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The Woods of Frome and Bathwick, Somerset
William and Sarah WOOD had a child, William, near Garston Hall, Coal Ash Walk (now Portway), Frome, in about 1780. William (1780), a cloth weaver, married Sarah STOKES of Frome at St. John the Baptist, Frome (early C19th print, right), in 1802. They are then absent from the Frome records for the next nine years. Their children included John (1811), Joseph (1st January 1814) born at Blunt Street, Frome, and Sarah (1816). All three were baptised at Rook Lane Independent chapel (pictured below) on 21 April 1816. Rook Lane is considered to be one of the finest examples of non-conformist architecture anywhere, but it is no longer a place of worship and its future is uncertain. [Two other Woods who turn up and may be related were Ann (married name COLLINGS and John Woods who were brother and sister. John gave his birthplace as Dover and Ann as Weymouth, and they were born within a year of each other].
William Wood would have been in his forties when William Cobbett visited Frome in September 1826, and described the consequences of the collapse of the woollen clothing boom. Unemployment and poverty were rampant. He saw "between two and three hundred weavers, men and boys, cracking stones, moving earth, and doing other sorts of work, making a fine road into the town. " He is indignant with the "bluff manufacturers" who "have ground down into powder those who were earning them their fortunes....These poor creatures at Frome have pawned all their things, or nearly all." He sees proofs of the "irretrievable decay of the place". A century later, the population was still less than when Cobbett had visited the town. In 1840 Lewis said of Frome Selwood, then a town of 12,240 people, that it "consists chiefly of a great number of streets, irregularly built and inconveniently narrow, but from their situation tolerably clean...long celebrated for its woollen manufacture, of which the principal articles are broad cloths and kerseymeres, of a very superior quality: the manufacture of wool-cards is also carried on to a great extent, and formerly they were supplied to almost every town in England. The beer brewed here has long been kept in great repute for its excellent quality, and is usually kept to a great age". The population in 1961 was 11,000.
For the next fourteen years Joseph and Martha lived at 22 (later 25) Grove Street, just over Pulteney Bridge on the Bathwick side of the river Avon (click here for maps. prints and photo of Grove Street) and probably in the block on the near right in the picture. Their children were Elizabeth Ann (1835), William (1837), Sarah Anne(24 December 1841), Henry (1844 and another in 1845) and George (1848). On August 9th, 1849, Martha Wood died at Odd Down, Widcombe. According to the death certificate, the cause of death was “inflammation of the mucous membrane of the bowels”. Her daughter Elizabeth was present at the death. Her place of burial is still undiscovered. Her death had a disastrous effect on the family. On the 21st January 1850, Joseph and four of the children (William, Sarah, Henry and George) were admitted to the Bath Union Workhouse in Walcot, but placed under Orders of Removal. They were joined by Elizabeth on September 18th 1850. In 1851 at the time of the census, Elizabeth, then 16, was in service in Lark Place, Bath, and Joseph had also left the workhouse, and is not traceable in the census in Bath. The remaining four children were still in the Bath Workhouse in the 1851 census. Placing the Woods under Orders of Removal meant that the Workhouse Board did not believe that they had a settlement (a right to be supported by the parish) in Bath, but no action was taken until November 7th 1851, when a Pauper Examination was held at the Guildhall, Bath. Evidence was heard from Ann Collings, formerly Woods (their aunt? - see above) and their grandfather William Wood, then 71 and an inmate in the Frome Workhouse. Although all the children were born in Bathwick, their settlement was their father's home parish (unless he had gained a settlement in Bath). The court found that the children belonged in Frome, and
the order was made to move them (then aged 14, 9, 6 and 3) to
Frome workhouse (pictured below and below right, now flats). The Frome Workhouse records show that the Wood children spent much of the next nine years in and out of that institution. William was “taken by his sister” (Elizabeth) on 24th February 1853. Elizabeth herself was in during September and October 1853 due to sickness. However, in April 1854 she married Joseph GODWIN, a young brewer, at Argyle chapel, Bathwick (Ann Collings was one of the witnesses) and the couple settled in Batheaston and later St Catherine, raising twelve children and adopting a niece (see below). William Wood Sr. died in the workhouse in 1854 and was buried at St. John's. Sarah, Henry and George Wood were destined to spend the rest of their childhood in the Frome workhouse, barring a number of short-lived escapes. Henry was one of a group of boys who absconded in 1854 and again in 1855. Sarah absconded on at least one occasion, in March 1856, with a friend Susan Reynolds, by scaling the walls of the girls' playground. Henry maintained the family tradition by absconding in 1856, returning ten days later, destitute.
