The Norman and Marshall Families - Paupers and Peasants
John Norman and the Brown Family
My line follows through John and Hannah's second son, John, who was baptised in Holton on 2 Jan 1803.
John Norman junior married Harriet Brown at Shepton Montague in 1827. They were my great great great grandparents.
Harriet Brown was the daughter of John Brown and Elizabeth Brown née Ball. The Browns lived in Shepton Montague, Somerset and had three children baptised there.
- Harriet: 1811
- Samuel: 1814
- James: 1817
It is not certain who John Brown's parents were. In the 1851 census return he gave his age as 76 (giving a birth year of around 1775) and his birth place as Shepton Montague, but no suitable baptism has been found in that parish.
Elizabeth Ball was from Longbridge Deverill in Wiltshire. She was the daughter of Luke Ball and his wife Ann and was baptised 1790. One line of Balls, all using the name Luke can be traced back to a marriage with Dorothy Berjew (a member of the a Hugenot family) in 1669. Dorothy was the daughter of John Berjews, Vicar of Kingston Deverill. Berjew researcher Don Edwards has found 10 Berjew Vicars in Dorset and Wiltshire . The earliest was Richard Berjew who was Vicar of Kingston Deverill from 1593-1639. However there appears to be a gap of perhaps one generation in the records (between 1770-1790) so we cannot confirm the family link and at present cannot take Elizabeth's family further back.
Harriet's brother, Samuel Brown married an Elizabeth and was a farmer of 7 acres in Shepton Montague in 1851. He had died before 1861. The couple had just one son, John, who became a butcher.
Her brother James married a Jane from Yeovilton. They set up home in Bruton, and in 1861 the widowed Elizabeth was living with them. They had sons: Sidney, John, William, Edwin and Albert. Sidney became a groom. John was a coachman who moved to Bexley in Kent. William was an ag.lab and Edwin a collar and harness maker. Youngest son Albert, however, received a good education, attending Sexey's Hospital School in Bruton. This school was established for children from large, poor families in the area; they were to apprenticed for 7 years to mechanical trades as well as being maintained, clothed, education. There was also a trust to care for12 independent elderly people, and after John Brown's death his widow Jane was taken in as a resident pensioner.
Albert followed in Edwin's footsteps, taking up a trade as a harness maker. He moved to Marmhull and married an Adelaide. They had two children Bertie and Lucy.