Berriman,Bennetts and Sisley

[organicjohn]

I have been neglecting my Cornish ancestors for a while and thought it time I gave them some attention.I am looking to find ancestors of Matthew Berriman b.1786,Charity Bennetts his first wife (died 1826) and Hugh Sisley b.1797.Hugh Sisley married Mary Baragwanath whose sister Zenobia was the second wife of Matthew Berriman.I found quite a lot on the Baragwanaths on-line but need to check it again.

[Cornish Terrier]

Matthew Berriman was baptised at Towednack 9th April 1786 son of John and Mary (nee Roberts).

Hugh Sisley was baptised at St Ives 10th September 1797 son of Hugh and Catherine (nee Nash)

I can take the Berriman line back but have not pursued Hugh Sisley as yet.

CT

[organicjohn]

THanks CT
I would be pleased to hear what you have got going back with Matthew Berriman
Hope you have not had too many fires to deal with.We have have had a spate of moorland fires in the S.Wales valleys started by bored kids in their school holidays.Pretty small scale I guess compared with what you would be used to.There is a lot of dead grass and heather at this time of year before it re grows and it has been dry for several weeks with strong drying easterly winds
John

[Cornish Terrier]

Hi John - we had a busy fire season this year with several towns lost or all but lost in Tasmania, South Australia, NSW and Victoria. A couple of the fires in Victoria lasted for almost two months due to location and terrain and they threatened numerous towns on a regular basis for a while. Locally we had two recently that needed 20 and 30 tankers plus air support with other smaller fires thrown in for good measure.

The skeleton line for Matthew Berryman/Berriman going backwards is:-

Matthew Berryman (1786 Towednack) m. 1. Charity Bennetts 1809 2. Zenobia Baragwanath 1838

John Berriman (1743 Towednack) m. Mary Roberts 1774

John Berriman (1720 Towednack) m. Elizabeth Eddy 1742

Mark Berriman (c.1686) m. Eleanor Eade 1708 Redruth

Richard Berriman (c.1655) m. Margaret Thomas 1684 Zennor

Nicholas Berriman (1618 Zennor) m. Margery Hiddons 1648 Zennor

John Berriman m. Elizabeth Veale 1611 Gulval

Nicholas Berriman m. Joane

William Berriman m. Joan

Obviously some of those very early lines are deduced from Wills and partly from piecing together of available scraps of information but back to the marriage of Richard and Margaret in 1684 and perhaps Nicholas and Margery in 1648 I am fairly confident of.

Mind you, I do need to revisit the Berryman/Berriman families again now that I have more records to work with but I doubt there would be many changes.

CT

[organicjohn]

Thanks CT
Going back at least to 1650 is pretty good.Do you have anything on Charity Bennatts? I found a website or maybe it wasFamilySearch tracing the Baragwanath line to about the same time.I think it was compiled by a compatriot of yours.
Gosh the fires have been bad with you over the summer.We get the occasional report of your fires on our news when news stories are a bit sparse .

John

[Cornish Terrier]

Do you have anything on Charity Bennatts?

Charity was born at St Ives 12th May 1784 and baptised 28th November of that year. Her parents were Thomas Bennatts and Grace Osborne who married at St Ives 11th June 1764 and Charity was the 12th of 14 children.

Thomas Bennatts was baptised at St Ives 29th August 1742 son of Philip Bennatts and and his second wife Christian Safeguard who he married at Lelant 23rd August 1731. He first married Margaret Hicks at St Ives 7th January 1709.

My current understanding is that Thomas was probably baptised at St Erth 2nd July 1687 son of John Bennetts als Kerroe.

Grace Osborne was baptised at St Ives 7th February 1742 daughter of Robert and Grace (nee Donithorne) Osborne of Zennor.
Robert Osborne of Towednack married Graice Donithorne at St Ives 6th January 1738.

CT

[organicjohn]

Thanks for the info on Charity Bennatts.The post I thought I had sent you yesterday seems to have been lost in the "ether" or I failed to click when I should have.Very annoying I gave some details of a family line of possible living ancestors in Cornwall who were living in St.Ives in the 1960s.I will look at my info again before I make another post about them.