On October 26th 1859 Sarah Wood returned to the Workhouse, destitute and pregnant. This is what the records reveal about the following five months. She gave her age as 20 but she was now 17, and was classed as “an able-bodied woman”. The number 85 was attached to her workhouse clothes. The work she was given was “picking oakum”. Oakum was scrap rope which the workhouse bought from Bristol docks at £14 per ton. After the inmates had separated the clean rope it was sold back at £20 per ton. Sarah was allocated a quantity of three pounds a day.
During the week ending January 14th, 1860, she was in confinement and on the
14th she gave birth to a daughter, whom she named Florence. Florence was a
very fashionable name in the late 1850s in the wake of the publicity
surrounding Florence Nightingale, although a search of the 1881 census will
show that it was by no means unknown before. Florence was given the number 111
and she was baptised at Christ Church, Frome (built 1818, pictured left) on
February 8th 1860. The father's name is not given in the register or the birth
certificate. Sarah returned to oakum picking duty (two pounds a day) on February 13 and was discharged with Florence at her own request on 8th March
1860. Florence may have been in Batheaston in 1861 but there is no record of
Sarah there, and she disappears from the record until July 1870 when she married miner Henry GODWIN of Batheaston
(her brother-in-law) at St. Peter's church, Blaina, Monmouthshire, both
giving their place of residence as Abertillery. By September1871 they had
moved into the next valley at Cwmnantddu, near Pontypool, where George H. was born.
Between 1878 and 1880 they moved to nearby 15 Chapel Road, Pontnewynydd, and in
1891 were at 9 Ebenezer Road. Further children had been Kate A. (1874), William
John (1876, who died in the Llanerch
Colliery disaster of February 6th 1890, caused by the absence of
safety lamps), Martha (1878), Frederick (1880),
and Edward Albert (1882). In 1901 Henry and Sarah were running the Star Inn, 140
High Street, Abersychan. Sarah Ann Godwin died on the 1st of January 1917 still
at the Star Inn. By 1871 Florence Woods had been adopted by Sarah's sister (her aunt) Elizabeth Godwin (the Godwins moved from Batheaston to St Catherine between 1860 and 1862), and most records from that point show that she had taken the surname Godwin. She appears among the Godwins in the 1871 census, and so it appears that she spent her childhood in St Catherine. In 1880 she was in service and living at the Avondale brewery, Batheaston (right) near the toll bridge over the Avon, and she married Walter KING at Bath Register Office in 1880 (her signature, below). The witnesses were Richard Godwin (her cousin) and Sarah Godwin (presumably her mother, who had travelled from Pontypool to Bath for the occasion). Unlike their menfolk, Elizabeth, Sarah and Florence could all write their names. Shortly after the marriage - perhaps immediately after - Florence and Walter followed Sarah and settled in Pontypool, Monmouthshire.
Joseph abandoned his children to the workhouse and there is no match in the 1881 census. Had he died (he would then have been 71), or emigrated? Did he ever see his children again? Elizabeth Godwin died a widow in 1899 at the age of 63, and is buried with her husband at Batheaston, the plot marked by a headstone with the inscription: They are gone but not forgotten - Never shall their memory fade - Loving thoughts shall ever linger - Round the spot where they are laid. William: he is probably the William Woods, 42, a warehouse porter, living with his wife Sarah Ann (no children) in Ashley Hill, Bristol in 1881. Henry: he is probably the shoemaker Henry Woods, 37, living with his wife and six children in Llandaff, Cardiff in 1881 (Henry had been apprenticed to a shoemaker in Frome from the workhouse). George: unless he became a steam hammer driver in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, no obvious matches in 1881.
Sources: Frome Union Workhouse records, Somerset Record Office. Bath Union Workhouse records, The Guildhall, Bath. Bath Sessions records, The Guildhall, Bath. Links: Wood-England web site and link to mailing list
24/12/06 |
This branch of the Wood/s
family goes back at least to the late 1700s in Frome, Somerset. The name
oscillates between Wood and Woods down the years.
Frome
was at its peak in the 16th to 18th centuries as the premier cloth weaving
centre of the area. The factories were kept busy producing blue cloth for the
army in the Napoleonic wars, but in the subsequent peace it fell into a steep
decline. In 1823 twelve Frome clothiers went bankrupt and the Poor Rate rose
dramatically.
For a transcript of the evidence, 
In September 1856 Sarah, claiming to be 16 but actually three months short of
her 15th birthday, left the workhouse at her own request. Where would she go?
Most likely, to her sister at Batheaston. Shortly afterwards,
William was re-admitted for two months owing to illness. A year later Henry
left for a trial with Mr Holville, a shoemaker of Frome. In March 1859 George
was taken into service by G.H. Sheppard, Esq.
Both Henry and George were to spend one final spell in the workhouse: Henry
parted from the shoemaker but other “work was found for him”, while George
had injured his hand in work.
We now know what became of William Sr., Martha,
Sarah Ann and Florence. What of the rest of these Woods?