The Skidmore and Scudamore Families of Frampton Cotterell, Gloucestershire 1650-1915
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Skidmore (Scudamore) Families of Frampton Cotterell Linda Moffatt © 2015 THE SKIDMORE AND SCUDAMORE FAMILIES OF FRAMPTON COTTERELL, GLOUCESTERSHIRE 1650-1915 by Linda Moffatt © 2015 1st edition 2012, published at www.skidmorefamilyhistory.com 2nd edition 2015, published at www.skidmorefamilyhistory.com This is a work in progress. The author is pleased to be informed of errors and to receive additional information for consideration for future updates at [email protected] This file was last updated by Linda Moffatt on 9 March 2017. DATES • Prior to 1752 the year began on 25 March (Lady Day). In order to avoid confusion, a date which in the modern calendar would be written 2 February 1714 is written 2 February 1713/4 - i.e. the baptism, marriage or burial occurred in the 3 months (January, February and the first 3 weeks of March) of 1713 which 'rolled over' into what in a modern calendar would be 1714. • Civil registration was introduced in England and Wales in 1837 and records were archived quarterly; hence, for example, 'born in 1840Q1' the author here uses to mean that the birth took place in January, February or March of 1840. Where only a baptism date is given for an individual born after 1837, assume the birth was registered in the same quarter. BIRTHS, MARRIAGES AND DEATHS Databases of all known Skidmore and Scudamore bmds can be found at www.skidmorefamilyhistory.com PROBATE A list of all known Skidmore and Scudamore wills - many with full transcription or an abstract of its contents - can be found at www.skidmorefamilyhistory.com in the file Skidmore/Scudamore One-Name Study Probate. CITATION Please respect the author's contribution and state where you found this information if you quote it. Suggested citation 'The Skidmore and Scudamore Families of Frampton Cotterell, Gloucestershire 1650-1915 by Linda Moffatt at the website of the Skidmore/ Scudamore One-Name Study www.skidmorefamilyhistory.com'. PRIVACY The Skidmore/ Scudamore One-Name Study does not, as a matter of course, publish any biographical detail from the last 100 years, unless with permission of descendants. 1 Skidmore (Scudamore) Families of Frampton Cotterell Linda Moffatt © 2015 PREFACE The first account of this family was written by the late Warren Skidmore in 2006. With Warren's blessing, I revised parts of his 2006 piece and took it forward to include people born up to the time of the British census of 1911. The account would not be nearly so complete without the labours of the late John Hunt of Potton, Bedfordshire who acquired most of the raw material long before the days of the Internet. We are also indebted to the late Mrs Kathleen Skidmore who turned up many of the records noticed here on the London families. Since the publication on our website of the 1st edition in 2012 much more material has become available. This 2nd revision in 2015 takes the story on to 1915. It also includes the World War 1 service of a number of men, as well as numerous other minor amendments and additions to our knowledge made over the past three years. Linda Moffatt, May 2015. INTRODUCTION The origin of the Frampton Cotterell Skidmores in Westerleigh. Gascelyn’s lands at Frampton Cotterell and Westerleigh descended to Sir Thomas Seymour who died at Frampton Cotterell on 23 April 1627. An inquest post mortem taken at Thornbury on 31 July 1628 shows that he died owning the manor called “Gaslings” alias Frampton Cotterell. The messuages, cottages, closes, meadows, pastures (as Simple sketch plan to show the position of Westerleigh village, of Mayshill, and of Ashbury. well as the advowson of the church) are named but nothing is said about the tenants. Seymour’s small holding in Westerleigh (now shown as 20 acres of pasture) is also mentioned. Nothing is said about the tenant who held it, but it might possibly have been James Skidmore (ca.1565-1629), a substantial yeoman like his father, who had a farmstead at Ashbury at the time of his death (about two years after Seymour died).1 Ashbury was a hamlet close to Frampton Cotterell but is now lost as a place-name.2 The eldest Skydmore son and heir in each generation had probably held this freehold farm at Brownfield in Ashbury. The younger sons, as always, were forced to either negotiate a leasehold from the lord of the manor, to learn a useful trade in the parish, or better 1 Warren Skidmore, unpublished. 2 It survived until at least 1830 when it appears as a knoll in the Ordnance Survey map with coordinates at 156-682(812). It may have been formerly reckoned as a part of Mayshill. 