Category: Smithers

Henry and Sophia Smithers: the next generation

Big cities usually act as magnets, attracting people from the countryside to the excitement and employment opportunites urban centres offer. But several adult children of Henry and Sophia Smithers did the opposite: born in greater London at the beginning of the 19th century, they scattered across Engand and beyond as adults.

Henry Smithers (1762-1828) was born in London, while his wife, Sophia Papps (1763-1845) was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire, not far from Stonehenge. They were married in 1783 at St. Matthew’s Parish Church, Bethnal Green, and had seven children. 

Henry Keene Smithers was born in St. Andrews Holborn parish, London in 1785. His birth and that of his sister Charlotte Sophia were registered simultaneously in the non-conformist records on Dec 14, 1789. After being apprenticed to his father, he became a coal merchant, then a general merchant and accountant. He and his wife, Charlotte Letitia Pittman, and their eight children lived in Southwark, on the south bank of the Thames River. He died in 1859. He was my three-times great-grandfather, and I have written in greater detail about his life and beliefs in two previous posts.

Charlotte Sophia Smithers was born in St Saviour’s Parish, County Surrey, in April 1789, so the family must have moved across the Thames before she was born. I know very little about her life except that she did not marry and was living with her brother Henry Keene Smithers and his wife in St. Giles, Camberwell at the time of the 1841 Census of England. 

By the time the 1851 census took place, she was age 61 and living as a lodger with a Baptist minister’s family in Bedfordshire. She described herself as an annuitant, meaning she had some private income. She died a few months later.

Martha Keene Smithers, born in 1790, was said to have been a great beauty. She married John Van Cooten, at St. Woolos Church in Newport, Monmouthshire, Wales in 1808. (Newport was an important coal-exporting port at the time, and her father had a business there; it went bankrupt in 1812.) Martha and John had six children, at least one of whom was born in the Netherlands. (John’s father was originally from the Netherlands, but he became a sugar plantation owner in Demerara, Guyana, South America, which is where John was born.) 

Their marriage must have been an unhappy one because, according the Van Cooten family website, Martha went to the West Indies, leaving John and their young children behind. She eventually returned to England, but, although she and John did not divorce, they never lived together again. Her brother Sydney, who was steward to the Duke of Devonshire, supported her. At the time of the 1851 census she was living with her daughter Anna in London. She was buried in the parish of St. George Bloomsbury, London in 1854. 

John Hampden Smithers was born in Southwark, Surrey in 1792, and his birth, like that of his older siblings, was registered at the Maze Pond Baptist Church. He was likely named after English politician John Hampden, who challenged the authority of King Charles I and was killed in battle in 1643 at the outset of the Civil War in England.

In 1806, when brother Henry Keene was wrapping up his apprenticeship, John became apprenticed to his father. John was admitted to the Freedom of the City of London by patrimony in 1815. Also in that year, the business he and his father owned on Oxford Street in London went bankrupt.

In 1822 John married Amsterdam-born Elizabeth Hoffmann by license at St. Marylebone Church, London. They had five children, the eldest daughter baptized in London, a son baptized in Liverpool, and the two youngest daughters, born 1827 and 1830, baptized in Derbyshire. All the children were baptized in the Anglican church. In 1827 John, a provision merchant in Liverpool, went bankrupt a second time. Soon after that the family appears to have moved to the city of Derby. 

The 1851 census showed John, his wife and three daughters living in London. John gave his occupation as proprietor of houses (basically a landlord.) I did not find the family in 1841 or 1861 in the British Isles, so perhaps they were living in Europe. He died in 1867 in Nice, France and was buried in the Anglican cemetery there. 

Sydney Smithers was born in Southwark around 1795. I have not found any record of his birth or baptism. He married Catherine Longsdon in 1822 in Youlgreave, Derbyshire, and they had three children baptized in the Church of England. Sydney worked for William Spencer Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire. A Whig in politics (he supported liberalizing restrictions on Catholics and abolishing slavery,) the duke was friends with kings, writers and botanists. He owned several vast estates, including one in Derbyshire. Sydney and his family lived in Ashford, Derbyshire, and his duties probably involved managing the duke’s household and estate there. Sydney died in 1856, age 61.

Augusta Sophia Smithers, was born in 1799 or 1800, and was baptized in 1827. Adult baptism is normal for a member of the Baptist church, but several things suggest this baptism was not a happy occasion.

The baptism took place on August 26, 1827 at the Anglican Church of St. Mary Edge Hill, near Liverpool, where her brother John lived. Her parents were Baptists, but it appears that Augusta Sophia was converting to the Anglican religion. The register of the baptism listed her father’s name, but her mother’s was left blank. Perhaps her mother did not attend the service that day. 

