Gilkes Family of Northamptonshire

Important People in the Story

Thomas of Sibford

We were looking in the Marriage Licences box at the NRO when we came across the wedding of Thomas Gilkes and Mary Wats, found the entry and saw that Mary was from Sulgrave, which was pleasing, and that Thomas was from Sibbard Gore in Oxfordshire. Mary's home was that given for Joseph Gilkes and so things were fitting together quite well(see Moreton Pinkney).

When we tried to find out about Thomas' family, however, we ran into problems. Not only were there large numbers of Gilkes in Sibford, but there were three who were of the 'right' age, with no means to distinguish them. One Thomas - our main suspect - was baptised as an adult not long before the wedding, and we suspect he may have been a 'lapsed' Quaker; but this makes him perhaps harder to trace.

We think he may be the lapsed Quaker because of other evidence - or even lack of it. People did move between faiths and we have found the couple having two children baptised, but we have never found a wedding for the daughter or a burial for either of the parents and have surmised that they may have become Quakers; again in Joseph's case.

There are records of Quaker meetings from Eydon in Northamptonshire and one or two of these possibly support our ideas about our Thomas.

18th October 1755 This meeting apoint John Ashby and Wm. Simon to visit Wm. Pell and Thos. Gilkes consarning there mis conduct and bring there report to the next meeting.

8th December 1755 John Ashby and Wm. Simons vizited Wm. Pell and Thos. Gilkes and there advise semed to take sum affect on Wm. Pell the other taken but little notis of what is said

9th February 1756 The minnit consarning Wm. Pell and Thos. Gilkes continued

8th March 1756 Wm. Simon visited Thos Gilkes and he told him he did not intend to be a member of our society.

So did Thomas leave, join and leave the Quakers again? There are no references to Thomas between 1746, his wedding, and those above. Back to Sibford, perhaps. Another job to do!

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John the Gamekeeper

In his book, with the catchy title 'The Reminiscences chiefly of towns, villages and schools', the Revd. T. Mozley wrote that, "The Gilkeses were a clan of the old lower middle class, good looking, well mannered and educated. John Gilks in his green velveteen suit was the most ornamental figure in the village when I came. He was evidently a game keeper in office and a poacher out of it.

The Revd. Mozley had quite a bit to do with John Gilkes and started off finding him a bit of a colourful rogue, but ended by having a bit too much of him. At one point he was given a letter by the curate allowing him to shoot on the Glebe. The letter was dated. Sometime later, when apprehended for shooting a bird, John showed the letter to the authorities; the missing corner of the page made them suspicious and he was sentenced to 2 months imprisonment after the facts were checked. The curate thought it harsh.

John was gamekeeper at Towcester and some other surrounding areas and was appointed in 1809, but there are no real stories about him that are confirmed. Some of the family 'myths' involve a gamekeeper and a fight and a fraud with dogs and transportation - but John did not live in an age when convicts were sent to the Indies, neither did he end with a different wife, so perhaps they are just mis-tellings of some other tales.

Of his sons, James did the best, perhaps, becoming Parish Clerk and village schoolmaster for more than 20 years. Elijah, John's youngest, became a publican, first in the village and then in Birmingham, where he lived at 83 Hingeston Street; a part of this street still stands. His son Thomas had a tough start in life and left the village early, finally ending his days as 'an old sawyer' in Lower Heyford. He is my great, great grandfather. Joseph, his second son, has never been found, just like the Joseph in the generation before.

He had five daughters; Ann, James' twin, died aged 13 and Sarah and Elizabeth 'disappeared'. Mary had an illegitimate son and then married in Farthingstone to a man who became Clerk to the Parish. Sophia went north, marrying in Barnack and living in Kingscliffe.

John died aged 76, 4 years before Mary, after 56 years of marriage.

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Joseph's Girls

Joseph and Elizabeth Gilkes had about 8 girls; 'about 8', because they seemed to have had a second Anne without the first Anne dying.

The first Anne was their first child, Christened some 6 months after they married. We have never found a wedding for Anne, or a burial, but she did baptize a girl of her own, Ruth, on 7th May 1807. The note in the register said that Ruth was 13 on the 3rd February 1806. We have never found what happened to Ruth either.

The next daughter to have disappeared was Susannah, who had Sophia at the age of 16 or 17. Again, neither mother nor daughter have recorded weddings or burials. Her tender years set her apart from her sisters, who were women when they gave birth.

