Thomas Misselbrook (circa 1779 to 1870)

Thomas Misselbrook’s granddaughter Frances Bennett was a grandmother of Dorothy Bennett, who was the wife of Sidney Alfred Parsons.

Thomas was born in the village of Chilworth in Hampshire, and baptised there on the 5^th of September 1779. His parents were Thomas and Sarah Misselbrook. Young Thomas had two brothers, Joseph and Benjamin, and a sister called Elizabeth.

Chilworth is in central southern England. It lies between Southampton and Romsey, and is marked with a red C on the map.

During Thomas’ lifetime, life in Chilworth revolved around the Chilworth Estate and its manor house. While Thomas was growing up the estate was owned by Peter Searle, who was something of a philanthropist and rebuilt the church. In 1825, while Thomas was still a young man, the estate was sold to John Fleming of the wealthy Fleming family who owned land in the neighbouring parish of North Stoneham.

In 1802, on the 18^th of March, Thomas Misselbrook of the parish of Chilworth married Elizabeth Ireland in the parish church of Saint Nicholas, North Stoneham.

For at least the first ten years of their marriage, Thomas and Elizabeth lived in North Stoneham and Thomas worked as a labourer. Their first four children were born there. Their first child was a girl whom they named Elizabeth; she would grow up to marry Henry Bennett and become a great-grandmother to Dorothy Bennett.

By 1817 the family had moved to Chilworth where Thomas worked on the Chilworth Estate. His father died a couple of years later. In 1820 Thomas became a gamekeeper and was awarded a gamekeeper’s certificate by Peter Searle of Chilworth Manor. Thomas and Elizabeth’s last three children, Henry, George and Joseph, were born in Chilworth, but Henry died when he was only 12 years old.

In 1834 Thomas was the freeholder of a house with land in Green Lane and, as such, he was listed as one of the men qualified to vote in parliamentary elections.

By 1841 Thomas and Elizabeth’s daughters had left home, but their three sons were still living with them. Their daughter Elizabeth had married Henry Bennett, a Chilworth Man, in 1829 and they and their children were living next door to Thomas and Elizabeth.

Thomas continued to work as a gamekeeper until he was in his 70s and his employer by then was John Fleming who had bought the estate. Thomas’ wife Elizabeth died in May 1853.

After he became a widower Thomas lived alone, still next door to his daughter Elizabeth, until he died over seventeen years after his wife in November 1870.

Thomas Misselbrook was buried in Chilworth on the 8^th of November 1870.

Children of Thomas and Elizabeth Misselbrook

Thomas and Elizabeth had nine children. They were :

• Elizabeth, born 1804 in North Stoneham. Elizabeth married Henry Bennett in 1829 and lived with him in Chilworth. Their daughter Frances was a grandmother of Dorothy Bennett, who became the wife of Sidney Alfred Parsons.

• William was born about 1806 in North Stoneham and he was baptised there on the 6^th of April 1806. He became an agricultural labourer and lived with his parents in North Stoneham and Chilworth until he was over 30 years old. Then he married Louisa Hurbet, a girl from Chilworth. William and Louisa lived in Nursling, a village adjoining Chilworth to the south-west. They had one child, Louisa. William died in the spring of 1868 and was buried in Chilworth.

• Sarah was born about 1808 in North Stoneham. In January 1831 she married George Grant in Lyndhurst in the New Forest. George had been born in Lyndhurst and the couple lived in Emery Down, near the Manor House, which was just a couple of miles from Lyndhurst. George worked as a coachman. George and Sarah had five children. George died in 1871 after which Sarah lived in Lyndhurst with her married daughter, Charlotte Peckham. She died in 1893.

