a history
Birth: 1772
Marriage: 1800
Spouse: Henry Pinsent
Death: 1848
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0490
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Birth: 1917
Marriage: 1945
Spouse: Martin Barnes Nettleton
Death: 2003
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0485
Click here to view close family members
Grandfather: Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent: 1849 – 1904
Grandmother: Harriet Ann Soden: 1860 – 1949
Father: Harold Charles Frank Pinsent: 1884 – 1968
Mother: Constance Amy Hildige Johnson: 1886 – 1964
Gwendolyn Edith Mary Pinsent: 1880 – 1968
Frances Maud Pinsent: 1882 – 1962
Harold Charles Frank Pinsent: 1884 – 1968 ✔️
Phyllis Charlotte Pinsent: 1894 – 1981
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Henry John Pinsent: 1812 – 1894: GRO0420 (Purser, Peninsula and Oriental Steam Ship Company, London, Middlesex)
Charlotte Best Sharpe: 1819 – 1904
Married: London, Middlesex: 1842
Children by Charlotte Best Sharpe:
William Henry Pinsent: 1845 – 1895 (Married Frances Arabella Baker, Stratford, Essex, 1885)
Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent: 1849 – 1904 (Married Harriet Ann Soden, Madras, India, 1879)
Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent: 1852 – 1902 (Married Helena Maud Robins, London, Middlesex, 1878; Margaret Ellen Sharpe, Madras, India, 1900)
Frances Anne Pinsent: 1853 – xxxx (Married Arthur Sellon Cowdell, Madras, India, 1876)
Eliza Charlotte Pinsent: 1857 – xxxx (Married John Kennedy, Portswood, Hampshire, 1879)
Mary Louisa Pinsent: 1859 – 1948
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0420
Click here to view close family members.
Henry John Pinsent was the eldest son of Henry Pinsent by his wife Joanna (née Wogan). He was born in Bloomsbury in London and grew up there with a younger brother, George Pinsent, who died unmarried in his early twenties and several elder sisters. His father was a “carpenter,” an “undertaker” and later a “builder”.
In around 1915, one of Henry John Pinsent’s granddaughters (Frances Maude Markwick – one of his son Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent’s daughters) wrote to my grandfather (Francis Wingfield Homfray Pinsent) and said that she had heard from her aunt Eliza Kennedy that Henry John “may have “gone into the East India Company’s Navy at the age of 14 but after a few years his father lost all his money and couldn’t afford to keep him there.” Whether this is true or not, I do not know. However, it is certain that Henry John was working as a “supercargo” (the man responsible for the sale and/or storage of merchandise) on commercial sailing ships trading along the west coast of Africa in the 1830s.
In spring of 1834, Henry John was “assistant supercargo” on the “Matchless” which traded for “gum Arabic” at Portendic (a now abandoned city on the coast of (French) Mauritania). The ship’s captain dropped off some trade goods and left Henry on shore there, while it carried on down the coast looking for other trading opportunities. While the “Matchless” was away, a French ship entered the harbour and boarded another British ship, the “Industry.” They claimed that they had the sole right to trade in Portendic, and they took Henry and the crew of the “Industry” to Goree (Senegal) where they were released. Needless to say, by the time Henry got back to Portendic the “Matchless’s” stores were long gone. The owner of the ship, Mr. George C. Redman, complained to the British Government and it triggered a diplomatic row with the French. There is considerable correspondence on the subject in “British and Foreign State Papers: V. 30.”
Following the release of the “Industry” and the subsequent diplomatic row, British merchants trading along the coast thought that the issue was resolved and the French had agreed to allow them to trade in Mauritania. However, they were mistaken. That autumn, the “Eliza” off-loaded its trade goods at Portendic and left them in Mr. Pinsent’s care as continued on its way along the coast. Unfortunately, when it returned it arrived a day or two too late. Shortly after the “Eliza” entered the harbour, completed the requisite paperwork and started to take the gum Arabic on board, a French brig, the “Bordelaise,” arrived and the commander informed the “master” of the “Eliza”, Mr. Sayers, and his “supercargo” (Mr. Pinsent), that, in future, no British ships were to be allowed to trade there. The “Bordelaise” and the “Gazelle,” (a second French warship that arrived shortly after the “Bordelaise,”) then proceeded to strafe the residents on shore. In the process, they destroyed several buildings holding British cargo. The French commander then ordered Mr. Sayers to sail by midnight. He refused, saying that his ship’s ballast was out of trim and it would not be safe to do so. At that, the commander threatened to send over his own crew and seize the “Eliza.” The following morning, Mr. Sayer and Mr. Pinsent, realizing that it was hopeless to resist, set sail for the nearest British settlement.
The British Government was not impressed and it sent sharply worded letters to the French – who responded in kind (British and Foreign State Papers: V.30). The issue was later discussed in the House of Commons and Captain Sayers and Mr. Pinsent were called in to testify (House of Commons Papers: Volume 58: Correspondence between Portendic Claimants and Her Majesty’s Government: 12th Conference: 14th July 1844). Henry John would have been twenty-two years old at the time of what came to be known as the “Portendic Incident”.
What enticed Henry John, a Londoner, to go to sea in the first place is unknown; however, his (suspected) grandfather, John “Pinson” of Paignton was a “mariner” in his youth. Perhaps that had something to do with it. Presumably Henry John continued to serve as a “supercargo” or “stores manager” throughout the 1830s. When the 1841 Census was compiled, he was a “mercantile agent” living with his parents on Seymour Street.
Henry John Pinsent married Charlotte Best Sharpe, (a “miniature painter”) the daughter of an “engraver” from Birmingham, at St. James’s Church in Clerkenwell in 1842. His marriage certificate tells us that by then he was a “purser” (someone who handles administration and finance onboard a large ship), and a letter he wrote shortly afterwards shows that he was working for the “Peninsula and Orient Steam Navigation Company” (P. & O.). This famous company was founded in London in 1835. In 1837, it acquired a Government contract to carry British mail to the Peninsula ports of Portugal and Spain and from there, on to Gibraltar. Three years later (in 1840) it received another contract to service Egypt – and it later agreed to extend its remit to include Ceylon, Madras and Calcutta. The Company provided a regular service to Australia by 1852 – albeit it had to use a rail link at Suez until the Canal was built in 1869 (www.poheritage.com). In 1890, Henry John wrote a letter to the editor of the Southampton Herald clarifying some observations it had made about one of the P. & O.’s ships, the “S. S. Hindostan,” and the life of one of its captains, Samuel Lewis: In it, he writes:
“I joined the ship as purser, the beginning of the year 1842, while she was fitting out at Liverpool, and she was commanded by Captain Robert Moresby of the then Indian Navy (of Persian Gulf and Red Sea survey celebrity), and brother of Admiral Moresby, R. N. then commanding on the East Indian station. Captain Engledue, a director of the P. and O. Co., who died about two years since, left this port of Southampton on the S.S. Hindostan, on 24th September 1842, as the then representative of the P. and O. Co., and was the real pioneer of the overland mail route, which commenced on January 1843, and in which opening I participated. Captain Samuel Lewis, at the date named, commanded the S.S. Braganza, of 638 tons, then the largest P. and O. Co.’s ship on the Peninsular line, while the new ship, the Hindostan, was 2017 tons, and considered to be largest and finest ship afloat” (Southampton Herald: Wednesday 23rd April 1890).
