Apologies for the long silence yesterday - I was frantically scribbling notes and downloading more wills.
Sugarbakers, firstly, you deserve a medal for transcribing those wills so wonderfully well! By the time I was two pages in to Samuel's I was suffering from severe eyestrain and an incipient headache. Secondly, you didn't miss anything, it's just that early yesterday morning I inadvertently stumbled on a missing piece of the jigsaw puzzle while looking through the NA catalogue:
Counterpart Lease for 99 Years or 3 lives
Deeds: Baldwin Street. Feoffees: Sarah Henderson, widow of Anthony Henderson, jeweller and daughter of Thomas Terret, cornfactor, deceased.
After you asked the question, it took me a while to figure out just how I'd come to the conclusion that Samuel's brother and Anthony the jeweller were the same man, but then I went back through my notes and there the clue was. It seems Bristol merchants generally tended to wear several business hats, as it were. I had also thought that Samuel the sugar baker and Samuel the linen draper were two different men, but now I strongly suspect that the same man was both - Sam's earlier partner in the sugar refining business, Samuel Peach, was also a linen draper and a partner in a bank.
Capetown, it's not surprising you're confused. The Sarah Goddard nee Henderson mentioned in Anthony and Samuel's wills is the grandmother of James Thomas Goddard who was my 4 times great-grandma Hannah Newton's second husband. James Newton was her first. Although there was no issue of the second marriage (Hannah was in her fifties by then), I wanted to know more about J.T.G. because he was in a different league to James Newton on several levels. The latter was a working-class cork cutter while J.T.G. was a highly skilled maker of telescopes and camera lens, and came from a fairly prosperous merchant background. Having seen the auction notice for the contents of the Nelson Street house with its mention of telescope and microscope, I think I know where J.T.G.'s interest in opticals came from. Would you mind having a peek at Thomas Short's 1779 will for me? It isn't available on the NA website unfortunately, but it may shed a great deal more light on Samuel H. and Letitia Short's side of the family.
Christopher Ludlow was corn inspector for the city of Bristol for many years and a very lucrative post it probably was, too. I came across this snippet from the Bristol Charities Report just now which links in the Beddome name:
"Rachel Beddome's Gift
'...Mrs Rachel Beddome left to the congregation of Dissenters, meeting in the Pithay, 100l towards a hose for the minister to dwell in, which 100l is at present in the hands of William Ludlow, senior. The interest hath been at four percent, and paid to the Rev. Mr Tommas.'
N.B. - This 100l was paid into the hands of Mr Christopher Ludlow, by the executors of Mr William Ludlow, 13th January, 1766, but has since been paid by him, with the consent of the Rev. Mr Beddome, towards the purchase of the parsonage house in Cumberland-street, which cost 330l."