[trencrom]

Hi John. I too have researched this Bennatts family.

Thomas Bennatts, father of Charity, died in 1825 leaving a will which is now at the Cornwall Record Office. His wife Grace predeceased him in 1817.

Grace Osborn nee Donithorne, was christened at Gulval in 1713. Her father was William Donithorne but the identity of her mother is not presently known as no marriage for this William has been found. Grace appears to be the Grace Osborne, widow who was buried at St Hilary in 1803. Her husband Robert Osborne was buried at Zennor in 1769 and appears to be the Robert Osborne who was christened there in 1717 and whose parents were John Osborne and Jane Osborne, nee Thomas, who married there in 1694.

For Philip Bennatts' ancestry, see the thread on this forum entitled "Bennatts anyone".

Trencrom

[organicjohn]

Thanks for tht extra info on the Osbornes and Donithornes.I will have a look now at the Bennatts posting
John

[londoner]

Re: Hugh Sisley and Mary Baragwanath
Haven't done much on them but at least two of their daughters married Berrimans - Zenobia married Thomas son of Matthew in 1845 and Mary - who m Philip Bennets also son of Matthew in 1853.

[organicjohn]

I have traced Hugh Sisley provisionly back to Michael Cicely (1657-1719) but am not too confident.I have traced some of Hugh Sisley and Mary Baragwanath`s children. Thomas Bennetts Berriman and wife Zenobia Sisley moved to Bromley by Bow in London where he worked as a shipwright by the Thames.Some of their children moved back to Cornwall and I have not tracked all of them down.Mary (my gt.grandmother) married Thomas Blackburn from Wanstead,Essex who was a Master grocer,then sanitary inspector.His father had ended his days in the workhouse at Wanstead.Mary died in 1930 and was buried at Ilford cemetry.Elizabeth Sisley (b.1834) married sea captain Henry Bryant.Their son Henry (b.1861) lived with his parents until they died then at the age of about 50 married a woman much younger than himself and emmigrated to Pittsburgh,USA.I have also traced Selina who married tin miner Richard Kernick in 1851.A son of theirs Thomas Berriman Kernick married Philippa Allen Burrell in 1893.She was still alive in 1965 as she was reported in the St.Ives Times and Echo of 19th Feb to have attended the wedding of her grandson. I visited Thomas Kernick,Phillipa`s son in 1966 during a family holiday.Mother always referred to him as "Little Tom".He had lived in London during the 1920s.

[Cornish Terrier]

Selina who married tin miner Richard Kernick in 1851

And Richard Kernick was a first-cousin to my 2xgt-grandmother Betsy Noall!

At the moment I have not taken the Sisley (var.) family back beyond Hugh's father Hugh and his marriage to Catherine Nash at St Ives in 1797 but I will take a look tonight and see if the trail I follow leads to the same conclusion as yourself.

CT

[Cornish Terrier]

John - finally I have completed the main part of my intended work on the Sisley family1

After working my way backwards through the Parish Registers I have concluded that you are correct in identifying Michael as your ancestor. His first appearance in the register is with his marriage to Hannah Toman at St Ives in 1682 at which time he was recorded as Michael Cycera. (Phillimore has this as Ogcera but after close scrutiny of the entry I found that writing from the entry below encroached and made the name difficult to read. But it is certainly Cycera.)

The name appeared variously as Cicera and Cicela and gradually morphed to Sisley.

I have worked my way through the family mostly to around 1900 with a few a little later and the name was consistently Sisley but for one family who appeared as Sisely on many occasions.

After all of that I have but three burials that I cannot comfortably account for:-

1829 James Sisley age 3 - the only possibility I can see is James Stevens Sisley who was born in 1827

1767 Jane Sissley - I have absolutely no idea about her

1759 Hugh Cicely - this one is the big one!

Online trees and IGI have a death for a Hugh Cicely/Sisley in 1789 and I have tracked it to a record on Ancestry - UK, Extracted Probate Records.
Collection: Cornwall & Devon:- Calender of Wills Administrations and Accounts Relating To The Counties of Cornwall and Devon in The Consistorial Archdiaconal Court of Cornwall, 1700-1799.