Henry John Pinsent saw, and oversaw, the Company’s move from London to Southampton. He also witnessed its change from steam-enhanced wooden ships to massive ocean liners, and he lived through the Company’s rapid growth in mid-1800s.
The Company sent Henry John and Charlotte out to India and their first son, William Henry Pinsent, was born and baptized in Calcutta in Bengal in 1845 (India Births and Baptisms: 1786 – 1947: familyseach.com). Charlotte must have brought him home soon afterwards as the newspapers tell us that Mrs. Pinsent and a child went out to Calcutta in October 1848 (Maritime Arrival from the Bengal Directory: 1848-1849). They were (or at least Charlotte was) back in London when their second son, Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent was born in 1849. Mr. Henry J. Pinsent and one child (presumably William Henry) returned from Calcutta in April 1849 (Entry and Departure from the Bengal Directory: 1850). Similarly, Mr. Pinsent and a child returned from Calcutta in January 1852. This clearly incomplete log of their travels shows that Henry was active in India until at least 1852. Thereafter, he may have settled to a desk job with the P. & O. in England.
When the Census was taken in 1851, Henry John and his extended family (which included his father and Charlotte’ mother) were living in Hornsey, in north London. They were still there when Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent was born the following year. Frederick may have had a twin brother Henry George Pinsent who died at birth. However, as the name has been scratched out of the original birth record and replaced by “Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent” it was probably an entry error. Henry George Pinsent does not reappear in the family records.
By the time their next child (Frances Anne Pinsent) was born in September 1853, Henry John was a “superintendent purser” who was living with his family in South Stoneham, in Hampshire – which was a much more practical location for his work with the “Peninsular and Orient Shipping Company”. Two more daughters followed, Eliza Charlotte Pinsent (the Eliza Kennedy previously mentioned) born in 1857 and Mary Louisa Pinsent in 1859.
Henry John was actively involved in local affairs in and around Southampton in the 1850s and from then on. We find him acting as “Honorary Secretary” to a Committee formed in 1856 to show support for a couple of doctors who worked at the “Royal South Hants Infirmary” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 2nd February 1856). The doctors’ supporters felt they had been (somehow) maligned. The committee arranged to hold a meeting at the “Dolphin Hotel” in Southampton on 10th March that year (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 8th March 1856). What the outcome was, I am not sure. That September, Mr. Pinsent, (who must have been a staunch advocate on all things Indian) gave a strong press endorsement – supported by the above-mentioned doctors – of “the Indian Vegetable Firbrous Flesh Rubber” or (modern-day “Loufah”) that had recently been introduced into the Country (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 6th September 1856). On the same day, the local papers described a call by Mr. Pinsent and others for financial support for a “3d ‘bus service” that was to run from Portswood (where he lived) to the Southampton docks five times a day (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 6th September 1856).
Henry John made an impression in the community and he was called upon to serve on the “Grand Jury” at the “Borough of Southampton Quarter Sessions” on several occasions. The first time was in January 1857 (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 17th January 1857). Other editions of the Hampshire Gazette show that he was called upon again in January 1862 and 1863, and also in April 1865 and 1867. He was also called for jury duty in January 1869 and in the summer of 1870 and 1871.
Henry was an early arrival at the “P. & O. Co.” and he must have had many friends in the upper echelons of the “P. & O Company”. He was called upon to act as executor for a colleague, Captain Powell, “a Commander in the service of the P. & O. Steam Navigation Company” in June 1859 (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 4th June 1859). A few years later, he attended the funeral of Captain Kellock, late “commander” of the “S. S. Himalaya”, “S. S. Bentinck” and other “P. & O.” ships (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 11th January 1862). Predictably, he attended many more funerals later in his life and he also contributed to subscriptions for memorials to other Southampton worthies.
By the mid-1860s, Mr. Pinsent was a twenty-year plus veteran of what was a rapidly growing and increasingly influential company, and it is not surprising that he was invited to attend the presentation of two full-size portraits to the Company’s long-time Chairman, Mr. Arthur Anderson and his wife. The presentation was made at the Company employee’s school in Southampton. Mr. Anderson had been instrumental in founding the school as a way of holding on to staff and encouraging young men to join the “P. & O. Co.” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 17th June 1865). Henry John sent two of his son, Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent and Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent to be educated there before they headed out to India (see elsewhere). Only one of them stayed on in the service of the “P. & O. Co” so it was not a prerequisite.
Popular though he was, Henry may not have been universally liked! In September 1861, he saw to it that a local “cabman” who he had managed to offend was charged with using insulting language. Sensibly, the Magistrates put it down to a misunderstanding and the “cabman’s” apology was deemed sufficient (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 7th September 1861).
Mr. Pinsent was a strong advocate for his local community of Portswood, often to the annoyance of other civic leaders who saw it as a brazen attempt to embroil them in what they saw as unnecessary costs on his local issues. For instance, Henry felt that Portswood should be brought under Southampton’s “Board of Health” and linked to its water supply. There had been a recent death from typhus in the area and he said that: “the water on his own premises, medical gentlemen had informed him, was impregnated with poisonous gases. He, therefore, used rainwater” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 5th October 1861). What the outcome here was I am not sure; however, water purity was to become a serious issue in Southampton by 1865. Henry John, among others, signed an open letter demanding the “City Council” call a meeting to discuss it and then address the City’s sewage problems (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 30th December 1865).
