In April 1871, Adam Thomas Rendell was a tenant farmer at Manor Farm; in April 1881, he was a farm manager at White Vine Farm.

Birth at North Perrott

Adam was born at North Perrott in 1846, the third child of Thomas and Jane Rendell. His father was a prosperous farmer who farmed 176 acres and employed five labourers in March 1851.

School at Axminster

In April 1861, Adam was a scholar at a school in Chard Street, Axminster.

Marriage

On 15 March 1870, Adam married Anne Young, the daughter of Albert Young.

Manor Farm, Hardington

In April 1871, Adam was the tenant of Manor Farm, Hardington, where he farmed 256 acres and employed seven men, five boys and one girl.

In November 1872, he gave his employees a harvest supper of roast beef and plum pudding and provided a band to play music.[1]

Adam and his family left Manor Farm in 1878. On 16 March 1878, he and his wife provided supper for forty people as a farewell gift.[2] Several days later, the village Friendly Society presented him with a silver tea service and a butter dish to show their appreciation for his services as the treasurer.[3]

Manager at White Vine Farm

By April 1881, Adam was the manager of White Vine Farm. His father, Thomas Rendell, may have taken on the lease of White Vine and engaged Adam to look after it because he was concerned about Adam’s mental health.

Mental collapse

When he was forty, Adam suffered a severe mental collapse from which he never recovered. His father paid for him to be a patient at a private asylum at Fisherton Anger near Salisbury. In his will, his father instructed his wife to pay the fees of £70 per annum while she was alive and then for his trustees to pay them.[4]

Adam entered the asylum on 10 September 1886 and died there on 6 March 1917, aged seventy.[5]

His wife’s later life

Ann went to Yeovil to live with her married sister, Sarah Penny. She divided her younger children between both grandparents. By March 1901, Ann lived with her parents at the Laurels, East Chinnock. After her father died, she moved to Court Farm, East Chinnock, with her brother, Albert.

Ann died intestate at East Chinnock on 25 May 1927, aged 76, leaving an estate valued at £116-1s-9d.

Children

Adam and Ann had seven children, three of whom died before April 1911. The seven children were four sons and two daughters, plus a child who died young. One son died in Johannesburg in 1897, aged 23.[6]

References

[1] Western Gazette, 22 November 1872, p.7.

[2] Western Gazette, 22 March 1878, p.6

[3] Western Gazette, 29 March 1878, p.6.

[4] The will of Thomas Rendell, dated 23 November 1899, proved at Taunton on 26 November 1900.

[5] Lunacy Patients Admission Registers, 1846-1921, Civil Registration Death Index.

[1] Western Gazette, 4 June 1897, p.8.