Having not seen the record for myself I cannot verify the actual contents. However several online family trees claim this to be the husband of Elizabeth Stevens in which case he was born in 1717.

But I beg to differ!

There was a Hugh Cicely buried at St Ives 27th July 1759 and I think it more likely that this was the husband of Elizabeth Stevens.
The only other possibility is that he was the son of Richard and Mary but as I can find no burial for Richard or Mary I suspect this family left the area.

The primary reason for my difference of opinion regarding the 1789 record is the burial of Mary Sisley, widow, at St Ives in 1797. I believe this can only be Mary Giles which means that her husband had to be deceased before 1797.
As the last child of Hugh and Mary was baptised in 1775 then Hugh had to have died sometime between 1775 and 1797. With no burial found at St Ives then the only possibility seems to be that he must be the man in 1789.

If you have any thoughts or other details on this I would be very interested to hear them.

CT

[organicjohn]

Hello CT
I am delighted that you have established that Michael Cicely(Sisley),1657--1719 was my ancestor.Incidently I looked at the ancestry of Alfred Sisley (1839--1899) the artist and found that his family were from Kent and did not appear to be related to the Cornish Sisleys.I am not sure if I have quite worked out all the intermediate generations.I have the next generation as Richard Cicely,b.1684 who married Jane.I do not have her full name or dates.I have as their sons Hugh,b.1717 who married Elizabeth Stevens and Richard,b.1710who married Mary Davies.Richard Cicely had sons Richard and Hugh both born around 1745.It was not this Hugh but the Hugh born to Hugh and Elizabeth in 1742 who you think is my ancestor.I have this Hugh who married Catherine Nash in 1797as my ancestor.I do not have dates for Catherine Nash. I have two sons for Hugh and Catherine,my ancestor Hugh born 1797 and Richard,born 1805.I have 1864 as the date of death of this Hugh although I remember being uncertain of this perhaps on account of finding the death of the Hugh born 1745. So are you related to the Thomas Kernick,b.1897 who I mentioned previously and whose sons I might try to contact?There are also the Baragwanaths to look into again!

[Cornish Terrier]

I have the next generation as Richard Cicely,b.1684 who married Jane.

I also have not found a marriage for Richard and Jane and nor have I found a baptism for son Richard. I do agree that the Richard who married Mary Davies at Madron belongs here and I have found three children for them:-
Richard bp. 20th June 1736 St Ives
Thomas bp. 31st October 1741 St Ives (buried 29th February 1748 St Ives)
Hugh bp. 6th July 1745 St Ives

As mentioned in my last I cannot find any burial or marriage records for the remainder of this family so suspect they may have wandered off towards the rising sun at some point.

Richard and Jane had two sons named Hugh with the first baptised 7th May 1715 and buried 13th January 1715/6 at St Ives.

I have this Hugh who married Catherine Nash in 1797as my ancestor.

I don't have a baptism record (or parents) for Catherine but she was buried at St Ives 15th June 1828 age 57 putting her birth around 1770/1.
Hugh and Catherine had seven children of which four were sons:-

Hugh bp. 10th Sepember 1797
Nancy bp. 28th March 1800
William bp. 12th September 1802
Richard bp. 3rd May 1805
Nancy born abt 1807
Mary bp. 22nd July 1808
John bp. 29th May 1811

William was my main problem here as there was another William Sisley baptised in the same year to John and Sibella Sisley. There was a marriage for one of these Williams and I had difficulty working out which until I looked at the above family again and found that most of them died fairly young.

Hugh lasted until 1864 and I am not sure about Mary but the rest died as follows:-
Nancy buried 21st June 1802
William buried 20th October 1826 age 24 **
Richard buried 3rd July 1831 age 25
Nancy buried 4th February 1838 age 30 (she married James Ninnes in 1829)
John buried 9th November 1830 age 20

So are you related to the Thomas Kernick,b.1897

I would be a long distant cousin I suspect. I have not tracked the Kernicks much beyond about the 1851 Census but Richard Kernick I think was a first cousin to my 2xgt-grandmother so there would certainly be a connection.

CT