The “P. & O. Co.” brought eight new vessels into service in 1863 and one, the “ S. S. Poonah” took its first official outing on 11th April 1863. There were a large number of company notables onboard, including Mr. Pinsent … (Allen’s Indian Mail: Tuesday 21st April 1863). Henry was also invited onboard the “S. S. Deccan” when it conducted its trials off Portsmouth in January 1869, and, along with other company officials ,was treated to a “sumptuous dejeuner” (London and China Express: Friday 15th January 1869). The “S. S. Hindustan” underwent its speed trials in the waters off Southampton in October the same year (Allen’s Indian Mail: Wednesday 13th October 1869) – and Henry got to tour the “S. S. Australia” as is ran the measured mile in September 1870 (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 3rd September 1870). He was also onboard to toast the success of the “S.S. Indus” the following year (London and China Express: Friday 2nd June 1871).
It was probably Henry John’s eldest daughter, Frances Anne Pinsent, who joined him at the “Lord Mayor and Mayoress’ Fancy Dress Ball” in November 1870. If so, she went at “Titania the Fairy Queen”. One of her brothers (presumably William Henry Pinsent) went in full uniform as a “Bombardier in the 1st Hants. Volunteers” (Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 9th November 1870). Mr. and Mrs. Pinsent and Miss Pinsent attended a grand ball put on by the “Mayor of Southampton” in honour of the marriage of the Duke of Edinburgh and Princess Marie of Russia in 1874. This “Miss Pinsent” could have been Frances Anne; however, she may well have been out in India by then, in which case it would have been her sister Eliza Charlotte (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 24th January 1874.)
Mr. and Miss Pinsent (presumably Frances Anne Pinsent went out to Bombay, on the “P. & O.’s” latest acquisition, the “S. S. Hydaspes” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 21st September 1872). Frances likely stayed on in India as she married Mr. Arthur S. Cowdell in the Cathedral in Madras, in December 1876 (Pall Mall Gazette: Saturday 9th December 1876). There is nothing to suggest that Eliza Charlotte Pinsent ever went out to India. She married an Irishman, Mr. John Kennedy of Londonderry in Portswood, in October 1879 (Northern Whig: Tuesday 7th October 1879). The youngest of the daughters, Mary Louisa Pinsent, remained unmarried and is, presumably, the Miss Pinsent who later features in Portswood and Southampton social events. For instance, “an entertainment, under the auspices of Miss Pinsent” was put on in Portwood, in 1886 (Southampton Observer and Hampshire News: 13th February 1886).
Southampton was best known as a centre for commercial trade and travel to the East in those days; however in Victorian times it also served as a base for the “Royal Navy” and for elements of the “Army”. It was home to Her Majesty’s training ship “Boscawen” and, by tradition, the city provided an annual outing for the (350) boys. In 1863, Henry John was involved in organizing the festivities (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 29th August 1863).
The following month, he was a principal at a testimonial dinner given for Lieut. Colonel Grimston, who had recently relinquished command of the “2nd Hants (Southampton) Volunteers” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 5th September 1863). Also, that December he attended a dinner in support of the Southampton “Volunteers”. This followed on after a shooting competition at the local butts. The traditional toasts were proposed, including one by a Mr. Falvey to “The Army, Navy and Volunteers.” He gave the requisite rousing speech praising the quality, strength and resilience of Britain’s armed forces. The traditional responses were duly made and, towards the end of the evening, Mr. Pinsent proposed “Success to No. 3 Company”. He said: “Although he was not a Volunteer himself he had much sympathy with them, and he had a son who was a member of the company. He wished them every success, and he thought that as long as they continued to do their duty and attend to their drill they need not fear being invaded” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 5th December 1863).
By then, Mr. Pinsent was also involved with civic groups and he was a frequent spokesman for the “P. & O. Company”. He proposed the toast: “The health of the Chairman, Mr. J. C. Sharp” at the annual dinner sponsored by the “Southampton Club” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 24th October 1863). A few years later, he was called upon to speak at the opening of the Southampton “Imperial Hotel”. The hotel had been built to service the needs of affluent passengers transferring from the newly installed rail system to ships and visa versa. He said that: after 25 years’ experience in the service he could testify to the importance of a good commissariat on board ship, for if not attended to properly something was certain to go wrong. The pursers had a difficult duty to perform, especially in giving satisfaction to some of their Indian passengers, (hear), but he was bound to say that those engaged in that department of the service were peculiarly fitted for it, and performed their duties most efficiently. Those who were interested in that magnificent hotel could not do better than cultivate the good feeling of the officers and surgeons of the Peninsular and Oriental and other steamship companies connected with the port, and he was satisfied from all he had seen that better accommodation for passengers could not be found anywhere (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 7th September 1867).
One issue that pursers’ onboard large ships had to deal with was, of course, theft, and Henry John and the “P. & O. Co.” were not exempt. In 1868, a “butcher” on the “S .S. Massilia” saw a man steal three pounds of mutton and he was charged with the offense at the “Petty Sessions” at Southampton Guildhall. Unfortunately, the principal witness was unavailable (at sea) and Mr. Pinsent had given no clear instruction to the company’s detective on how to proceed – so the miscreant got off (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 12th September 1868)! The following year, a “coloured man” was charged with stealing a pillow blanket and other items valued at 10s while a servant on board the “S. S. Massilia”. The goods were found ashore and he was detained before he returned to Bombay on the “S. S. Poonah”. In this case, Mr. Pinsent said that, regardless of the outcome of the proceedings, the company would send the culprit back to Bombay (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 6th May 1869).
Thomas Henry Broad, a storekeeper and late “Chief Steward” on the “S. S. Ceylon” was not so lucky. He was caught smuggling and was sentenced to a £100 fine or six months in jail. He opted for the latter (presumably not by choice) and became ill and died in custody. Mr. Pinsent was present at the inquest. The jury returned a verdict of “Death from Natural Causes” and (fortunately for the company) his widow accepted the finding (Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 1st February 1871).
The Portswood drainage issue raised by Mr. Pinsent in 1861 was never properly resolved and it came up for discussion again in 1870. Some of the community wells were now useless and others were deteriorating fast. Whether Mr. Pinsent and his family were still using rain water is not stated. Unfortunately, there were enough voters in the district who had a satisfactory supply of water that any attempt Henry John and the others made to seek a remedy were howled down by their cost conscience neighbours. Mr. Pinsent wrote to the Town Clerk and offered to attend a meeting to discuss the matter. The issue was sent to a committee (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 30th July 1870) which, I presume, also reviewed the letter Mr. H. J. Pinsent wrote to the “Council” that October regarding the nuisance caused by an overflowing well in Portswood (Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 5th October 1870). The following March, the Government sent an inspector and the whole issue was thrashed out in the Guildhall. Mr. Pinsent argued for bringing the district under the central government control (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 18th March 1871).