2 Skidmore (Scudamore) Families of Frampton Cotterell Linda Moffatt © 2015 still to be apprenticed to a tradesmen in the cities which offered the very best opportunity for advancement. Many of the sons left Westerleigh for Bristol, went up to London, or off to Ireland or New England, and at a still later date to Australia. The use of the surnames Skidmore and Scudamore in the Frampton Cotterell families. The families using the parish church of St Peter's, Frampton Cotterell were baptised, married and buried with the surname Scudamore until mid-1841 - the burial register clearly shows the switch between May 1841 (at the burial of Ann Scudamore) and August 1841 (at the burial of Lucy Skidmore). This coincides with the first British census to list all members of a household, taken on 6 June 1841, at which families in Frampton Cotterell, Winterbourne and Bristol were enumerated as Skidmore. In the early years of the 19th century when Frampton Cotterell boys were apprenticed, their surname was recorded as Skidmore. The descendants of our Frampton Cotterell families using St Michael's church in Winterbourne (first entry 1792) are always found as Skidmore, as are those who moved to work on the Gloucester docks, the coal mines of Monmouthshire, the ironworks in Bristol and those who became hatters in Southwark, London. This suggests strongly that the Frampton Cotterell families were known as Skidmore but were recorded up to 1841 by custom as Scudamore by the clergy of St Peter's. Some families from Frampton Cotterell and Winterbourne moved into Bristol during the 1840s and were initially boot and shoemakers - see descendants of Pinnell Skidmore [21] and of Daniel Skidmore [23]3. Certain of the descendants of Daniel [23] later used the surname Scudamore on an 'everyday basis', some from as early as the 1850s, others from as late as the 1890s. Details can be found in the text and on the family tree which accompanies this account. It seems that brothers from a single family adopted the surname at different times, at least as far as can be judged by the names they gave to census enumerators - see the sons of Luke Skidmore [49]. In fact, Luke's son Daniel Skidmore in his will (proved in 1876) named as one of his executors his brother George Scudamore. The first Skidmores in Frampton Cotterell parish. Skidmore families are found in the neighbouring parish of Westerleigh as early as the 15th century though the earliest mention of Skidmore residing in Frampton Cotterell does not occur in the parish registers of St Peter's there until the 1680s. Edward Skidmore was buried on 11 January 1682/3 at Frampton Cotterell and his widow Sarah (née Atwood) followed on 27 December 1688. A younger Edward Skidmore and William Skidmore, presumably brothers or cousins, were raising their families in Frampton Cotterell during the 1690s and 1700s. We presently have no evidence of the occupation of Edward Skidmore but we know that William Skidmore was a feltmaker at Frampton Cotterell when on 19 June 1699 he was a bondsman at the marriage of Richard Prior, a feltmaker of Stoke Gifford, and Elizabeth Hollister of Frampton Cotterell (a couple who intended to marry at Augustine the Less, Bristol). We know that the art of feltmaking existed in the Westerleigh family in the late 17th century. Robert Skidmore (1640-77) was apprenticed on 26 March 1655 to Abraham Read, a citizen and weaver of London, for a term of seven years. He was admitted a freeman in the Weaver’s Hall on 8 December 1673 and lived in the parish of St Olave’s, Southwark. His son Robert, baptized 22 January 1664/5 at St Olave’s 'the son of Robert and Susan Skidmore' is presumably the Robert Skidmur of London, a member of the Company of 3 The male heads of the households described below are given code numbers which enable them to be easily tracked through this account. These codes match those in the master databases of birth, marriages, deaths and censuses produced by the Skidmore/ Scudamore One-Name Study. 3 Skidmore (Scudamore) Families of Frampton Cotterell Linda Moffatt © 2015 Feltmakers4 who took the Association Oath in 16965. He had died there before 10 January 1711/2 when the administration of his estate was given to his widow Jane. At present, the Skidmore/ Scudamore DNA Project has obtained genealogical DNA evidence from only three male descendants of Frampton Cotterell residents. These three DNA results match each other but do not match those from descendants out of the adjoining parish of Westerleigh. The three participants all descend from one man - Daniel Skidmore FCL[11]. Daniel [11]'s first wife died in 1769 which suggests his birth was around 1740- 1745. His baptism as Skidmore or Scudamore has yet to be found and Warren Skidmore has tentatively suggested he is a son of Daniel [5]. When more men of Skidmore/ Scudamore descent volunteer to take part in our DNA study, it is possible that we will be able to establish that Westerleigh and Frampton Cotterell Skidmores are indeed 'genetic cousins'.