John (born 1565, lived to at least 1607) and Winifred (born 1568, lived to at least 1608) WILLIAMSON of New Hall
New page 19 October 2024
Links:
Immediate ancestors: Anthony and Elizabeth WILLIAMSON and probably Edward and Janet RADCLIFFE of Applethwaite (no page yet)
Immediate descendant: Humphrey WILLIAMSON
The Williamson of Applethwaite story - WILLIAMSON of Applethwaite research notes
index of surnames
John and Winifred are listed as the parents of Humphrey at his baptism in the Crosthwaite parish registers, which I have consulted in transcript. (I should note that there's still work to do on the paper trail for wthis family in general is ancestral to me, but I think it is likely because their property New Hall ends up owned by my proven ancestors and there seems no reason other than inheritance why it would.) John is described as "of New Hall" in the parish registers in the early 1600s, and Humphrey is described as "of Newhall" in a 19th-century history of the parish church quoting a document of the 1630s (I haven't got to Humphrey in the original PRs yet, to check his residence as a groom or father). So the family home seems to support their family relationship.
John's parents were Anthony and Elizabeth WILLIAMSON of New Hall in Crosthwaite.
Winifred was at marriage a RADCLIFFE of Applethwaite. Looking through the parish register (book transcript) from the 1562 (when the surviving register starts) to 1576, there's one Radcliffe of Applethwaite family (Edward and Janet) baptising children and they do have the only Winifred Radcliffe baptism in the period, in 1568.
John was the first child of Anthony and Elizabeth WILLIAMSON baptised 9 September 1565. At that date, Anthony and Elizabeth (married only six weeks) still lived in Anthony's birthplace Applethwaite, but within a couple of years they had set up home in nearby Ormathwaite (another hamlet in the same parish), where they raised their family. John grew up with ever more younger brothers and sisters, the eighth and youngest child born when John was 18. I think the family was fairly well-off, in the yeoman class or bottom gentry, but it seems that some of his siblings may have died as children - his first sister Janet possibly when John was still a child or youth himself.
I don't know any details of Winifred's early life, beyond the possible baptism entry for her
There does appear to have been an episode in John's youth that doesn't on the face of it do him any credit. There's a baptism entry in the parish register: 28 February 1585/86 Gawine son of John Williamson son of Anthony, and Agnes Ritson, base gotten. So a John Williamson, most likely this John, aged 20, was named as the father of an illegitimate child, whose mother he did not go on to marry. I don't know how bad this was on John's part - if he supported mother and child materially, practically and/or emotionally I don't think any record would survive unless they married, and I've seen no sign of that. I haven't yet found out anything about Agnes or what became of her or Gawine.
About three years later, or 13 October 1588, John (aged at this point 23) married Winifred (20) in Crosthwaite. He was at this point still described as of Ormathwaite, and she was of Applethwaite, where she had also likely been born. Within a year they had set up home there in Applethwaite - the parish register seems to show sisters for Winifred but no brothers (unless they were a fair bit older and born before the register began), so possibly John as a son-in-law even took over a landholding from her parents as they got older.
As Applethwaite residents, John and Winifred baptised six daughters. The first four were:
1589 Janet
1591 Margery
1594 Isabel
1596 Ann
But Ann seems to have been buried less than two weeks after her baptism in June, and there was a cluster of Applethwaite burials in the autumn, including Janet and Isabel Williamson within four days of each other. So Margery may have been the only survivor of these first children.
Then John and Winifred baptised two more girls while living at Applethwaite:
1597 Mary
1599 Katherine
At the 1597 baptism, John is described as a Bailiff - RN to look up exactly what this means in this period/region. Off the top of my head some sort of managerial role for someone else's property.
While Katherine was still very small, John's first cousin, John Williamson of Dacre, died. It appears that he died without male heirs and so, under the terms of the will of his father (John of Applethwaite's uncle John Williamson late of New Hall in Crosthwaite), the family property in Crosthwaite, including New Hall, passed to John of New Hall's brother Anthony, or his heir male - John of Applethwaite. (I haven't yet established whether Anthony or his wife Elizabeth was alive at this date, but their surviving children were likely all adult by this time, so if surviving perhaps Anthony and Elizabeth were content to remain at their established home and let their eldest son and grandchildren take over the new place. If this happened in 1600, I think the family was probably John (about 35), Winifred (32), Margery (9), Mary (3) and Katherine (1). Possibly more daughters, if not all the burials relate to this family.
Note that the provisions of the will required Anthony or his heir to pay 100 pounds money to the female heir of the original estate as a condition of getting the property, so it must have been at least that valuable and Anthony/John must also have been at least that rich. It was a substantial sum at that time.
Having had only daughters previously, John and Winifred had sons now. From the baptisms in the parish register (which from 1600 I've only seen in database extract form so far):
1601 Humphrey
1604 (or late 1603/04) Francis
1606 John
1608 Anthony
I know little of John or Winifred's later life. My inherited family tree says John died in 1610, but I think that may be his other cousin John, who married Alice and lived at Applethwaite in the 1600s - he died in 1609/10 and left a will. I need to consult the 17th-century burial registers.
I have not found a will of John's, though New Hall presumably passed to his oldest son Humphrey and then to his heir in turn (who was not our ancestor). It, or at least a property of that name Under Skiddaw, seems to have come to our ancestral branch of the Williamson family some time in the 18th century, being bequeathed in a will of 1779 and transferred out of the Williamson family in 1810. I think that this may have been by inheritance down the line of Humphrey's second son Jonathan.
The only one I know anything about is the eldest son, Humphrey, who married twice and had several children, I think at New Hall.
If you are interested in this family I'll be pleased to hear from you. Click this link to email me at deletethis.ianwilliamson161@gmail.com but delete everything up to and including the first dot, leaving just my name and number @ service provider.
Links:
Immediate ancestors: John and Jane WILLIAMSON and unknown
Immediate descendant: Humphrey WILLIAMSON
The Williamson of Crosthwaite story - WILLIAMSON of Crosthwaite research notes
index of surnames