Introduction

John Griffin spent his childhood at Abbott’s Hill Farm, Pendomer. After marrying in 1873, he was a dairyman at various dairies in the Yeovil area, including at Lansdown Farm, Hardington.[1] At the turn of the century, he changed from dairying to milling, becoming the miller at Sandford Mills, Sandford Orcas. He then moved to a village in Worcestershire, where he became a farmer. Three of his sons emigrated to Canada.

Childhood

John came from a farming background. His father, Thomas James, was the son of John and Eleanor Griffin of Abbott’s Hill Farm, Pendomer. His mother, Mary, was the daughter of John and Mary Harris, who ran a dairy at Melbury Osmond. Thomas and Mary married at Merriott on 2 May 1850, and Mary joined John and his parents at Abbott’s Hill Farm.

Unfortunately, their marriage was tragically short-lived. After giving birth to Thomas James in 1850 and John in 1851, Mary died in 1852, shortly after the birth of a third son, William, who also did not survive.

Mary’s death left Thomas as the sole guardian of his two young sons. His mother, Eleanor, had died in 1851, and his father, John, was in his mid-sixties at the time. This situation would have been difficult for Thomas, and after three years as a widower, he remarried in 1855. His new wife, Mary Hopkins, was the daughter of a farm labourer from Seavington St Mary. Thomas may have met her through a shared connection with the Bible Christians, a religious group with many followers in the West Country. While Mary’s affiliation with this group is speculative based on its popularity at Seavington St. Mary at the time, Thomas’s connection is supported by the 1871 census, which recorded a Bible Christian minister staying at Abbott’s Hill Farm, probably while on a preaching tour.

Thomas and Mary married at Pendomer Church on Christmas Eve, 1855. Although Mary was fifteen years older than Thomas, she outlived him by fifteen years. She helped him on the farm and acted as the stepmother to his two sons, Thomas and John.

Marriage

As they grew older, both Thomas and John helped their father on the farm, staying until their early twenties. John was the first to leave, marrying Mary Harris, the daughter of John Harris, a neighbouring dairyman, on 21 October 1873. Two years later, Thomas married Mary Rose Dimmock, a school teacher, at Norton-sub-Hamdon.[2] The couple later moved to Wiltshire, where Thomas became a gardener.

Over Compton

By 1874, John and Mary lived at Over Compton, where their first child was born.

Hardington

After only a brief time at Over Compton, John and his family moved to Lansdown Farm, Hardington, where they resided from about 1876 to the early 1880s. In April 1881, their household included two dairymaids, Mary Eastment and her sister, Emma.

While they were living at Hardington, Mary’s father, John Harris, came to reside with them. He died there on 3 May 1878, leaving an estate valued at under £20, which he bequeathed to Mary.[3]

The following year, John’s father, Thomas, retired from his farming business at Abbott’s Hill Farm, which he had inherited from his father, John, following the latter’s death in 1874.[4] Thomas held his farm sale on 19 April 1879 and retired to Barry Lane, Hardington.^[5] He may have been forced to retire by failing health, as he died on 29 December 1883, from Addison’s Disease at the age of 59.[6]

1880s and 1890s

During the 1880s and 1890s, John and Mary moved many times. By September 1884, they were at Halstock; in November 1886, at Pendomer; in January 1889, at South Perrott; in February and April 1891, at Abbotts Hill Dairy, Halstock; and by November 1898, at Sandford Mills, Sandford Orcas, where John ran the mill with his son, Walter. John’s stepmother, Mary, died there on 8 November 1898 at the age of 89.[7]

Final years

By March 1901, five of John and Mary’s eight children had left home. Thomas moved to Northfield, Worcestershire, where he ran his own carpentry and building business. His brother, Theodore, worked for him as a carpenter, and their sister, Bessie, was their housekeeper. Meanwhile, John Edward James married a woman from Lincolnshire named Elizabeth Ann Mayes and took a job at a grain mill at Turnastone, Herefordshire, where his sister, Ada, lived with them.[8]

The reasons for this migration northwards are unclear. However, John, Mary, and their three other children followed, moving to Upper Berrow Farm, Feckenham, about fourteen miles south of Northfield.

Death

John died at Feckenham on 7 December 1905 at the age of 54, leaving an estate valued at £340-8s-7d.[9]

Mary’s later life

After John’s death, Mary moved to 128 Milner Road, Northfield, where she ran a grocery business. The 1911 census recorded her living there with her daughters, Ada and Angelina. Her son, John, and daughter, Minnie, also lived in the same parish.

Mary probably died in the King’s Norton district in 1914 at the age of 61, possibly at the home of her daughter, Angelina, who moved there after marrying in 1913.

Children

John and Mary had five sons and four daughters;

1874-Thomas Henry Harris (emigrated to Canada in 1909);

1876- John Edward James (emigrated to Canada in 1911);

Circa 1878- Walter William Ernest (became a dairyman at Selly Park; died in 1910);

1879- George (died in infancy);

1881- Theodore Alfred George (emigrated to Canada in 1910);

1884- Bessie Mary Jane (never married; died in 1943; buried at Feckenham);

1886- Ada Annie Nellie (married Charles Phipps in 1913; died at Worcester in 1967);

1889- Minie Lily May (married James Gorton in 1908; died in 1956; buried at Feckenham);

1891- Angelina Sarah Maud (married John William Parish in 1913; died in 1963).

Summary of the home-made, poorly drafted will of John Griffin of Upper Berrow Farm, Feckenham

If my wife, Mary, survive me, she is to have the whole of my personal possessions and she may sell what she thinks proper at that time and with the money buy what she may think most suitable to bring an income for her proper support for her lifetime. I wish it to be parted as equal as possible between all my children that are then living.

If my wife should die before me, I desire my second son, John E J Griffin, shall be my executor and shall see that all I have is parted between all my children as equal as possible.

Wit: Bessie Griffin

Minnie Griffin.

References

[1] Later known as Landground Farm.

[2] Western Gazette, 9 February 1872, p.7.

[3] The will of John Harris, dated 27 October 1871, proved at Taunton on 24 June 1878.

[4] The will of John Griffin, dated 31 March 1873, proved at Taunton on 19 February 1875.

[5] Western Gazette 18 April 1879 p. 4.

[6] Death certificate of Thomas James Griffin. Addison’s Disease is a chronic endocrine disorder which advances at different rates in those affected .

[7] Western Gazette, 18 November 1898, p.8.

[8] According to 1911 census, John Edward James Griffin and Elizabeth Ann Mayes were married in about 1901, but their marriage has not been found.

[9] The will of John Griffin, dated 23 November 1905, proved at Worcester on 27 December 1905.