Henry’s activism was partly conducted through the “Portswood Workingmen’s Conservative Association” – the local affiliate of the “Parliamentary Conservative Party”. Water was still an issue in 1875, and the “Association” met to discuss “the subject of the rating, the sanitary condition of Portswood, and other interesting topics” in December (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 4th December 1875).
The previous year, Henry John had signed on as one of the eight backers then required to assent to the nomination of the two “Conservative” candidates (Right Hon. Russell Gurney, and Captain Engledue) chosen to contest the upcoming parliamentary election (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 31st January 1874). Henry was still attending “Conservative Association” meeting in the 1880s, however he was getting on in years and seems to have taken a less active part in the proceedings (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 15th May 1880, Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 2nd August 1882).
Henry John supported local charities, predictably, including the Southampton “Mission to Seamen” (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 27th September 1884). Mr. and Mrs. Pinsent donated pictures and books to the organization in May 1885 (Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 27th May 1885). He and his family had lived in Portswood since the 1840s and they were obviously very attached to the place. Mr. and Mrs. Pinsent, and Mr. Pinsent, jun., (probably William Henry Pinsent) attended the laying of the foundation stone of a new chancel to the “pretty little church” there in 1878 (Hampshire Advertiser: Saturday 11th May 1878).
In January 1875 the “P. & O. Co.” underwent a major reorganization. It moved a large part of its operation up to London and significantly reduced the size of its footpring in Southampton. Needless to say, there were lay-offs and retirements “Mr. H. J. Pinsent, the superintendent provedore; and Mr. Bates the superintendent of stores, with the whole of the staff, will forthwith terminate their connection with the Company. The above-named gentlemen will, with others, received such superannuation allowances as the length and values of the services entitles them to” (Hampshire Independent: Saturday 9th January 1875). He was sixty three years old and, perhaps. ready to retire.
Never-the-less Henry’s past caught up with him in March 1879,when George Laney brought an action of libel in “High Court of Exchequer” in London against him in his capacity as “superintendent purser,” and Captain Chapman as commander of the “P. & O. Co.” vessel “S. S. Indus”. The dispute stemmed from an entry in the ship’s log that stated “George Laney, being absent without leave since Friday evening is charged with desertion”. Apparently, on the ship’s previous voyage to Calcutta, in February 1877, Mr. Laney, the “storekeeper”, had been asked to fill in for the “barman” who had, for some reason, been relieved of duty. He had done so and been paid extra for it. At the end of the trip, Mr. Pinsent (who was retired by then?) had given him a good reference and he was re-engaged for the next voyage. However, something happened and he was verbally discharged (for no apparent reason) shortly before the ship next sailed. Mr. Laney brought a successful action for breach of contract and then decided to clear his name by means of the action for libel. The two defendants claimed absence of malice on their part but it was shown that the log entry was made on the same day as Mr. Laney’s dismissal and they were charged damages of £50. Why the change of heart? I do not know (London Stratford Times and Bow and Bromley News and South Essex Gazette: 12th March 1879).
The 1881 Census shows that Henry John Pinsent was a “Superintendent Purser” who had by then retired from service in the “P. & O. Steam Company”. He and his wife, Charlotte, and their son William Henry Pinsent, a “clerk” working for the “P. & O. Co.,” and their youngest (as yet unmarried) daughter, Mary Louisa Pinsent were still living in Portswood Park in South Stoneham, near Southampton. They had two domestic servants. Ten years later, the family was still there; however William Henry had moved out and Henry John was living with his wife and their daughter and two servants; one of whom was an “invalid nurse”. Presumably Henry was already afflicted by whatever the problem was that was later alluded to in his obituary.
Henry John Pinsent died in Portwood in November 1894. According to the Hampshire Advertiser (a newspaper that had covered his life fairly extensively over the years) he was fondly remembered: “Our obituary of today (Wednesday) includes the death of Mr. Henry John Pinsent who died at his residence, at Portswood Park, on Monday, at the advanced age of 83 years. Mr. Pinsent had been for a long period a resident of the borough, and we remember him more than a quarter of a century ago, when he was the Superintendent Purser of the Peninsular and Orient Company, when their magnificent fleet was located at our port. Although laid aside by illness, Mr. Pinsent never ceased to take an interest in all the affairs connected with the mercantile community of the port, as was evident when he was able to be wheeled on to the Royal Pier in his Bath chair in the summer months, and enjoy the sea breeze, and have a chat as to the changes that had taken and were taking place since his company first made the port their point of arrival and departure. It may fairly be said Mr. Pinsent was one of the last of the “Old School” who had seen Southampton under quite a different aspect to that presented at the present time. He was highly esteemed and respected and deep sympathy is felt for the widow and family in their bereavement” (Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 14th November 1894). Probate was granted to his widow, Charlotte Best Pinsent for effects valued at £2,174 (Calendar of Grants of Probate and Letters of Administration).
Charlotte Pinsent moved up to London in 1897. Her “excellent furniture and effects” at #4 Portwood Park were put up for sale by auction on 29th June that year (Hampshire Advertiser: Wednesday 16th June 1897). When the Census Takers made their rounds in 1901, she was living “on her own means” with her unmarried daughter Mary Louisa Pinsent at #1 Ilchester Mansions in Kensington. There were two young domestic servants living with them.
Charlotte’s son, Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent’s first wife (Helena Maud nee Robins) had died in India in 1884 and he had married Margaret Ellen Sharpe in Madras in 1900. The two of them returned to England in 1901 and Frederick died while living with his mother in Ilchester Mansions in May 1902. Frederick left his estate to his widow – who eventually remarried. Charlotte’s other son Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent (who was “Secretary of the Madras Harbour Board Trust”) also returned from India. He too died in Kensington, in April 1904. Thus, Charlotte had the misfortune to outlive her three sons. She died in Kensington in October that same year, 1904 (Hampshire Observer and Basingstoke News: Saturday 15th October 1904), and the balance of her estate passed to her unmarried daughter, Mary Louisa Pinsent (Calendar of Probate and Letters of Administration)
Mary Louisa Pinsent returned to Southampton. She was living with a Mrs. Weston on Lawn Road in 1911 (Census data). Twenty years later she was back in London living with her two sisters Frances Anne Cowdell and Eliza Charlotte Kennedy at #10 Gardens in Kensington (London, England, Electoral Registers: 1934/1936). Presumably their husbands had died. Mary Louisa died in Moongreen Hospital in Winchester in 1948. She passed her limited estate along to a Cowdell relative.
