I cannot quite believe that a whole year has passed since I took on the #52Ancestors challenge – and this is my final #52Ancestors blog of 2014. I began the year with a ‘kind-of’ plan which I have more-or-less stuck to, blogging about my ancestors every Sunday…. apart from this last one!
Jessie Petherick was born in 1851 of Thomas and Elizabeth (née Elliott) Petherick in Tavistock, Devon. In the 1861 census (RG9/1460/54/20), she was aged 10 and a scholar, her father recorded as a wheelwright – master, employing 1 man and 1 apprentice. Jessie remained at home in Tavistock until well into her 20’s, working as a shop assistant. Miraculously, in two consecutive censuses, ten years apart (1881 and 1891), she was visiting the same family – the Gibbs family who were firstly at 45 College Street and then at 60 College Street. Harriet Gibbs was a housekeeper on both censuses and Jessie Petherick, was a visiting shop assistant. Odd!
In 1892, Jessie Petherick married Edward Francis Frowd in Bristol, a druggist/chemist in Portishead, Somerset. Jessie may well have been working as a shop assistant in his business but, by 1901, Edward had a male shop assistant, Charles Gibbons, in his chemist shop on the High Street in Portishead (RG13/2357/29/1):
Jessie was 41 at the time of her marriage to Edward and the couple did not have any children together. In fact, by 1911, Edward had retired and the couple were living at Moorland House, Portishead:
It would appear from available documents that Jessie did not return to Tavistock, although most of her siblings did not move far from the town where they were born. Her husband, Edward, predeceased her by just three years and in her will in 1935, Jessie left effects of £5,232 16s. 1d. with executors listed as Richard Petherick (a relation?) and Edward Hicks:
Jessie and Edward lived at Moorland House for over twenty years.
