November 2011 – George Peapell

November  – 2011 George Peapell

 

Today the British Library has made four million pages of newspapers from the 18th and 19th centuries available online. This is a wonderful opportunity and potential resource for one name studies anywhere.

And…

I am coming to the end of capturing the main information on the “Peapell” name for the UK. I have been tidying up the parish baptisms, marriages and burials that I have gleaned from a number of sources (London, Wiltshire and Berkshire mainly).

I have found several interesting “Peapell” three of them named George. The first George is one I knew about from Mum’s research. He was a Baptist preacher in Highworth and also village constable.    He was buried in a vault in his house in Highworth which became a Baptist chapel.  An interesting character and needs a full write up from all the sources available at some time.

The second George is George Peapell the Metropolitan Sergeant born in 1815 – I wrote about him last month. My real interest is not so much about him but his children who seem to have varied and difficult to follow lives. One of George’s children (William) would appear to have been disinherited by the family but was still living close by for many years perhaps 30 or more.  In 1881 he was at the Royal Victoria Coffee Shop in London. After 1891 Williams is living with another relative Jane Peapell either his wife, niece, or sister depending on which source I look at!  Today the announcement that some newspapers are on line allowed me to search for Peapell. The first to come up was a newspaper called “The Era” – heard of it … no neither had I. On 24 Mar 1883 it reported “William Peapell, ‘aged forty, late Manager of the Victoria Coffee Palace Tavern (late Victoria Theatre), was brought up at Southwark Police-court, on Thursday, from Margate, by Detective-Sergeant Jupe, IL division, charged with stealing 102 Ss. 5d”.   Then I found the “Reading Mercury” on 31 Mar 1883 “William Peapell, late manager of the Victoria Coffee Palace Tavern, has been sentenced to six months’ hard labour for stealing £102 the property of the working committee. The Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland has commuted the sentence of death passed at Kild …”. So that was why he was his family seems to have disowned him!  I will have to get the full articles and any others I can find.

The third… well I have found a George Peapell who married Jane Allen on 18^th October 1866 at St Luke Chelsea, London. He was a “servant” and his father, also called George, was also a “servant” according to the marriage register (on line through Ancestry.com). I cannot link them to the main Peapell tree yet although it is likely they are. Why do I think so…the witnesses to the marriage are Charles and Ann  Marie Peapell.  I am certain they are the Charles Peapell and Ann Marie Warren who married in April 1851 in London.  Charles was a servant to Lord Radnor (rising to Butler) at Coleshill before becoming a railway constable in London.  But I have no record of George as a brother or cousin but he was a similar age to Charles.  George became a coachman later and George and Jane died without children The next entry in the newspapers archive is  “London Daily News” 14 September 1874 “George Peapell, a coachman, was reexamined, charged with assaulting Jane, his wife, Mr. W. Doveton Smyth defended. The wife, who was unable to walk from the effects of kicks she had received, said that seven weeks ago she and her husband left the serv …” – This looks like the same George Peapell.

So I know I have to get the full articles now and find what other information I can glean – I think a years subscription is over the top for a few pages but a two day subscription for £6.95 may be just right if I can make sure I know what I am looking for.

 

Next is a choice or choices, do I follow up these loose ends, start on the overseas “Peapell”, or start on “Peapell variants”…

 

Kevin Hurley 29 November 2011