Grandfather: John Pinson: 1734 – N/A (unconfirmed)
Grandmother: Elizabeth Lang: N/A – N/A
Father: Henry Pinsent: 1769 – 1854
Mother: Joanna Wogan: 1772 – 1848
Henry John Pinsent: 1812 – 1894 ✔️
George Pinsent: 1814 – 1838
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Birth: 1852
Marriage N/A
Spouse: N/A
Death: N/A
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0415
Possible twin brother of Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent who died at birth. It may also be the result of an entry error.
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Henry Pinsent: 1769 – 1854 GRO0413 India (Carpenter, Undertaker and Building Contractor, London, Middlesex)
Joanna Wogan: 1772 – 1848
Married: 1800: London, Middlesex
Children by Joanna Wogan:
Mary Ann Pinsent: 1802 – xxxx
Henrietta Pinsent: 1803 – 1806
Eliza Pinsent: 1805 – 1839 (“Married” William John Steedman, London, Middlesex, 1836)
Henrietta Pinsent: 1806 – xxxx (Married Edward Symons, London, Middlesex, 1827)
Joanna Pinsent: 1808 – xxxx (Married William Bellman, London, Middlesex, 1830)
Emma Pinsent: 1811 – xxxx
Henry John Pinsent: 1812 – 1894 (Married Charlotte Best Sharpe, London, Middlesex, 1842)
George Pinsent: 1814 – 1838
Emma Pinsent: 1817 – xxxx
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0413
Click here to view close family relatives
Henry Pinsent has no birth record but he was probably the son of John Pinson and Elizabeth (née Lang). If so, his father was a “master mariner” and he was born in Paignton on the south coast of Devon in 1769. Henry seems to have moved up to London in the late 1700s, and he may have changed the spelling of his name on arrival. There were other Pinsent families (from the HENNOCK, DEVONPORT and TIVERTON branches) around at the time. Doubtless they had Devonshire accents – and this similarity may have facilitated the change.
The 1851 Census tells us that Henry Pinsent was an 82-year-old “former builder,” who had been born in Tiverton in 1769. I can find no sign of him being born near Tiverton. The best I can do is a “Henry son of John Pinson”, a “master mariner,” baptized in Paignton that year. It is fifty miles away. This Henry had a elder cousin (?), John Pinson, who had been born in Paignton in 1761.
London’s Land Tax Records show that a John Pinsent rented a property on the west side of “Little Guildford Street” (near Russell Square) from the Duke of Bedford between 1813 to 1832. Perhaps this Henry’s cousin (?) “John Pinson” as his father would have approximately 98 years old if he stopped making the Land Tax payments in 1832! It must have been a large piece of land as it was taxed at around £34 per annum. It certainly included Henry’s builder’s yard.
According to “Robson’s”, “Pigot’s” and other London City Directories, Henry Pinsent was a “carpenter” and an “undertaker” who operated out of “#22 Little Guildford Street, Russell Square”, between 1819 and 1840. He was also listed as living at that address in the “Dictionary of English Furniture Makers 1660 – 1840” in 1820.
While there, Henry was convicted of some “nuisance” in relation to an addition to“a first-rate dwelling house on the north side of the public road or way leading from London to Uxbridge, called the Uxbridge road, and being the first and corner house west from Peterburgh Place.” What the problem was is not stated; however Henry’s appeal failed and he dealt with the problem. “The order of Court having been complied with, the surveyor certified the same on the 18th October 1831, and filed a certificate with the clerk of the peace”. The prosecuting surveyor grumbled that the appeal cost him £50, so presumably Henry had been spared costs (Accounts&papers of the House of Commons: Volume 44: Returns relating to District Surveyors).
Henry and his family had moved to “#41 Seymour Street, Euston Square”, near “Hyde Park” by 1836 and that was where he was living when the Census takers caught up with him in 1841. Nevertheless, he must have retained some connection to the “Little Guildford Street” property as his wife, Joanna, died there in 1848. Henry had married Joanna Wogan in St. Giles in the Fields parish church in March 1800. They had nine children (seven daughters and two sons) over a period of seventeen years. London was not a healthy place in the early part of the 19th Century and infant deaths were all too common until the City fathers rebuilt the sewers in the second half of the century. Henry and Joanna lost at least four daughters (Mary Ann, Henrietta, Emma and Emma) early, and they reused the names “Henrietta” and “Emma” after two of the deaths.
Sadly, their eldest surviving daughter, Eliza Pinsent, was tricked into a bigamous marriage in 1836. The miscreant was apprehended and tried in London’s “Central Criminal Court” (“Old Bailey”). The case transcript is available online. Eliza was “in service” and training to be a “cook” when the deception occurred. She was thirty-one years old and she had around £126 saved up when she met and fell for William John Blackstone Steedman. He claimed to have money and property of his own, and they were married in front of witnesses in St. George’s Church in Bloomsbury in January 1836.
Needless to say, Mr. Steedman took control of her money and, after forty days or so, he started to take trips – ostensibly looking for a position as a landlord in a country inn. However, he eventually wrote to say that he would not be returning. Eliza told her father and he asked around and discovered that Mr. Steedman was previously married and he was then living with his wife and children in Blackfriars. Mr. Steedman was arrested and brought up in “Hatton Garden Court” for a preliminary hearing. There, it was established that he had been married for eleven years and had five children, and that his wife was aware of the deception! She was arrested on a charge of conspiracy (Sun (London) Saturday 9th April 1836). Mr. Steedman’s lawyer at the “Old Bailey” tried, but failed, to besmirch Eliza’s reputation and Mr. Steedman was sentenced to seven years transportation. He was shipped to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania, in Australia) in December that year. The “New South Wales and Tasmania, Australia, Convict Musters, 1806 – 1849” seem to show that he was granted a conditional pardon while there. I am not sure why! However, he was promptly sentence to another fourteen years (for what is unstated) in 1838.
In the course of her Court testimony, Eliza (“a well-looking woman”) referred to her sister, Mrs. Simmons (Symons) with whom she stayed after her “marriage” fell apart. Her brother George Pinsent testified to being present and a witness at the so-called “marriage” – which took place in Bloomsbury. Eliza had had enough. She never remarried.