• Benjamin was born in Chilworth on the 3^rd of November 1810. Benjamin found work in Marylebone, London, as a labourer at the zoological garden which had recently been established in Regents Park. On the 22^nd of September 1833, at the Old Church in Saint Pancras, he married Jane Gouldon, who had, like Benjamin, been born in Chilworth. Benjamin worked for the London Zoological Society for sixty years. By 1871 he was the Head Keeper and lived in the Keeper’s Lodge. Benjamin and Jane had ten children. His son George worked at the zoo for a time as a “money taker”. Benjamin continued to work until he was nearly 79 years old, and then he retired on a pension to live with his wife at their house in Achilles Street in Hampstead. Benjamin died in October 1893 and probate was granted to his son Walter Misselbrook, a builder’s foreman. For more information about Benjamin Misselbrook and the early history of London Zoo — Click Here.

• Charlotte was born in about 1813 in North Stoneham. In about 1832 she married Elias Macey, who was a gardener, and the couple lived together in Millbrook Lodge, in the village of Millbrook near Southampton. The family later moved into Southampton where they lived in Cumberland Square. They had ten children. Elias died in the spring of 1883 after which Charlotte lived as a boarder at a private house in Southampton. She died in 1895.

• Joseph was born about 1815 in Chilworth. As a young man he worked as an agricultural labourer and lived with his parents. In 1852 he married a girl called Elizabeth Farrent in Southampton. She had been born in Marston Magna in Somerset but was working as a servant in the home of a Southampton Wine & Spirit Merchant. Joseph and Elizabeth lived in Southampton where he worked as a cellar-man in a brewery. For some time they had no children of their own but in 1861 they were fostering a three year old child from Cardiff called William Stricland Osborne. Soon afterwards they had a daughter called whom they named Henrietta Martha. She was born early in 1862 but later that same year Joseph died. Some years later Elizabeth got married again, to a painter called Edward Callan whose wife had died and who had two young children.

• Henry was born in Chilworth in about 1817 and christened there on the 28^th of September of that year. He died when he was only twelve years old and was buried in Chilworth on the 14^th of March 1830.

• George was born about 1824 in Chilworth. He moved to Knowlsley in Lancashire, near Liverpool, to work as a gamekeeper on the Earl of Derby’s estate. In 1848, while he was there, he married a Scottish girl called Isabella Wilson. Their first child, a daughter, was born there, but then the family moved back to Hampshire where they lived in Southampton and George worked in a brewery. They had two more children, a girl and a boy, but in 1861 Isabella died. Four years later George got married again, to a widow called Jane Rudd who had several children of her own. George and Jane had one child, a daughter whom they named Alice. George died suddenly at work in 1881. The incident was reported in several newspapers — “SUDDEN DEATH AT BREWERY. - On Saturday afternoon George Misselbrook, aged 57, living in Exmouth-place, a cellarman, was at work at the brewery of Messrs. Hine Bros., in Birmingham-street, when he fell down suddenly in the scalding-house and died immediately. The deceased was a very stout man, rather feeble, and short-breathed, and it was conjectured his death was the result of fatty degeneration of the heart or apoplexy”.

• Charles was baptised in Chilworth on the 4^th of May 1825. He left home while he was still a teenager and went to Millbrook, a village adjacent to both Southampton and Chilworth, to work as a labourer. He lived in a room or small cottage at Whitehead Wood Farm, near Hill lane, in the Shirley district. Before his 20^th birthday he married Jemima Powell, a girl from nearby Swaythling. They lived in Burgess Road and had eight children. Charles and his son Tom were assaulted in 1872. The case was reported by the 24^th of August Edition of the Hampshire Advertiser as follows: “ASSAULT CASE. — Walter Richards, a beerhouse keeper, of Burgess-street, was summoned for assaulting Charles Misselbrook, a labourer, of the same place, on the 13th of August. — Mr. Kilby appeared for defendant. — Case dismissed. — A second summons against the same defendant for assulting Tom Misselbrook, by horse-whipping him round a cellar, was decided by defendant being fined 2s 6d and costs, 8s 6d, or seven days' imprisonment.”

Return to Dorothy Bennett’s 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.