Sidney Alfred Parsons and his Ancestors

James Parsons of Horsington Marsh (1742 to 1830)

James Parsons was a brother of William Parsons of Holton who was a great-great-grandfather of Sidney Alfred Parsons, the person upon whom the family tree described in these web pages is based.

James was baptised in Kington Magna in North Dorset on the 20th of January 1743. He was the second child of Moses Parsons and his wife Martha, née Turl. The Parsons family had lived in Kington Magna for several generations; Moses’ grandfather, Richard Parsons had been born there during the English Civil War.

James was only about 20 years old when, in Horsington, on the 14th of May 1762, he got married. His bride, Susanna Longman, was even younger than him having been baptised in February 1744. For some years they had no children but then they had a son whom they named Robert and, at about the same time, Susanna passed away. She might well have died in childbirth. Her funeral was in Horsington on the 17th of February 1769.

Nine years later James married again. His new wife was also called Susanna (sometimes spelt with an 'h', sometimes without). They were married in Horsington on the 16th of June 1778.

The couple lived at Horsington Marsh near where Susanna’s father Robert Hockey farmed. The marsh lies to the south of Wincanton, a town on the main road from London to Exeter and Plymouth. Horsington is in the county of Somerset but close to the border with north Dorset. The local area is shown in the map below.


Horsington Marsh lies to the north-east of the village of Horsington in a low-lying area drained by the River Cale and the Bow Brook. The River Cale flows through Wincanton and both it and the Bow are tributaries of the River Stour which reaches the sea at Christchurch near Bournemouth. The most important commercial crop in the area was flax which was used for making linen, canvas, and paper. After being cut it was prepared by a process called retting in which the stems were laid in the slow moving streams of the area so that the softer tissues would rot and wash away leaving just the fibres. Flax declined in importance during the 19th century as cotton imports increased and as steam ships began to replace sail in the latter part of the century.

James and Susannah’s home, which became known as Parsons’ Farm, is ringed in red on the map. It stood on the site of the present Burnt House Farm, the old farm house having burnt down in August 1898.

James’s parents, Moses and Martha, lived at Nyland in the parish of Kington Magna. Nyland, Higher Nyland, and Kington Magna (only partly visible) are highlighted on the map, as is Horsington village where both of James’s weddings were held and where he was eventually buried.

James and Susanna had four children: Mary, James, Susanna and William. Mary married and lived with her husband Thomas Lush but the other three children, who never married, continued to live with their parents. Also living with them was young Susanna’s illegitimate son Charles Parsons who was born about 1815.

In 1802 James and Susannah’s daughter Mary died. She was only about 23 years old.

In March 1821 James’s wife Susannah died. She was 74 years old. Later that year he made his will. Interestingly, he made generous provision for his his deceased daughter Mary’s son Thomas, but his son-in-law Thomas Lush, who had married Mary when they were both very young, received only one shilling. The will can be read here — The Will of James Parsons of Horsington Marsh, 1821.

James died on the 3rd of December 1830 and was buried in Horsington ten days later. He was 88 years old.

James’s three youngest children continued to live at the farm and when the last of them, William, died in 1879, the following newspaper advertisement was placed to re-let the farm:


FARM. — TO BE LET, by TENDER, in two lots :-

Lot 1. — A very productive GRAZING and DAIRY FARM and Orchard, with convenient House and Buildings, situate at Horsington Marsh, 1½ miles from Templecombe Station, the whole thing being 64a. 0r. 14p.
The house and large portion of the land to be let from Christmas next.

Lot 2. — A convenient House and Buildings, viz. :-
   House and Garden   1a. 1r. 10p.
   Pasture   9a. 1r. 24p.
   Orchard   3a. 3r. 3p.
To be entered upon at Lady-day next.

TENDERS to be sent in on or before 10th September next to Mr. T. Lush, Milton, Gentleman; or Mr. William Parsons, Cards Farm Hardway Bruton, who do not bind themselves to accept the lowest or any tender.
The property will be shown by Mr. James Down, on the premises.
 

The Mr. William Parsons of Cards Farm named in the advertisement was a son of James Parsons’ daughter Susanna’s illegitimate son Charles.

