Eyam

“Thomas, I would have you give my clothes away” Elizabeth Furnace 1627

I have found more 17th century wills – a small clutch in fact – and all casting a light on the intermarrying Furnace and Bennett families, farmers and lead miners of Eyam (1607-1670).

This post concerns Elizabeth Furnace’s will of 1627, a simple list of clothing bequests to family members and friends. It is both deeply touching, and illuminating – an insight into the surprising prosperity of farming folk of the Eyam lead field during the second year of the reign of Charles I.

Elizabeth was the wife of Richard Furnace (11th great grandparents in my surmised tree, and variously spelled Furness, Furnis, Furnies). In his will of 1607 Richard was styled a husbandman which means he was a free tenant farmer and/or small landowner. On the farm he grew corn, oats, hay and barley, kept over a hundred sheep, a few cows, a breeding pig and had two mares. The household details are sketchy but the contents mentioned are typical of the time: board tables, bed frames, arks and chests, bedding and bolsters, hams curing in the roof space, twenty pewter dishes. He appears to have owned his house and the ground it stood on.

Five of Elizabeth and Richard’s children survived to adulthood. Two of them, Thomas the eldest son and his sister Anne married Bennett siblings, Margaret and William junior. If you have read my recent family history posts (see links under ‘related’) you will have already met the elder William Bennett, farmer of Gotherage, and also his spinster daughter Joan, sister of Margaret and William, she who apparently preferred taking over her father’s tenancy to marriage.

In 1627 when Elizabeth Furnace dictates her last wishes (a nuncupative will) to son Thomas, she has been widowed for twenty years. She is probably at least 70 years old, born then during the reign of Elizabeth I. The granddaughters to whom she leaves personal items are presumably ‘grown up’ enough to make immediate use of the gifts. Thomas’s teenage daughter, Elizabeth, for instance, does not feature, though her sisters and mother do.

Here then is my transcription. I’ve used modern spelling:

These are the words of a will nuncupative of Elizabeth Furnace the wife of Richard Furnace of Eyam in the county of Derby … received before her death.

Thomas, said she, I would have you give my clothes away

I would have you give to Anne Furnace the daughter of my son Richard Furnace two gowns and one petticoat

I would have you give to my daughter Joanne Furnace two petticoats, three waistcoats and three doublets and hat

And I would have you to let your own wife have two petticoats, one pair of new shoes and hose which I never had on

And I would have you to give to Amie Bennet of Gringlow my daughter’s daughter one hat and my napkin in my pocket

And I would have you give to Thomas Bocking’s wife my gloves in my pocket

And I would have you give your daughter Margaret the ruffs I have on

I would have you give your daughter Ann my working day gown and band

I would have you give Elizabeth Townsend my hose and shoes which I have on

I would have you give my waistcoat which I have on to Elizabeth Furnace my daughter

I would have you give to my daughter Anne my working day apron which I have on and my kerchief on my head

I would have you give to my daughter Joanne Furnace my ark and all my linen clothes in it

And Thomas I will give you fifty six shillings in my chest and forty shillings which Thomas Bocking oweth me…

…these were her last words

signed Thomas Furnace of Eyam in the County of Derby Yeoman

A few of these bequests need some explanation. Pockets for instance were separate ‘tie-on’ affairs that usually came in twos. Devised in the 17th century to rest on the hips, and fastened at the waist, they were often highly decorative. Women of rank carried in them all manner of valuable trinkets and snuff boxes, smelling bottles, even their diaries, whereas housewives might have their sewing kit, a comb or, in Elizabeth’s case, her gloves (also a valuable item) and napkin stowed there. They were pretty capacious items, forerunners of the oversized designer handbag. But then napkins were also large (around 36” by 45”, roughly a square metre) and doubtless needed to be kept close in a time when people still mostly ate using their fingers. It anyway seems a very personal item to bestow on granddaughter Amie Bennett, and probably conveys symbolic meaning too. I’ve seen other wills where a pledge to honour family obligations was sealed with the exchange of a napkin or handkerchief.

You can see more about pockets HERE.