Like her brother John, Augusta Sophia is hard to trace. I did not find her in the 1841 or 1851 censuses, but in 1861, at age 60, she may have been living as a lodger in Wandsworth, Surrey. She may have been living as a lodger in Islington, London in 1871, and she is probably the Augusta Sophia Smithers who died in Croydon, Surrey in 1881.

Rosa Smithers only appears in the records twice: the day she and her sister were baptized as adults, and the day she died, two weeks after her baptism. Everyone must have known she was very ill when she was baptized. She was buried at the Church of St. Mary Edge Hill, near Liverpool, Lancaster, on 8 September, 1827. She was just 24 when she died.  

Several months later, in April 1828, her father also died in Liverpool and was buried in the same cemetery.

These highlights are all I know about the lives of Henry and Sophia Smithers’ children. Put them together, though, and patterns start to appear. I have begun to suspect that, although their father wrote of his love for his children in his 1807 book Affection, with other poems, these siblings were not very close. In many of the families I have researched, I have found widows, elderly fathers and unmarried sisters living with other family members. In the case of my Smithers ancestors, this was not the case. I should not speculate, though; I will never learn the truth.

Research Remarks

For more information on other generations of this family, and other families with the same last name, see Michael Smither’s Smither, Smithers, Smythers family tree in Ancestry.com’s Public Member Trees section. http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/49405444/person/12982389958

This article relies primarily on birth, marriage and death records found on Ancestry.com, supplemented by census records as of 184I. I found bankruptcy announcements in English newspapers on findmypast.com.

I have written more extensively about Henry Keene Smithers, non-conformist religious beliefs and apprenticeships. See https://www.writinguptheancestors.ca/2014/12/the-apprenticeship-of-coal-merchant.html and https://www.writinguptheancestors.ca/2014/12/henry-keene-smithers-non-conformist.html

The Van Cooten family page, www.vc.id.au/fh/smithers.html, includes several references Martha Keene Smithers and points to the position held by Sydney Smithers.    

My suspicion that John Hampden Smithers was named after a politician from the English Civil War era who died in battle in 1643 is based on a poem called Hampden in Henry Smithers’ 1807 book Affection, with other poems. (see https://books.google.ca/books?id=DGUUAAAAQAAJ  p.11-12)  At first I had no idea who Hampden was. Then, while researching Henry’s political interests, I found an article about John Hampden. Henry mentioned someone named Sydney in the same poem, so perhaps his younger son was also named after a politician.

There was probably only one Augusta Sophia Smithers living in England at that time, so the person I found in the census was probably my ancestor. I was confused, however, because her birthplace was listed as Wandsworth, Sussex. All the information I have about Henry’s family, including property tax records, puts them in Walworth, Sussex.

Henry and Sophia Smithers

Many marriage records are just that: the name of the bride, name of the groom, date of the event and the location. Other records include additional information that helps the genealogist track down earlier generations or solve various mysteries.

Such was the case of the 1783 marriage license issued to my four-times great grandparents Henry Smithers and Sophia Papps. Both were minors (they were ages twenty and nineteen respectively) when they wed, so their fathers had to consent to their marriage and pay £200 — a very hefty fee — for the license. With the names and occupations of their fathers, I was able to follow both families back one more generation.

Henry and Sophia were married on 22 Feb.1783 at Sophia’s parish church, St. Matthew, in Bethnal Green, a town east of London. The associated allegation document reveals that Sophia’s father was Richard Papps, a merchant, and Henry’s father was Joseph Smithers, a schoolmaster at St. Margaret Lothbury Academy, London.1

With this information, I was able to confirm that Sophia’s parents were Richard and Mary Papps. Richard Papps had married Mary Smith in Salisbury on 1 Aug. 1758.2 Over the next eight years, the couple had six children although at least one of them died. Sophia was baptized on 9 Nov.17633 at St. Thomas Church, Salisbury, Wiltshire. Richard had a clothing business in Salisbury, which is near Stonehenge, in southwest England.

St. Margaret Lothbury Church

Henry’s parents, Joseph Smithers and Martha Keene, were wed on 19 March 1760 at St. Mary, Newington, Southwark, Surrey, on the south shore of the Thames River near London Bridge. Their marriage license revealed that Joseph was from the ancient parish of St. Margaret Lothbury in central London, and that Martha was the daughter of John and Alice Keene. Finding the name Keene was interesting because several Smithers family members in later generations had Keene as a middle name.  

The fact that Joseph was a schoolmaster at St. Margaret Lothbury suggests that he was the son of the Joseph Smithers mentioned in a list of obituaries in the Gentleman’s Magazine, 3 July 1789. That obituary read, “Mr. Jos. Smithers, master of the academy, Lothbury.“ So far I have not found any other information about him, or about the academy. St. Margaret Lothbury church still exists.  

