Great Great Grandparents - Paternal

Crick

Zachariah Crick



Born: 1819, Tendring area, Essex, England
Died: 1910, Colchester, Essex, England


Emma Nowell

Born: 1835, Pontefract, Yorkshire, England
Died: 1908, Colchester, Essex, England


Children


William Crick, born 1858, Pontefract, Yorkshire, England - my great grandfather




Zachariah Crick

Zachariah Crick is a most intriguing character in the Crick family history - I first found him as a child in the Tendring Workhouse, then later with his half-brother in the Grenadier Guards at Buckingham Palace, the Crimea and Pontefract in Yorkshire, later still as a police constable in Bishop Monkton, Yorkshire and finally as a brickmaker in Old Heath, Colchester, Essex. And that is only part of the story! He is certainly (thanks to Patrick Denney) the ancestor I know most about.

As I said, his story seems to begin in the Tendring Workhouse. He is found there in the 1841 English Census aged 11, listed as a pauper with his brother Charles (aged 9). His other brother, William, aged about 13, was with their mother Milly in Wix about five miles away. Zachariah and Charles had been left in the Workhouse by their mother after their father was convicted of stealing grain and transported to Australia.


Cobbold


William Cobbold
Born: 1819, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England


Died: ?, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England


Sophia Wade

Born: 1821, Westhorpe, Suffolk, England


Died: ?, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England


Children


Emma Cobbold, born 1842, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England
Hepzibah Cobbold, born 1846, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England
Susannah Cobbold, born 1848, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England
Walter Cobbold, born 1851, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England
Mary Ann Cobbold, born 1855, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England - my great grandmother
Sarah Ann Cobbold, born 1857, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England
Elizabeth (Betsey) Cobbold, born 1860, Mendlesham, Suffolk, England

William Cobbold

Nothing much is known about William, he seems to have spent his life working as an agricultural labourer mostly in or around Cay Hill area near Mendlesham Green. He appears there in the census of 1861 and the census of 1871, living side by side with three of his brothers, Thomas, John and James. By 1881 William is still living next to John and Thomas, but James seems to have moved to Mendlesham. By 1891 John seems to have died, so William lives close by with John's widow, his nephew Henry and the returning James.

A distant cousin and local expert on all things Mendlesham, Roy Colchester, says that they all occupied a single house divided into three, 'The triple dweller cottage at Cay Hill occupied by the Cobbold families was destroyed during the last war by the nearby explosion of a 4000 pound bomb released by a Mosquito. It would now be called a friendly fire incident. The brick foundations are still visible and the present owner is hoping to gain planning permission to erect a house there.'

I've got my fingers crossed that the foundations are still there when I visit Mendlesham again. Having taken a virtual ride down Cay Hill thanks to Google Street view it seems like a green and pleasant place with quite a few older houses and what seems to be farmland surrounding it. I don't think it's changed a lot since the 19th century, except fror the paved road of course.

Sophia Wade

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