The waistcoats and doublets would mostly likely have been fitted jackets with sleeves, and the petticoats full gathered skirts for outer not under wear. Wool is likely to be the fabric of choice for country living, with linen for under garments. Both men and women wore a long shift with a high gathered neck, and doubtless it is Elizabeth’s linen underwear that is kept in the ark (dome-topped chest) to be given to daughter Joanne. Women’s clothing also had a masculine look in the 17th century, hence the wearing of doublets and also large hats.

Gowns at the time were sleeveless, pleated across the shoulder back. With added ruffs they were garments that conveyed great presence. Obviously there is no knowing how Elizabeth’s gowns would have looked. There seems to be little surviving evidence of 17th century clothes for the middling classes. But it’s likely they were fairly plain and in sober shades suitable for a widow. In fact Anne who is to receive them is the daughter of Elizabeth’s second son, Richard Furnace. He was/or would become a non-conformist who gave financial support (both in life and after his death) for the relief of persecuted Quakers. (The house in the header image is his house in Eyam, built in 1615.)

Elizabeth’s gowns would have been nowhere near as grand as the one in the photo. Nonetheless, it is obvious that clothing generally was both highly valued and valuable to be bequeathed in this manner. Today most of us would feel uncomfortable to receive the used and personal items from a dead grandmother. I’m also surprised that Elizabeth was so very well clothed for the widow of a husbandman, and in an era when ordinary working folk struggled to own two shirts or shifts (one on and one in the wash) and when a single woollen jacket would be expected to last for many years. But then it is also possible/likely that her parting ‘wardrobe’ spanned decades of ownership of clothing that had been well made and cared for. Fashions during Elizabeth’s lifetime had not changed so very much. On the other hand she was not a dependent. Richard had left the farm jointly to her and to Thomas. She could buy a new waistcoat or hose if she so decided. Besides, it seems the Furnace family is prospering since Thomas now styles himself ‘yeoman’.

I’m wondering if you have formed an image of this woman as she bequeaths all her clothing down to the pieces she is wearing. She is clearly not bedridden, for she has on her hose and shoes; also her working day apron, doubtless over a full woollen skirt (petticoat), complete with well-filled pockets. Then there’s the sleeved waistcoat like the one in the pattern diagram above, probably also in plain wool. There are ruffs at her neck, a kerchief over her hair. She has all her wits about her too as she enumerates and disposes. Perhaps she is in her bedchamber, the ark and chest lids up, Thomas sitting at a small table near the window as he takes down her instructions. Elsewhere in the house, Margaret his wife is overseeing the preparation of the day’s meal, potage (a stew or sorts). Elizabeth her daughter checks on the batter that is fermenting for the next batch of oatcakes, a Derbyshire staple. Outside, life on the farm continues, a soundscape of bleating sheep and the rattle of cartwheels on unmade roads, the chatter of passing neighbours.

The young Elizabeth, busy with household tasks, will marry Francis Frith of Eyam in 1636. They will have nine children. The second son William will be the favourite of Elizabeth’s aunt, Joan Bennett of Gotherage, her mother’s sister. In spring 1665, when in his early twenties, William will be entrusted to be Joan’s executor and inherit her tenant farm and all its possessions. Joan says his mother Elizabeth is to have all her wool and linen clothes. She says that William is to deliver them to her.

When 11th great grandfather was about to die…

“My mind and will is…” Joan Bennett 1665

When 11th Great Grandfather was about to die…

These last few months I’ve been tracking down great grandparents and have gathered rather more than are manageable. But one family line, the (Derbyshire) Bennetts of Eyam, Grindlow and Bradwell has yielded treasure. I’ve recently found two seventeenth century wills, of father and daughter, written 45 years apart. First was the discovery (on a well-known genealogy website) of the will of 11^th great grandfather William Bennett, farmer of Gotherage (also Gotheridge and Godriche), a remote tenant farm between Eyam and Abney. It was written in 1620 – four hundred and one years ago – and on the 20^th May, as in yesterday when I began writing this post.

William says he is ‘sick in body but of good and perfect remembrance’; it is time, then, to share out his worldly goods. As in all wills of this era, the most pressing provision concerns the afterlife and so he begins by bequeathing his soul to ‘Almighty God my maker and redeemer,’ and requesting that his mortal remains be buried in Eyam parish churchyard. There is nothing here to indicate his age, but the bequests show that one son and two daughters are married and have children of their own. Other sons, George and Francis, are apparently still at Gotherage, as is their sister Joan. All of William’s offspring appear to be adults since there are no coming-of-age conditions attached to bequests. And so, given that the usual marrying age was 21 (often older for men), it is likely that William was between 50 and 60 years old.