Mary was different again; she had three children, no weddings and no burial. She had twins, Silence and Louisa, who both died in infancy. Two years later she had another daughter, Ann. If Ann lived, she did so without any recorded milestones in her life and just faded out like her mother.

The second Anne, a Sarah and a Patience all died in infancy, so out of 8 daughters and 5 grand-daughters born to Joseph and Elizabeth, only 2 have further stories to tell.

Elizabeth was also thought to be a 'lost one', but we had missed her wedding to Thomas Barrett in Moreton Pinkney in 1798. She seemed to have a 'normal' life compared to the others!

Finally, after one failure, the couple had another Patience, and she turned out to be a pretty interesting character. We were lucky to find anything about her for a couple of reasons. Bugbrooke's Parish Registers are still at the Church and we contacted the Vicar to arrange to search out our recent relatives. When we arrived he showed us one he had found; a wedding of a Patience Roddis, on Christmas Day 1850, witnessed by Alice Gilkes. We had come across Alice before as witness at other family weddings and so it seemed that Patience Roddis, widow, was probably Patience Gilkes. Further searching found her wedding to Henry Roddis and gave us the proof. Lucky because the name was found for us and lucky again because, the following day, in Banbury, Alice Gilkes became Alice Miller. Had the days been reversed we might not have found all the information.

Patience was widowed just before the 1841 Census, which found her living on a Bugbrooke farm with a Roddis family. By 1851 she had married again, to an outpatient of the Chelsea Hospital and was living in Bugbrooke village. Interestingly, the 1851 Census named the Roddis farm as Little Liff, the farm on which my Dad grew up.

It is still possible that we will find out more about Joseph's girls - we had failed on several occasions to find the wedding of Elizabeth for example - but it is unlikely, and I find that so annoying. I really want to know what became of them and their daughters, but I suppose that you can't win them all!

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James the Teacher

James was a twin, christened in 1806; his sister Anne died when she was only thirteen. His exact date of birth isn’t known, but it seems he was only 19 when he married Harriett Anne Hoare just before the end of 1825. They christened their first child, William, a year later and he declared himself to be a labourer.

Although William was their first born, Harriett already had a son, with the exotic name Lorenzo. There could not have been many of that name in South Northants at that time and it would be interesting to know who the father was. There is no record of that in the entry of his christening, but it says “Harriett Anne Hoare, single woman”, but the ‘single woman’ is heavily crossed through. There is, however, a fairly simple explanation of how that could have happened. Before long, at his children’s christenings, James was no longer a labourer but Parish Clerk – and that would have given him access to the Parish Registers to make the alteration. At his early death, Lorenzo was buried as Lorenzo Gilkes, so James had obviously ‘taken him on’.

James’ progress continued when he became the village schoolmaster in 1833, his wife Harriett Ann becoming the Infant Mistress. Later on, their daughter Emma became the Infant Mistress after she had spent some time in Northampton, where she married William Slow, a stonemason from Rothwell. James added another feather to his cap when he became Census Enumerator for the area. He was also the man to whom post was delivered in the village.

The couple had 12 children – 13 counting Lorenzo – including 6 sons. Perhaps it is not surprising that Harriett Anne died aged only 47, but at even that young age she outlived 7 of their children. Five lived long enough to be married; one returned to her home village, one went to Northampton, one to Stony Stratford and two to London.

I have been a teacher for most of my life so I have some feelings for James. He did well for himself and was quite an important man in the village; Parish Clerk, schoolmaster, Census Ennumerator, Postmaster. Yet when he died his estate was worth £50. Some things don't change!

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John Thomas

John Thomas Gilkes was born in Farthingstone in 1844. His baptism has just been found; under John Jilkes on 27th April 1845. Census records confirm the year of birth. Despite this rather uncertain beginning, we do know that he reached Bugbrooke as a sawyer in the mid 1860s and settled there to bring up his family. His will still describes him as a sawyer, but he had other 'irons in the fire' as well and employed several people at different times.

This photograph was taken early in the last century and shows John Thomas and Hannah(nee Eales - another 'extinct' Bugbrooke family?) with, from the left, Harry, Arthur, John and William. The picture you are looking at is a scanned copy of a photocopy of the original, so its quality is quite remarkable I think.