Interestingly, her father Henry Pinsent registered the death of an eight-month old granddaughter, Eliza Emma Pinsent in July 1837. Whose child it was is not specified. It could conceivably have belonged to his eldest daughter, Mary Ann Pinsent or his youngest, Emma Pinsent – if they were still alive. Alternatively, is must have belonged to Eliza as her other two sisters had long since married. Henrietta married Edward Symons (Simmons) – a “coach painter” in 1827, and Joanna married William Bellman – a “beer-shop keeper” in St. Marylebone in London in 1830. Their brother George had trained as a “chorister” at St. Paul’s Cathedral (A History of English Cathedral Music: 1549-1889: John Skelton Bumpus) and was a “professor of music.” Sadly, he died of a fever in 1838, at the age of 23 years. He never married.
Three years after the Court case, Eliza died in an accident involving a “horse-drawn omnibus.” Evidently, “Mrs. Eliza Pincent, a respectable married female” was crossing Regent’s Street in Central London front of a ‘bus when the sound of its doors slamming triggered its horses to take off and they ran over her before the ‘bus driver could bring them under control (The Globe: Monday 17th June 1839).
Henry’s second son Henry John Pinsent married Charlotte Best Sharpe in Clerkenwell in September 1842 and had six children. His life is described elsewhere. Henry’s wife, Joanna (née Wogan) died at the Pinsents long-time home in Little Guildford Street in 1848. She was seventy six years old. Henry, who had long since retired, moved in with his son, Henry John, after he returned from India. He lived to be eighty five years old and died in Hornsey in London, in 1854.
Father: John Pinson: 1734 – N/A (unconfirmed)
Mother: Elizabeth Lang: N/A – N/A
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Birth: 1803
Marriage: N/A
Spouse: N/A
Death: 1806
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO1650
Click here to view close family members
Grandfather: John Pinson: 1734 – xxxx (unconfirmed)
Grandmother: Elizabeth Lang: xxxx – xxxx
Father: Henry Pinsent: 1769 – 1854
Mother: Joanna Wogan: 1772 – 1848
Henry John Pinsent: 1812 – 1894
George Pinsent: 1814 – 1838
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Birth: 1806
Marriage: 1827
Spouse: Edward Symons
Death: N/A
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO1403
Click here to view close family members
Grandfather: John Pinson: 1734 – N/A (unconfirmed)
Grandmother: Elizabeth Lang: N/A – N/A
Father: Henry Pinsent: 1769 – 1854
Mother: Joanna Wogan: 1772 – 1848
Henry John Pinsent: 1812 – 1894
George Pinsent: 1814 – 1838
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Birth: 1856 (née Helena Maude Robbins)
Marriage: 1878
Spouse: Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent
Death: 1884
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO1251
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Birth: 1860 (née Harriet Ann Soden)
Marriage: 1879
Spouse: Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent
Death: 1949
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0398
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.
Harold Charles Frank Pinsent: 1884 – 1968 GRO0391 (Paymaster Captain, Royal Navy)
Constance Amy Hildige Johnson: 1886 – 1964
Married: 1912: Portsea, Hampshire
Children by Constance Amy Hildige Johnson:
Joan Constance Hildige Pinsent: 1917 – 2003 (Married Martin Barnes Nettleton, Swansea, Glamorganshire, 1945)
Charles Hildige Pinsent: 1914 – 1998 (Married Ethelwyn Phillipson, Jhansi, India, 1941)
Family Branch: India
PinsentID: GRO0391
Click here to view close family members
Harold Frank Pinsent was the son of Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent, who was a merchant in the Madras (Chennai) in India, by his wife, Harriet (née Soden). He was born in Hampstead, near London, but spent most of his early years in India. Harold’s birth was reported in the Pall Mall Gazette (Monday 31st March 1884) – just two days before the same newspaper reported the death of his aunt, Helena Maud Pinsent (née Robins) in Madras. She was the first wife of his uncle, Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent.
The Census records show that Harold had older two sisters, and that his mother brought all three of them back to England to be educated. While in England, they lived with Harriet’s father (James Soden) who was a “Superintendent Purser” employed by the “P. & O. Co.” based in Southampton. Harriet was with her parents in 1891 and again in 1911. There must have been trips back to India as Harold later had a third sister who was born there, in 1894. The children’s paternal grandfather (Henry John Pinsent) had also worked for the “P. & O. Co.” as a “Superintendent Purser.” He retired and died in Southampton in 1894.
Harold attended “Merchant Taylors’ School” (a Public i.e. “Private” School) in Hertfordshire between 1894 and 1899 and entered the “Royal Naval College” at Dartmouth as a “cadet” in 1900. In fact, Harriet was staying at a boarding house in Devonport with Harold and her daughters Frances and Phyllis when the census was taken in 1901. Presumably she was down in Devon to see her son settled in.
Harold played cricket for “H.M.S. Britannia” (the Naval shore station) in 1900. It would have been interesting to watch its match against Totnes on Saturday 4th July 1900 (Dartmouth and South Hams Chronicle: Friday 6th July 1900) as it pitted Harold’s team against that of Robert Maye Pinsent – who came from the DEVONPORT branch of the family. Robert was the son of John Ball Pinsent, one of the Newton Abbot Brewers. Their lives are discussed elsewhere. Robert was probably the better player on that occasion but Harold had a good match when “H.M.S. Britannia” played “Plymouth College” the following year. He made 43 of his team’s total of 118 runs (Dartmouth & South Hams Chronicle: Friday 21st June 1901).
Harold took the “Civil Service” exams and succeeded in getting one of only fifteen “Assistant Clerkship” in the Royal Navy (Evening Express: 6th July 1901). Thus we find that H. C. F. Pinsent was an “Assistant Clerk” at “H.M.S. Vivid” (another Naval shore station) at Devonport a few days later (Portsmouth Evening News: Wednesday 10th July 1901). Harold he had still to graduate from the Academy, so we also find him taking part in a gymnastic display on “Dartmouth College” grounds a week or so later (Western Times: Friday 2nd August 1901).
