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Henry Stephenson = Mary Pritchatt
Henry Stephenson:
Born ABT 1820, Birmingham1
Occupation: Brush maker2
Brush maker on Agnes' birth certificate (he was the informant) comb merchant in her wedding certificate. Cannot be identified in the 1881 census index though his wife is described as married rather than a widow.
Mary Pritchatt:
Alias Mary Stephenson
Born 1813, Edgebaston3
Died 13 December 18984
Buried 17 December 1898, Harborne Parish Church
Something of a mystery surrounds Mary, on which a study of 1861- 71 census data may shed light. TWH tried to get the full story and failed, and was convinced that there was a scandal being covered up. His father would not discuss his parents or childhood.
TWH's understanding was that Agnes was Mary's only daughter, that Agnes never knew her father, and that she was brought up by Mary on her parents' farm. He suspected that Mary was unmarried. He also left a note of information given to him by his aunt Gertrude saying that she recalled her grandmother Mary at 'Manor House Farm' Birmingham.
The 1851 census tells a different story, showing six children with a good spread of ages, and though there are no mementoes of Agnes' family, there some relating to the Stephensons - two letters from Stephenson cousins on her wedding and a photograph of her father-in-law sent to her eldest son many years later. However, by the 1881 census when Mary was living at 42 Harborne Road she was described as the head of the household and with income from house property. Perhaps significantly, she is described as married rather than widowed. Two sons, George and Francis, are also listed there, together with a female servant of 16 called Elizabeth J Cox (b Fairfield, Worcester).
If TWH's identification of his grandmother's parentage is correct, and in other respects his information concerning family genealogy has proved reliable, then there are a number of other questions. Mary Pritchatt's marriage has still to be traced, though we now know that TWH was probably looking at too late a date. Another problem is in finding any other trace of Mary's parents. They cannot be identified in the 1851 census transcription for Warwickshire, and so the anecdotal evidence that they were a farming family cannot be verified.
Born 1838, Birmingham5
Died 26 December 19216
Buried Lodge Hill Cemetery
Believed to have wife Mary and daughter Alice (m Sale) and to have lived at Polwarth Gardens, Edinburgh (souce Gertrude Hingston who visited them about 1890, via TWH). However, at the time of the 1881 census George was listed at his mother's house in Harborne Rd but described as married. TWH was told that George's wife left him and Mary and Alice cannot be identified in the 1881 census index. It is possible that she is the Mary E Stephenson who describes herself as Agnes' "Scotch cousin" when writing her wedding congratulations to Agnes in 1877.
Born 1841, Birmingham7
Born 1844, Birmingham8
Born 1845, Birmingham9
Occupation: Shop assistant10
At the 1881census Francis is described as unmarried and living at his mother's home at 42 Harborne Rd.
Born 1848, Birmingham11
Agnes Stephenson = Henry Hingston > Family
Married 3 March 1877, Edgbaston Cong. Chapel12
Agnes Stephenson:
Alias Agnes Hingston (3 March 1877)
Born 21 November 1850, Birmingham13
Died 10 December 1904, Harborne14
Buried Harborne Parish Church
Henry Hingston:
Born 19 January 1840, Bigbury15
Baptised 14 February 1840
Died 1924, Cheltenham
Henry left Devon as a young man and is reputed to have gone to Tasmania. It was said by his grandson TWH that he returned to Devon to try his hand at farming, went broke as an ironmonger in the Seven Dials area of London, and was working as a clerk at Nettlefolds engineering firm in Birmingham at the time of his marriage. Later, probably in the 1890's, he went abroad again, certainly to New Zealand and possibly elsewhere, repeatedly returning home to see his family, before returning to die in 1924. A H Crispin, who himself emigrated to the USA, believed that he had settled in California so he may also have gone there.
He was always hoping to 'make his fortune'; TWH believed that he had squandered one in his youth, and the proceeds from the sale of the Ashford farm in 1891 also disappeared, presumably spent on these expeditions. We should note that TWH could not get the full story, and Henry's inheritance may not have been very great. It is always accepted that the loss of his elder brother, grandfather and father within a short period in his early teens must have been traumatic, and it would have been very difficult for him to run the farms in Devon.
Born 185416
Died 8 March 193817
Buried 12 March 1938, Handsworth
The survival of a memorial card amongst Howard's papers suggests that he was a younger brother of Agnes. In the 1881 census he might be the Alfred Stephenson aged 26 and born in Birmingham who was working as a stationers' assistant and lodging at Albert Court, High St, Sutton Coldfield Warwicks.
note
Based on 1851 census plus Alfred, assumed to be a younger brother.
1 : 1851 census gives age as 30
2 : Brush maker given on Agnes birth certificate (he was the informant) comb merchant on Agnes marriage cert.
3 : Memorial card gives her age as 85, the 1851 census as 34.
5 : Age at death 83 (memorial card). 1851 census gives age as 10.
7 : 1851 census gives age as 9
8 : 1851 census gives age as 6
9 : 1851 census gives age as 5
11 : 1851 census gives age as 2
12 : Marriage certificate gives Henry as a commercial clerk of Metchley Lane Harborne, and Agnes as living at 12 Brighton Terrace Harborne
13 : Birth certificate. Address is 10 Islington Row Birmingham
15 : Letter from Henry in 1902 written on his birthday.
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