The opening lines of William Bennett’s will 20th May 1620

Having settled spiritual matters, William’s next thought is of his daughter Joan. There is every suggestion that she has refused to be married, and he seems anxious to ensure her well being. I could of course be reading this wrongly, but it strikes me as enlightened: for the next few centuries spinsters tended to be considered family burdens and therefore status-less. Here, it seems, is a father bequeathing freedom to a daughter to do as she likes.

And so he writes:

I give and bequeath unto Jone Bennet my daughter £20 * and a bed, to be maintained with sufficient meat drink lodging and apparel so long as she pleaseth to stay at Goderiche and if it please her to depart and go away from there then she shall have her portion paid her by my executors to do with it as pleaseth her going been against marriage before.

[* around £3,000 in modern monetary values]

The rest of the will comprises bequests to sons and sons-in-law, and a lamb to each of his grandchildren. Eldest son William receives 20 shillings (a month’s wages), son-in-law Thomas Furness 10 shillings. George however is to have £33 in lieu of the fact that his brother Francis has been managing the farm for his own use.

Finally, all William’s goods, catells and chattels are to be shared equally between his wife Ann (we hear nothing else about her) and sons Francis and George.

The will then concludes with monies owed to him by local householders in Eyam, Grindlow and Abney. It amounts to over £63, which is a tidy sum in 1620. In fact the National Archives currency converter says this was equivalent to more than £8,000, or a skilled tradesman’s wages for 1260 days.

Sums owed to William Bennett

There is no clue as to what services William was rendering. It seems unlikely that these were all unpaid bills for farm produce since most of the people here were likely to be fellow farmers, at least in some capacity. And while the probate inventory sets William’s worth in goods and livestock at £133 19 shillings (£17,500), the contents suggest a fairly modest farming enterprise. My one notion is that he had a side-line in transporting lead ore to local smelting points in the area, one likely spot being due east of his farm, at Bole Hill, a name that historically signifies lead smelting.

High Peak farmers, of necessity, had many strings to their livelihood bow. Many combined farming and lead prospecting. The latter was a dangerous enterprise, but the lead miner’s freedoms associated with the King’s Field of lead deposits were well worth having. They included free timber from landowners’ woodland, free access to and over other people’s land while extracting ore, and the right to freely graze their animals on common land. In return, they paid ‘lot’ to the monarch, a 13^th portion of their gains, and a tenth part tithe to the church, all overseen by the Barmaster and jurors of the Barmote Courts who were themselves lead miners.

Here’s another view of the barn ruins, this time looking north towards Highlow and Hathersage

And more general views, the first taken by Jonathan Clitheroe higher up the hillside above Gotherage Plantation and well above the barn ruins:

And this next Neil Theasby view which is taken beside Gotherage Plantation and looking across Bretton Clough to Abney Barn. On the horizon, left of centre, you can just make out the scarred ‘face’ of Mam Tor below which were extensive lead mining operations in the 17th and 18th centuries (Odin Mine):

A challenging landscape, however you look at it.

I have found the location of Gotherage Barn on an 1879 Ordnance Survey map. You can see farm fields much as they would have been delineated on the original estate tithe and rent book maps. The blue ribbon marks the barn remains, but there is no sign of the house where the Bennetts lived, though the presence of a natural spring below the barn might suggest it would not have been far away. You can see Bole Hill due east of the barn. A trip to Derbyshire Record Office and a sight of the Highlow estate rent books would doubtless reveal more, but that will have to wait. I’m also relying here on landscape photos taken by the lovely people who post their work on www.geograph.org.uk and allow reuse under Creative Commons licencing. They also add map references and all manner of locational assistance. What stars.