Admiralty Records (ADM 196/171: National Archives) show that Harold served as an “Assistant Clerk” on “H.M.S. Impregnable” from 15th July to 9th September 1901 and on “H.M.S. Implacable” from then until 25th October 1901. He then transferred to “H.M.S. Royal Oak” in the Mediterranean until 17th March 1902. Harold was on “H.M.S. Naiad” from then until 22nd September 1904. In the meantime, he passed his “intermediate” exam on 22nd February 1904 and was assigned to “H.M.S. Hannibal” (a “Majestic Class” battleship) as a “Clerk” until 15th July 1905. He was promoted to “ Assistant Paymaster” in March 1905 and served on “H.M.S. New Zealand” until 17th June 1907.
Harold played cricket for the “United Services Club” in England before taking up this last appointment. Presumably he played while on leave in July 1905 (Field Saturday 1st and 8th July 1905). Most Royal Navy ships of any size arranged sporting fixtures against local teams when visiting Empire ports. It was good public relations and reminded ex-patriot Britons that the Royal Navy was still a force to be reckoned with. It also made a break from life at sea. Harold also for “H.M.S. New Zealand” when it visited Madeira in September 1905 (Field: Saturday 30th September 1905).
“Assistant Paymaster” Pinsent had expected to transfer to “H.M.S. Hyacinth” in January 1907 but that assignment was cancelled for some reason (The Globe: Saturday 19th January 1907) and he was returned to the barracks and shore station at “H.M.S. Vivid” (Portsmouth Evening News: Tuesday 4th June 1907). More cricket ensued! He played for the Royal Navy against the “Incogniti” in Keyham in Devon in August (Field: Saturday 17th August 1907). He also played for the “R.N. Barracks” in Devonport against the “2nd Somerset Light Infantry” in July 1908 (Taunton Courier and Western Advertiser: Wednesday 8th July 1908). There were other matches that year and also the next. For instance, Harold played for the barracks team against Torquay in May 1909 (Western Times: Monday 24th May 1909) and against Leamington in September that year (Leamington Spa Courier: Friday 3rd September 1909). These games largely came to an end when he was posted back to sea to “H.M.S. Hindustan” as an “Assistant or Acting Paymaster” in October 1909.
Nevertheless, Harold did not go far. When the requisite data were compiled, the 1911 Scottish Census shows that he was a “single, assistant paymaster” on board ship. The “H.M.S. Hindustan” was a relatively modern battleship, so whether it was the Clyde or at the “Home Fleet” base at “Scapa Flow” in the Orkney Islands I do not know. However, “Assistant Paymaster H. C. F. Pinsent” collected money for a “Naval Disaster Fund” from the “Hindustan’s” Officers in the ship’s Wardroom and Gunroom in March 1912 (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 15th March 1912).
He was released from the Hindustan in August 1912 and married Constance Amy, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. F. G. Hildige-Johnson, in Southsea, in September 1912 (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 13th September 1912) before taking on his next assignment. According to the 1921 census, she was British, but she had been born in Montana. Harold was transferred on loan to the “Department of Naval Services” in Ottawa, in Canada. He served on “H.C.M.S. Niobe” until September 1915 and, despite health issues, stayed on as a “Staff Paymaster” for its “Patrol Service” from September 1917 until May 1919. During this assignment he spent six months on the “Patrol Depot Ship Guelph”.
While living in Ottawa, Harold received a letter from a young Canadian airman of British extraction who had received basic flight trained in New York and wanted to get to Britain to join the war effort. In his book on “The Royal Naval Air Service During the Great War”, Malcolm Smith (Google Books) describes how a “Lieutenant Commander Pinsent” suggested that he and his friends either (1) stay on in New York for more training, (2) Join the “Royal Navy” in Canada and await developments or (3) wait for the next Canadian draft going to England. He chose option three and eventually made it across to England and flew for the “Royal Navy Air Service.”
Both of Harold’s children were born while he was serving in Canada. Charles Hildige Pinsent was born in February 1914 and Joan Constance Hildige in January 1917. After the War, the family returned to England in May 1919 on “White Star Line” ship “Olympic” (U.K. Incoming Passengers: Ancestry.com). Unfortunately Harold took sick when he landed and he was sent to Peebles Hospital for an extended period. Perhaps he had succumbed to the flu epidemic that was then ravaging Europe. He did not return to active service until 7th November, that year. He did, however, recover his previous strength and ability. His 1922 evaluation shows that he was “above average, good at games; (a) fully competent and reliable officer (with a) character (that is) steady and quiet; mental average, physique very good, temperament cool, energetic and tactful, and a very good administrator (Capt. Cyril S. Townsend, H.M.S. Resolution”). He received similar plaudits other years. The final entry, in 1926, states “a very good officer and has been great assistance to me in administrating the destroyer command” (Rear Admiral (D) A. P. Addison, 2nd June 1926).
Harold’s administrative ability was recognized after the war and he was subjected to several years of intensive high-level training. He was assigned to the “Destroyer Depot” ship “H.M.S. Dido and Veale” from 8th December 1919 to 15th August 1920. He then transferred to “H.M.S Valiant” as a “P.L.C.” (“Pay Ledger Commander”?) “to gain experience in central stock-keeping.” He was there until 28th August, 1922. After that, he moved to “H.M.S. President”, the shore station in London, for a victualing course (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 15th September 1922) and then went on to “H.M.S. Victory” (another shore station) for another victualing course a month later (Western Morning News: Saturday 21st October 1922).
In 1923, he was promoted to “Pay Commander” and assigned to “H.M.S. Diligence”, the “Destroyer Depot” ship “H.M.S. Sandhurst” (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 14th March 1924) and other ships. However, it was back to “H.M.S. Victory” for a “Secretaries Course” in July 1926 (Hampshire Times: Friday 30th July 1926), and from there to “H.M.S. President” for yet another victualing course (Hampshire Telegraph Friday 31st December 1926). Harold completed his “Code and Cypher” course in September 1926 and his “U.T.” (?) Course at “H.M.S. Victory” in February 1927. From there, Harold move to “H.M.S. Vernon”, the “Royal Navy Torpedo Branch” shore depot – on 1st March 1927 (Portsmouth Evening News: Thursday 20th January 1927).
