1757
Mary Pinsent: 1728 – xxxx
Elizabeth Pinsent: 1732 – 1804
Male Siblings (Brothers)
John Pinsent: 1745 – 1804 ✔️
Thomas Pinsent: 1754 – 1841
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