The header photo by Neil Theasby, I’m pretty sure, shows a corner of Gotherage Barn, a building that is probably c1800s in date, and beyond it, across Bretton Clough, the Oaks Farm where there are other ancestral links, having been occupied by members of three separate family lines: Foxes in 1660, Bennets in the early 1700s, and 4^th great grandfather, Robert Jackson the hatter in the 1850s. Oaks is another of the many Highlow farms, originally owned by the Eyre family, but now part of Duke of Devonshire’s estate.

I’ve been trying to reconstruct some image of life at Gotherage in William’s time. The probate inventory is very sketchy compared with others I’ve recently transcribed. For instance it doesn’t record items by room, and similar items are lumped together: ‘pewter and brass’ £6 13 shillings 4 pence , ‘bedding and nappery ware’ (cloth items) £10. And then there are bits I can’t decipher.

But basically the domestic furniture comprised bed frames and many kinds of boards: cupboards, dishboards, bread boards and boards that would have rested on trestles to make tables. There were also stools and chairs and arks (storage chests).

We do know that William’s purse and apparel were valued at £10 (£1,300). He had two mares and one saddle, so was well equipped on the very essential personal transport front. He had four oxen for working the fields, with ploughs, harrows and yokes in the barn. There was corn growing in the field, ten pounds worth in sheep and lambs, 2 swine, 4 steers, 4 cows, 3 calves one of which was being weaned. There were hams hanging in the roof space and stores of meal, malt, butter and cheese. I also think there were bees.

There are more clues about the house from Joan’s probate inventory of 1665. Besides the barn with its’ ploughs, harrows and carts’ there were three main rooms, ‘the house’ which seems to be the living-cooking quarters, ‘the parlour’ where the beds were, and ‘the chamber’ which appears to have been used to store things. The house might have been wholly stone built, but I’m also imagining a part-stone, part timber-framed house, one main large living space, perhaps with an upper storey attic ‘the chamber’ (?) above. It’s the sort of place that would leave little trace of itself once left to decay, and doubtless any stonework would have been re-purposed. Most of the Derbyshire farmhouses we see now are stone-built, but many were late 18^th century re-builds, doubtless replacing aged and dilapidated predecessors.

But, I hear you asking, never mind about the house. What about Joan? What became of the young woman whose father appears to give credit where credit is due and is prepared to enable some (surprising) degree of free choice?

It will have to wait for the next instalment of the ‘Bennetts of Gotherage’. For now here’s another striking Neal Theasby photo of the barn ruins.

No Need To Wind This Clock

This magnificent sun dial was erected on the wall of Eyam parish church in 1775. I’ve posted a photo of it before, but this one was taken in October during our stay in Derbyshire. The village of Eyam is famous for its extraordinary response to an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1665 wherein the villagers agreed to quarantine the entire village so as not to spread the infection. You can read more of this story at an earlier post: In Search of Lost Time in Eyam and an Outbreak of Plague. As to the accuracy of this sun clock, well according to my camera it was exactly one hour slow when I took the photo, but then that may have more to do with the way we keep shunting the hour about at different seasons.

Time Square #8 Pop over to Becky’s for this week’s squares round up.

Six Word Saturday

In Search Of Lost Time In Eyam And An Outbreak Of Plague

This very unusual wall sundial is to be found above the Priest’s Door on the east side of Eyam parish church in Derbyshire. It dates from 1775, and was designed and made locally. I discovered it when were in the village doing a spot of family history research – not researching in any organised way I might add – more a matter of walking ancestral paths and acquiring a sense of place. Eyam is anyway a village with an awful lot of history, not least the story of how its inhabitants dealt with an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1665-1666 by imposing a cordon sanitaire around the village boundary, and for over a year sticking to it so as not to spread the disease to neighbouring communities.

Over the fourteen months that the outbreak persisted, 280 out of the 800 population died. It is thought the infection arrived in a parcel of fabric, sent in late summer from London to the Eyam tailor, Alexander Hadfield. The package was opened by his assistant, George Viccars, and it was he who was the first to fall ill and die. Thereafter, the disease spread rapidly throughout the autumn, slowed over the winter, and returned in full force in the following spring and summer. In the worst month of August 1666 seventy eight villagers died.