After the Vernon, the Admiralty sent Harold to serve on the battleship “H.M.S. Barham” in the summer of 1928 (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 18th May 1928). It had just completed a refit and been recommissioned. He was probably pleased to get to sea again – although it has to be admitted that in his early days he had been “inclined to sea sickness” (Admiralty Records). From there, Harold transferred to another battleship, “H.M.S. Warspite”, (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 27th July 1928). After that, it was the battleship “H.M.S. Malaya” in 1929 (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 20th September 1929). The administration of a major capital ship in those days must have been quite a challenge. Nevertheless, he still found time for the odd game of cricket. He was a member of the “H.M.S. Malaya” team that played a match against Eastbourne in July 2930. It must have been a memorable match for him as he retired hurt after scoring a respectable 41 runs. Evidently, “he tore a muscle in his thigh when running between the wickets” and after trying to continue with a runner standing in for him, was carried from the pitch “siting on a bat held by Lieut. Colonel L. C. Stevens and Mr. H. E. Grevell and was taken in a car to the Pier head for removal to his ship” (Eastbourne Chronicle: Saturday 12th July 1930).
For his final assignment, Harold was sent to “H.M.S. Pembroke” – the shore barracks at Chatham – where he was “assistant to Pay Capt. (S) Blanchflower” until 31st October 1933. Harold Charles Frank Pinsent retired from the Royal Navy with the rank of “Paymaster Captain” in 1934 (London Gazette: 9th February 1934); however, there was little chance of him slipping into a quiet retirement. He was appointed “Secretary” to the “Navy Week Committee in Portsmouth” the following year (London Times: Saturday 26th January 1935) . “Navy Week” was a major event in those days and, in recognition of the presses help in promoting of it, he sent a massive Christmas cake (made at the “Royal Naval Barracks” at Portsmouth and (apparently) covered by three inches of icing!) to the “Press Club” in London (Daily News (London): Saturday 24th December 1938). Doubtless it was appreciated. Navy Week allowed the British Government to show off its fleet and remind the World of its capabilities. The Navy was still at the heart and soul of the Empire and “Pax Britannica” still managed to keep the world at peace – or it did until 1939.
Harold and Constance lived in Portsmouth throughout the 1930s but moved to Mumbles, near Swansea on the South Coast of Wales at the outbreak of the “Second World War”. Harold, like so many other recently retired Naval Officers, had re-joined the navy; so when the 1939 Register was being compiled he was described as being a Royal Navy “Paymaster Commander” attached to “H.M.S. Lucifer” (the home of Britain’s minesweeper trawler base). He was an experienced administrator and his services would have been invaluable. According to family sources, he was appointed “Naval Supply Officer for the Bristol Channel”. The couple spent the war years living on Skelly Park Road in Swansea, Glamorganshire. Their children were both in uniform.
After the War, Harold and Constance moved back to Portsmouth. They were living in Southsea, close to where Harold had grown up by 1949. Constance died there in 1964 and her son (Charles Hildige Pinsent) and her solicitor handled her not inconsiderable estate (Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations): 1967 – 1995). The funeral was a quiet family event. Donations were to be sent to the “Royal National Lifeboat Institute”. Harold moved to Northampton after his wife died – presumably to be close to his daughter. He died there in April 1968. Once again, it was his son, Charles Hildige Pinsent, and his solicitor who probated the estate (Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations): 1967 – 1995).
Harold’s daughter, Joan Constance Pinsent had her own talents: she won a “Grade VI silver medal for having obtained the highest distinction marks in the elocution examinations in all England, Miss Joan C. Pinsent recited a portion of John Drinkwater’s “A Night of the Trojan War.” Taught by Miss More Bremner, Miss Pinsent is a daughter of Paymaster Capt. Pinsent (General Secretary of Navy Week) and possesses exceptional powers of recitation and elocution” (Hampshire Telegraph: Friday 3rd July 1936).
Joan joined the “W.R.N.S.” (“Womens’ Royal Naval Service”) and was promoted to the rank of “Third Officer” in June 1942, and to “Second Officer” in March 1943. She met her husband-to-be (ex-Flight Lieutenant Martin Barnes Nettleton, the headmaster of “Northampton Grammar School”), while hiking in north Wales in 1945 and, after (romantically) getting engaged on an uninhabited Island off the Pembroke Coast (Northampton Mercury: Friday 7th September 1945) they married. The Herald of Wales (19th November 1945) reported on the event and provides a photograph. Whether she ever seriously claimed to be a direct descendant of the Martin Pinzon who sailed with Columbus (see introductory sections of this database) as described in the earlier Northampton Mercury article is unknown but highly unlikely!
Joan corresponded with my father (Dr. R. J. F. H. Pinsent) in the 1960s. It seems that she remembered meeting a Lady Pinsent “in the Headmaster’s drawing room at Denstone College, Staffordshire in 1940”. She was probably not my great grandmother (Lady Emily Hetty Sabine Pinsent) as she thought, although Lady Pinsent had been matron at Denstone at the turn of 20th Century. She had died in 1922 when Constance was five years old! It seems unlikely that they ever met.
The other Lady Pinsent around at the time was Lady Laura Proctor Pinsent, Sir Richard Alfred Pinsent’s wife; however, she died in 1931 when Constance was fourteen years old! It is not hard to imagine a tongue-tied young teenager being reluctant, as she claims to have been, to question her Ladyship about her husband’s antecedents. Joan must have got the date wrong though – an easy thing to do – and likely the place as well. I have no idea why she would have been at Denstone in the first place!
As a young woman, Joan seems to have far from reticent about touching base with Sir Richard Pinsent’s son, Commander Clive Pinsent and his wife and three sons during the war. She visited them on their highland estate at “Edinglassie” near Huntley in Aberdeenshire. They were a naval family which must have made the small talk easier. Joan Constance also told my father that she served with a “W.R.N.S. Third Officer” Joan Isobel Pynsent while in the navy. Apparently, to avoid confusion, the latter (being the junior officer at the time) changed her name to “Johanna Pynsent” – which is how I first came to hear of her. After the war, Joan Constance Nettleton (née Pinsent) became a “teacher” and later a junior school “headmistress”. She retired in 1977. Her brother, Charles Hildige Pinsent, served with the army in India but returned to England after the Country obtained its independence.
Grandfather: Henry John Pinsent: 1812 – 1894
Grandmother: Charlotte Best Sharpe: 1819 – 1904
Father: Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent: 1849 – 1904
Mother: Harriet Ann Soden: 1860 – 1949
William Henry Pinsent: 1845 – 1895
Charles Powell Tronson Pinsent: 1849 – 1904 ✔️
Frederick Henry Davison Pinsent: 1852 – 1902
Frances Anne Pinsent: 1853 – xxxx
Eliza Charlotte Pinsent: 1857 – xxxx
Mary Louisa Pinsent: 1859 – 1948
Please use the above links to explore this branch of the family tree. The default “Next” and “Previous” links below may lead to other unrelated branches.