As can be seen from the following advertisement, the new tenant decided to use the premises as a training establishment for people who wished to learn how to make prime Cheddar cheese:

James Parsons’ children

James had one child from his first marriage and four from his second.


  •  Robert Parsons was born at about the time his mother Susanna died in 1769. Nothing is known of his early life but by 1798, when he married Elizabeth Lewis, he was a carpenter and wheelwright in Wincanton. His half-sister Mary’s husband Thomas Lush was a witness at the wedding. Robert and Elizabeth stayed in Wincanton for the rest of their lives and they had seven children. Robert died in 1844. When his half brother William died in 1880 he left legacies for Robert’s children.


  •  Mary, James’s first child with his second wife, was born in Horsington and was baptised there on the 1st of June 1779. In 1795, when her cousin Lydia married William Longman, Mary was a witness. The other witness a man called Thomas Lush. The Lush family were neighbours of Mary’s at Horsington Marsh. Two years after Lydia’s wedding Mary married Thomas. Mary and Thomas had one child, a boy whom they named Thomas but about two years after he was born Mary died. She was buried in Horsington on the 25th of March 1802. She was only about 23 years old.
Mary’s husband got married again later that year and went on to have three more children. Young Thomas became a farmer and eventually settled at Hook Farm in Charlton Musgrove, a village just to the north of Wincanton.


  •  James Parsons was baptised in June 1781. When his uncle Moses Parsons died in 1805 James was appointed, with Moses’ son William, as one of the trustees of his estate. After his father died in 1830 James continued to live at the farm with his brother William, his sister Susanna, and her illegitimate son Charles. He never married. In about 1840 a young servant girl called Mary Shute joined the household and in 1849 James, then in his late 60s, fathered a child with her. The boy, James, sometimes used the name Parsons and sometimes Shute. James died in 1855. In his will he made provision for Mary Shute and his son James. He also left an annuity for Naomi, a granddaughter of his uncle Moses Parsons. (Naomi had had a difficult life; after her father died in 1836 she and her mother, forced to rely on parish funds, were removed to her mother’s home parish of Sturminster Newton while her younger brothers and sisters were placed in a workhouse. The family were eventually reunited and lived in Stalbridge where Naomi’s mother worked as a washerwoman.)


  •  Susanna Parsons was baptised in Horsington in April 1784. She never married but when she was in her late 20s she had a child, Charles, with a butler called Thomas Smith. She and the child continued to live with her parents until they died and then with her unmarried brothers James and William. Susanna died in October 1854. She owned a house and land in the village of Stoke Trister and in her will she made generous provision for the children of her nephew Thomas Lush and for Naomi Parsons to whom her brother James also left money.
Susanna’s son Charles became a farmer at Marsh Court Farm. He married twice and had children from both marriages.


  •  William was James and Susannah’s youngest child. He was born on the 2nd of June 1786. Like his brother James and his sister Susanna he never married and continued to live at the family’s home at Horsington Marsh. After his brother James died James’ illegitimate son James Shute continued to live there and so, after he married, did his wife and his wife’s mother who became their housekeeper. William died in July 1879. In his will he made a large bequest to James Shute’s widow Mary who had by then remarried. Mary’s husband James Down was the executor of the will.



Return to Sidney Parsons’ Ancestors



You are free to make use of the information in these web pages in any way that you wish but please be aware that the author, Mike Parsons, is unable to accept respsonsibility for any errors or omissions.

Mike can be contacted at parsonspublic@gmail.com

The information in these web pages comes from a number of sources including: Hampshire County Records Office, Somerset Heritage Centre; Dorset County Records Office; Southampton City Archives; the General Register Office; several on-line newspaper archives; several on-line transcriptions of Parish Register Entries; and several on-line indexes of births, marriages and deaths. The research has also been guided at times by the published work of others, both on-line and in the form of printed books, and by information from personal correspondence with other researchers, for all of which thanks are given. However, all of the information in these web pages has been independently verified by the author from original sources, facimile copies, or, in the case of a few parish register entries, transcriptions published by on-line genealogy sites. The author is aware that some other researchers have in some cases drawn different conclusions and have published information which is at variance from that shown in these web pages.