John Thomas' work as a sawyer took him away from home for long periods. In both the 1881 and 1891 census he was 'away working' - once in Yorkshire. A search through the 1881 index has failed to unearth him, but perhaps that is not surprising. I was told that the work was often for railway building; the production of 'sleepers'. This could entail buying a wood or coppice close to a proposed track, felling and sawing the trees into timbers. The census taker possibly did not wish to trek out to interview a bunch of 'wild' foreigners camping out in the woods. The picture shows John Thomas, arms folded, with his steam engine and some of his men. It is said to have been taken in 1891 in Yorkshire.

The job of a sawyer had become 'mechanised' using a steam saw. In the 1861 census the family was at Nether Heyford; Thomas 59 Sawyer, Mary Ann 50 Lacemaker, Edwin 20 Steam Sawyer, John Thomas 16 Sawyer and Elizabeth 12 Lacemaker. The steam engine featured further in the Gilkes Brothers' road surfacing business; a large scale operation as shown in the picture below, taken in 1912.

The cost to hire the men, materials, horses, carts and steamroller was £60 per week. Three of John Thomas' sons are pictured; Harry standing and holding the horse's bridle, Jack (John) on the left on the leading cart and Arthur on the right. At the far left of the picture is the local baker, posing with his cart filled with the day's food for the workers.

John Thomas did well for himself and his family; he bought each daughter a cottage, for example. In his will it states that William Eales Gilkes was not to have a share in the estate, and I wondered what scandalous behaviour had led him to disinherit his eldest son. Someone told me, however, that the eldest son was often given his share early, to start him off. So, no scandal, perhaps.

In the farm my grandparents lived in at Duston, either side of the fire, were large portraits of John Thomas and Hannah. After Gramp's death the portraits were disposed of and I hadn't seen their faces from then to just a little while ago, but they remained familiar; particularly the stern faced Hannah! They are the earliest of my ancestors that I've 'seen' - or can expect to see I suppose - but I'd like to think there might be more photographs of them somewhere that I might yet see. Can anyone help?

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John Who Left

John Gilkes was born in Bugbrooke in 1877, the second of four sons born to John Thomas Gilkes and Hannah Eales. In the 1901 Census, aged 24 he was a carrier and his youngest brother, Harry James, was his assistant. The picture shows John with his cart in 1916 or so, just before he left the village.
He married Annie Constance Lovell, from an established Bugbrooke family, on Christmas Day 1902 and she bore him 5 sons and two daughters, all of them in Bugbrooke.

Southend is not a part of the country that had any Gilkes connections to my knowledge, so why John went is a bit of a mystery, but he gave up his carrier's cart and went to a general store in Southchurch Street in Southend. And he stayed in Southend, apart from a spell of munition factory work in Coventry during WWII. His last address was in Hartington Road where both John and Annie Constance died; John in 1951 and Annie in 1956.

Despite having 5 sons, the Gilkes name did not thrive and the remaining Gilkes, my informant Leslie, is the son of John and Annie's second son, Henry John. His marriage to Joyce Lesley Burgess is shown. John and Annie are on the left of the photo, behind, and next to Annie is their eldest son Basil.

The next picture is a 'Victorian' family portrait of Leslie John Gilkes and his family taken about 1973, and the family likeness through this set of pictures is remarkable.

Finding Les has been a real pleasure. I had no idea he existed and vice versa, but to find we are virtually the same age and with the same great great grandfather is amazing. We intend to meet in the next few weeks and swap a few stories and information on Gilkes matters!

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William and his Family

I still fail completely to stick to my 'Hints and Tips' - and still suffer for it. I continue to scribble things down in haphazard order and spend hours trying to find that little bit of information I need, but I never throw anything away and so it can be found with patience. I read the notes time and again and remember a lot of things, but forget others.

I had 'lost' George Gilkes, son of William and Mary, born in 1823 according to my records. He had married Sara Salmons in 1849 in Northampton and not appeared on any local censuses and I wondered if he had gone abroad. I tried http://www.familysearch.org and came up with a good lead - but this George's parents were given as William and Anne. Still, Mary had died in 1842 so it could be that William had taken a third wife, although I'd never found a likely wedding. The same site gave the birth of a William Gilkes in 1849 in Swinford, Leicester and his parents were George Gilkes and Sarah Salmons, so I had a place to search.

