This story is inspired by the 52 Ancestors
prompt “Mother’s Day” in honour of Mother’s Day on 9 May in some parts of the
world, including Australia. I picked
Mary Brownbridge because she had eleven children and she has an unusual
surname.
Mary Brownbridge was born about 1783, in Pollington, a rural
village in the parish of Snaith in Yorkshire.
She was baptised on 28 November 1783 in Snaith parish church. Her parents were John Brownbridge and Mary
Eastgate. Mary was the sixth of their
ten children. Her siblings were John,
Charlotte, Elizabeth, Bathia, Ephraim, Manassah, Anne, Isaac and Frances. The unusual biblical names came from the
Eastgate side of the family.
Father John Brownbridge was a wheel wright, so a tradesman. I think life was not always easy for the Brownbridge
family as three of the children died in early childhood: Ephrain, Manassah and
Isaac.
I don’t know if Mary Brownbridge was educated. She did not sign the marriage register on her
wedding day.
Mary Brownbridge married John Tomlinson, a farmer or farm labourer
from nearby Ackworth on 2 January 1803 in Snaith. Mary was likely only 20, so a minor and her
father appears to have signed the register to give his consent.
For Mary, becoming a mother may not have been straight
forward. The first child I have found
for Mary and John was William, who was born on 24 February 1805, more than two
years after the wedding. I wonder if
Mary miscarried or just failed to get pregnant in her first year of
marriage. Anyway, once she started
having children, she had no problems with one successful pregnancy every two or
three years for the next 21 years. John and Mary’s children were: Willam,
Elizabeth, John, George, Ann, Joseph, Jane, Thomas (my ancestor), Charles,
Sarah and Maria. Through all her years
of childbirth, she likely had support from her own mother, Mary Brownbridge nee
Eastgate, who died in 1827.
Mary lost one child, Jane, in infancy. I am not sure about two of her other
daughters, Elizabeth and Ann. Her other
children lived to good ages, with Sarah dying 1912, so almost within living
memory. I share DNA with one of her son Joseph’s
descendants.
In 1841, Mary and John were still living in Ackworth. In the census, their household included Mary
aged about 35, Ann age about 25, Martha aged 3, George aged 5 months and
William aged 35. The relationships are
not listed but my guess is that William is their oldest son and I think Mary
was his wife and possibly the mother of Martha and George. Ann may have been John and Mary’s daughter. John and William were listed as agricultural
workers, so likely doing unskilled seasonal work on a farm, which was long
hours and poorly paid. At about 65, John
must have been struggling.
Many of Mary’s children moved from Ackworth to Batley during
the 1830s and 1840s. I wonder if they
were drawn by the better opportunities in an industrial town compared to the
more rural are where they grew up.
Mary Brownbridge died in 1845 and was buried on 2 Jul
somewhere in the churchyard of St Cuthbert’s, Ackworth, aged 62. By this time, several of her children had
married and she was a grandmother to at least seven children, as well as a
mother.
While I don’t know much about Mary’s life, I do know that
she brought up her children to be respectable and successful people. Her son Thomas, my ancestor died with a
fortune of nearly £18000, earned as a house painter and gilder, a long way from
being an agricultural labourer.
I carry a little of Mary’s children’s DNA so her legacy
lives on.
Notes on lineage: Me > Dad > Helen Francis Ruth
Akeroyd > Percy Tomlinson Akeroyd > Frances Tomlinson > Thomas
Tomlinson > Mary Brownbridge
