And Rosina - details obscured but see research below.
Above, a different James Bird Brooks grave d. Dec 1st 1852 age 62 years
AND:
Mary, wife of the above Dec 28th 1860 age 74.
In All Saints Parish Church.
Research by Charlotte:
The bottom grave is for James Bird Brooks who was baptised at Marlow in 1790 (to William and Mary who was nee Bird) and his wife Mary. The Berkshire Chronicle announcing her death said that she was "much respected" and had died after a lingering illness.
The top grave is for their son James Bird Brooks (baptised 1825) and his wife Rosina nee Barnes (married Hoxton New Church 1847, both parties of Great Marlow).
James Bird Brooks Senior was a baker and corn dealer, a combination of occupations which was very common at the time. By 1833 if not earlier the bakery was in the Causeway, Marlow. See here for a description of the premises in 1833. It is still a bakery today.
Young George Moody was sentenced to one week's hard labour in 1847 for cheating James Senior out of 10 shillings.
In 1848 James Senior was the executor of the will of Martha Cleobury a gentlewoman of Chapel Street (see here).
When James died he requested that his wife take over his business with their youngest son William to assist her. He was to receive a third of the net profits when he turned 30 provided he continued to assist her and then take over fully once she died.
James Junior was a farmer at Finnemoor Farm at Ackhampstead chapelry just outside Marlow by 1847. The will of James Senior suggests that James Junior was at first running the farm for his father as the furniture in the farmhouse and the crops growing in the fields belonged to James Senior who was perhaps growing wheat and corn for his business there. James Senior was renting the property back in 1833.
James Junior was one of the overseers of Ackhampstead. Both James Junior and Rosina died at Finnemoor Farm House. Rosina's death was in 1861 when she was 71. Being a little isolated the farm was sometimes targeted by poachers and thieves after hen eggs or the turkeys raised there. Two daughters of James and Rosina died as young adults. Their graves are photographed on the blog here.
Siblings for James Junior were: Amelia (mentioned in the will of Martha Cleobury above), Jane, Sarah (married Marlow stonemason William Clifford, son also William who became a baker too. More on him here), and William who took over the family bakery business. Jane married William Hall the Marlow butcher of whom more here. She and her surviving siblings and their children all received legacies from James Senior in his will proved 1853. James Senior at the time of the will's writing in 1851 had 4 cottages in Woburn Buckinghamshire plus at Marlow his premises, 3 other cottages on the Causeway, 2 other nearby cottages, and cottages on Strong Beer Acre, Marlow (off what we now call Station Road).
The brother of James Senior, Joseph, was a farmer at Blounts with a William who was probably another brother.
More posts related to people of the Causeway, Marlow indexed here
Photos and headstone transcription by Kathryn, research by Charlotte.
References:
Will of James Bird Brooks. P.C.C. Copy held at the National Archives, Kew and transcribed by Charlotte Day.
Post office directory of Berkshire, Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire, with Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Huntingdonshire [afterw.] The Post office directory of Northamptonshire, Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, and Oxfordshire. (1847). United Kingdom: (n.p.).
Reading Mercury 4th December 1852 and 18th April 1874. British Library Archives, via the BNA.
Bucks Chronicle 5th January 1861. As above.
Windsor and Eton Express. 16th January 1847. As above.
Robson's Commercial Directory 1839.
1833 Parochial Assessment for Great Marlow transcribed from originals in my possession by Charlotte Day.
Great Marlow Parish Registers, transcribed by Jane Pullinger from the originals.
©Marlow Ancestors. You are very welcome to use these images for family or local history purposes if you credit this blog and link here.