Henry Smithers was born in Crooked Lane, St Michael Parish, City of London, on 7 Aug. 1762, and he had one sibling, Martha, two years his junior. Both births were  registered on 10 June 1776,4 according to the England & Wales, Non-Conformist and Non-Parochial Registers. 

In 1787, Martha Smithers married John Hemming, a London coal merchant and property manager, and a convert to non-conformity. They had 10 children, and some of their descendants live in Canada today. Martha died in 1833.   As for Henry, he became a coal merchant in London. He also loved to write poetry and non-fiction books. He died in 1828, age 65, in Liverpool, where his son John Hampton Smithers lived. I do not know whether Henry and Sophia were also living in Liverpool or just visiting. He was buried on 8 April 1828 at St, Mary’s Church Edge Hill, Walton Parish, Lancashire.

Sophia lived another 16 years. Unless I am mistaken, she appeared on the 1841 census, age 77, living with a family named Richardson6 and when she died she was living in the St. Pancras area of London. She was buried on 3 Jan. 1845 at All Souls’ Cemetery, also known as Kensal Green Cemetery.

Photo credit: Janice Hamilton

Research remarks

At that time, the minister typically announced a coming marriage (this was called reading the banns) at church to give people an opportunity to express their opposition to the union. Couples could bypass this step by paying a fee for a marriage license. A marriage allegation is a sworn statement in connection with the license application in which the couple state there is no known reason for the marriage not to take place. 

Henry was a non-conformist, meaning he was a member of a Protestant denomination, such as the Baptist or Congregational church, rather than the official Church of England. This is another reason why Henry would have had to obtain a marriage license to marry Sophia.

The 1783 marriage by licence of Henry Smithers and Sophia Papps at St. Matthew Church, Bethnel Green, can be found in Ancestry’s database London, England, Marriages and Banns, 1754-1921. There are two allegation statements related to the same marriage in Ancestry’s database London and Surrey, England, Marriage Bonds and Allegations, 1597-1921. One can be found under Henry Smithers’ name, the other is indexed under the name Joseph Smithers.  

An image of the Gentleman’s Magazine obituary for Joseph Smithers can be found on the Smither, Smithers Smyther Public Member Tree, maintained on Ancestry by Michael Smither. http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/49405444/person/27777427113/media/e6a90ca9-da31-4152-8396-7ab6f7eb4db0?pg=32768&pgpl=pid

The information about John Hemming was provided to me in an e-mail in November 2014 by descendant Graham Jeffery, who lives in Ontario. I will write a separate article about Henry’s and Sophia’s six children, and later I will write about Henry’s career and interests.

Footnotes

  1. “London and Surrey, England, Marriage Bonds and Allegations, 1597-1921” database, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed Dec. 16 2014), entry for Joseph Smithers, 22 February 1783, citing Marriage Bonds and Allegations. London, England: London Metropolitan Archives.
  2. “England & Wales Marriages, 1538-1940 “ database, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed Dec. 16 2014), entry for Richard Papps, 1 Aug. 1758, Salisbury; citing Salisbury, Wiltshire, England; Collection: St Thomas; 1570 – 1906
  3. London, England, Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1538-1812” database, Ancestry.com(http://www.ancestry.com: accessed 29 Nov. 2014), entry for Joseph Smithers, 19 March, 1760, Southwark; citing Church of England Parish Registers, 1538-1812. London, England: London Metropolitan Archives; St Mary, Newington, Composite register: marriages, banns, May 1754-Jul 1769, P92/MRY/010.
  4. “England & Wales, Non-Conformist and Non-Parochial Registers, 1567-1970”, database, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com: accessed 1 Dec. 2014), entry for Henry Smithers, 7 Aug. 1762, London; citing: General Register Office: Registers of Births, Marriages and Deaths surrendered to the Non-parochial Registers Commissions of 1837 and 1857. Records of the General Register Office, Government Social Survey Department, and Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, Registrar General (RG) 4. The National Archives, Kew, England.
  5. Lancashire, England, Deaths and Burials, 1813-1986” database, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com: accessed 1 Dec. 2014), entry for Henry Smithers, 8 April 1828, Lancashire; citing: Lancashire Anglican Parish Registers. Preston, England: Lancashire Archives. 
  6. “1841 England Census”database, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com: accessed 14 Dec. 2014), entry for Sophia Smithers, 1841, London; citing: Census Returns of England and Wales, 1841. Kew, Surrey, England: The National Archives of the UK (TNA): Public Record Office (PRO), 1841.