The Leicester Record Office gave me a big boost and looked up the 1851 census record for me for Swinford and - a bonus! George and Sarah were living with 2 toddlers and - William and Anne Gilkes. The two men were born in Moreton Pinkney, Northants and the two women in Maidford, Northants; this latter information opened up further intriguing possibilities and the whole story was becoming a bit of a saga.

I looked at the parish records for Maidford to find Sarah and her dad Richard, but could find no mention of him. What I did find was a baptism, on November 24th 1829, of Sarah Bird Salmons, daughter of Anne Salmons, single woman. Going further back, on July 28th 1822 was the baptism of Anne Newman Salmons, daughter of Anne Salmons, single woman! So was Richard the father an 'invention' to save the young bride embarrassment? Or extra embarrassment - the date of the wedding and the date of birth of baby William points to a further possible source of discomfort. Or, finally, extra-extra embarrassment, as her husband was her step-brother! An intriguing find to say the least!

I then used freeBMD to try to find a wedding for William Gilkes between 1842 and 1851 and there was one - but in Westminster! Even so, I clicked on the page number and was startled to find that an Ann Salmons was one of the possible brides, so was it a city wedding for two country folk or an unlikely coincidence of a pair of names? An FRC copy certificate seemed in order - and that also proved to be a bit of a saga in itself; the person who was picking up my certificate and posting it to me slipped a disc on the way to pick it up and the posting was, therefore, delayed. I'm pleased to say he is up and about again!

The certificate turned out to be an odd one; there was no information on parents, but William was, at least, a carpenter. In itself not much of a proof, but the rest of the certificate details were very telling. First, the address of the couple was Dartmouth Street, secondly, one witness was another William Gilkes. The 1851 London Post Office Commercial Directory had this William as a musical instrument maker at No. 36 Dartmouth Street.

The two Williams were cousins although the country cousin was 17 years the elder. So who was Sarah Perry? Could it have been Samuel's widow and mother to London William? Again I turned to freeBMD; BLANK Perry and Sarah Gilkes, wedding, 1827 to 1844? Bingo! William Perry had married Sarah Gilkes in 1842. Of course I now needed another certificate to prove who the lady was.

The Royal Mail, or whoever they are now, managed to deliver a copy certificate from London to Northampton in just 4 days - a feat not achieved since the early 18th Century I believe! It did, however, show that Sarah Perry, who witnessed the wedding of William Gilkes to Ann Salmons, was the widow of Samuel Gilkes, violin maker. Her father was a William Parr who had been left money in Samuel's will, so things tied in nicely. As always there is still a loose end - the other witness was an Eliza Ann Smith - not a good name to enter in a search engine!

William and Ann Salmons began married life on August 7th 1844. He was 50 years old and she was 43. Between them they had four children; his were George 21, Sarah 17 and Hannah 14 and Sarah, also aged 14, was Ann's surviving daughter. Where these children were for the wedding is unknown and it is not at all sure where the new couple lived straight after the wedding or which, if any, of the children lived with them. It seems pretty certain, however, that the youngest girls lived with the family at Swinford and that George was a pretty frequent visitor at least!

Hannah got married, at Swinford, to a blacksmith, James Baldwin, from Syresham near Towcester, Northants. In the 1851 Census he was actually at Moreton Pinkney as a Journeyman Blacksmith with Thomas Gascoigne, Blacksmith, and his family. Hannah has not yet been found, but her occupation at the time of the wedding was 'In service' and this was most likely around Swinford as she is not on the Northamptonshire Census disc. Some connection to Moreton Pinkney must have been maintained for this couple to have 'got together', but I can't see any way to find out exactly who was where and when.

William's Sarah was married in Northampton Register Office in 1849 to Henry Hortin, a groom. She was a servant and their address was St Giles Street, so it could be that they worked for the same people before getting married, but who they were and exactly where they lived is unclear.

This completes the weddings of William and Mary's family, but, as usual, things are still left incomplete for me. I cannot find any mention of James and Hannah Baldwin or Henry and Sarah Hortin after their weddings. Of 13 children named Baldwin in the GRO records, born at the 'correct time and place' I can find only one of them in the 1901 census and none at all in the 1881 census - on the internet at least. I have found much more about George and Sarah's family, however, and their 1881 and 1901 Census entries are now on my census pages.

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