Eyam’s self-imposed quarantine was managed by the young village rector, Reverend William Mompesson, and Nonconformist minister Reverend Thomas Stanley. It was agreed that every household would bury their own dead and, in a bid to maintain morale and give comfort to survivors, church services were held in the open air so people could gather together, but not too closely. Local landowner, the Duke of Devonshire, and others from neighbouring villages saw that supplies of food and other necessities were left at the village boundary.

It is a harrowing episode that demonstrates great human resilience and bravery, not least by the Reverend Mompesson, whose own wife was among the last victims. And today, as you wander around the village, the event continues to be marked by commemorative plaques outside the cottages that were once the homes of the families who were particularly afflicted.

It could seem mawkish, crass even, to make a visitor attraction from this horrific episode, but somehow it isn’t. The village quietly embraces you in a reflection on shared humanity – now and back through time. In fact the sun dial says it all: Induce animum sapientum – cultivate an enquiring mind. And then on the two supporting stone corbels, which you can’t quite read in the photo: ut umbra sic vita – life passes like a shadow.

I especially like the way that when it is noon in Eyam, the sundial shows the relative times in Calicut, Mecca and Panama, to name but a few of the far-flung places inscribed on the dial. It also includes a chart for longitudinal adjustments of local True Sun Time to Greenwich meantime, and throughout the year. Somehow it is uplifting to feel that in this isolated Derbyshire village, and over the centuries, the gaze of its inhabitants has extended to a world beyond its village boundaries.

So far I haven’t mentioned why we were visiting Eyam or explained presumed family links with this locality. Researches into the Fox family of Callow in Hathersage (covered in other posts) suggest that a possibly direct ancestor, one Robert Fox, yeoman farmer and lead miner, was living in the area between 1678 and 1699. I have a copy of his will and household inventory, so I know he owned 13 cushions and several field beds in one or more parlours. There were no Fox plague victims in Eyam, although Robert Fox’s second wife, Margaret Mower, had lost an uncle, Rowland Mower. His will is included in the 1842 book by local historian, William Wood, The History and Antiquities of Eyam ~ with a full and particular account of the Great Plague.

The Fox family connection is all a bit of a yarn, which may never be unravelled. So for now some more views of the village:

Eyam Parish Church and its 8th century Saxon Cross complete with Celtic influences.

This is Eyam Hall, very much post-plague, and built between 1671-6 and incorporating a much smaller existing property in the heart of the village. Its builders were newcomers, the land-owning-merchant Wright family, and their arrival signified revival, and an increasing interest in developing the lead mining potential the area. Landowners large and small were keen to exploit this highly valued mineral. And although lead had been mined across Derbyshire since Roman times, there is almost a ‘gold rush’ feel about the exploitative zeal from the late 17th century.

It is possible that post-plague opportunities around Eyam attracted the likes of putative ancestor, Robert Fox. My band of fellow Fox-hunters has not been able to establish if he was an incomer or if there were existing family connections with Eyam. His father was a tenant farmer at The Oaks, near Highlow, a few miles away, and he and Robert’s brothers may also have been involved in the lead business, possibly smelting.

Robert owned four small parcels of lead-bearing land in Foolow, two of which adjoined Wright land. When he thought he was dying in 1691 and wrote his will, he was very concerned to make it clear he had ownership of them, and that the proceeds of his property should be managed by his brother and brother-in-law for the upbringing and education of his four children – James, William, Mary and Robert. In fact he did not die until 1699, and it is not clear what happened to his family. We think the eldest James became a shoemaker in Eyam, and that Robert was possibly a very successful joiner in Wirksworth, the lead mining capital of Derbyshire. William is the one we have our eye on as the possible ancestor for the Callow Foxes, but his baptismal record has so far proved elusive, which is most annoying when we know that his three siblings were baptised in Eyam church. Ah, well. Such are the fascinations and frustrations of tracking down traces of families long past.

From: William Wood The History & Antiquities of Eyam 1842

Black & White Sunday: Traces of the Past

JOSEPH SIDDALL

P.S. A number of readers have asked what became of 3 year old Joseph Siddall. The Eyam Museum researches seem to indicate that there were in fact two surviving Siddall children, and they went to live with relatives in Sheffield, not that far from Eyam. There is quite a dynasty of Siddalls in the Eyam-Stoney Middleton area of Derbyshire, so they would not have been left without any family connections.

Tish Farrell

Writer on the Edge