Philip Ginn jnr of Bishops Stortford d. 1715

As the eldest of the three brothers, Philip Ginn jnr inherited "The Pewter Pot" when his father died in 1684 as related in the last post. Like his father before him, Philip was a Tailor; at the same time joining this occupation to running an Alehouse.  He married a lady called Margaret Grave (sister of Martha Grave who married his brother Aquila and daughter of William & Margaret Grave, Poulterers of Sawbridgeworth) in about 1690, though I have been unable to trace a marriage entry.  Margaret was born in 1670 and therefore a trifle underage when they married. 

Her parents have been researched a little as two Ginn brothers married two Grave sisters and the links are interesting.  As I say, William Grave was a poulterer, the Grave family being quite large in Sawbridgeworth.  William married a lady called Margaret during the Commonwealth period and proceeded to have eight daughters, four of whom survived.  Of these, Margaret (1670) married Philip here, Martha (1661) married twice, her second husband being Philip’s brother Aquila,  Grace (1673) married James Curtin of Sawbridgeworth in 1692 and then William Baron at Sawbridgeworth in 1708 and Joan (1675)  married Thomas Mumford als Muntford of Aythorpe Roding at Hatfield Broad Oak in 1695.  William Grave himself died at Sawbridgeworth in 1685 and left a will (ERO) The family were close and the inter-relationships were of some confusion to me (various family members being mentioned in Ginn wills) until the discovery in 2006 or so of the 1716 deed (DE/Z120/44686 at the HRO) which mentioned all four sisters at the same time and enabled me to work out how the Grave family and all their various kin fitted in to the Ginn story.

This couple had a gigantic family, most of whom failed to survive infancy.  There are no Ginn descendants of this man, there were no surviving sons, but there are most certainly descendants through the daughters and the family have always greatly interested me and new information has come to light as recently as this year.
  
So, Philip and Margaret lived a quiet life in North Street, Bishops Stortford had a huge family and no doubt socialised a great deal with the Grave family and Philip's brothers Aquila and James. 
 

Philip Ginn (like his brothers) was quite educated, he could write a very good hand.  He was not, sadly, immune to the various epidemics that periodically beset Bishop's Stortford, and had claimed his father and sister and  unfortunately became ill in early 1715 and died the same year, he was 49. It was probably smallpox again.

Philip’s early death provoked a bit of a crisis.  He left a will (ERO) the original of which survives and the last page with his signature is shown above and made various bequests, chiefly to the children, many of whom were underage when he died.   Margaret was left with the pub to run and a number of young children.  She also had to pay the bequests.

It is not totally clear what was happening between 1715 and 1733 but they seem to have mortgaged the pub.  We are not on clear ground until 1733 (from which date there are surviving deeds) at which point James Ginn and John Edwards (Philip's son-in-law) appear to be paying off the mortgage for £83.  We are left in no doubt that John Edwards provided most of the money, because the pub was put in trust for him.

I have no information on when Margaret died – she was alive in 1716.  I have assumed that she left Stortford with one of her daughters, although her burial entry could be missed from the register. As some of her daughters went to London I have considered  a possible entry at St Leonards Shoreditch in 1746 but the woman is given as 63 and our Margaret was 76.

"The Pewter Pot" passed into the hands of the Edwards family as will be briefly related below.

As I say, Philip and Margaret had a huge family but only six  survived:  

Ann -  Ann Ginn married John Edwards of Bishops Stortford in about 1724.  I have not yet found a marriage and it is not impossible that he was her second husband.   John was a Tailor (who also ran "The Pewter Pot").  They had a number of children including three sons named after her father and Ginn uncles, Aquila, James and Philip.  John died prematurely, in 1747 (see Will ERO). Ann also, she died in 1749, aged 54 (see Will ERO).  "The Pewter Pot" was inherited by their eldest son, Aquila Ginn Edwards and there is a heck of a story here.


Elizabeth - the second of her name, she married William Knott a weaver of Saffron Walden in 1724.  Although a William Knott died as SW in 1729, in her Uncle Aquila's will drawn in early 1739 she was still said to be married to William. 

Martha - it  has taken  me 23 years to trace her, even with the clues as to her husband in Ginn wills – the record of the marriage was simply not available.  Martha Ginn married James Sutton at  St Leonard’s Shoreditch in 1730.   James was a Tailor - no surpise there.  They lived in St George in the East parish in London (effectively Wapping) which was a new parish and had a new church

 and had  known children:  Margaret 1732, James 1734 (d) William 1736, Elizabeth 1739, Ann 1741,  at which point Martha was 42. They lived in Church Lane which became Backchurch Lane in Victorian times.   At this time the area was relatively rural though was developing swiftly.  James Sutton (Tailor) died in 1741 at St Georges.  I am working on what happened after that.

Margaret - the second of the name, she was alive and still a spinster in 1739 when she was 36.  I have not traced her.

Mary - as of writing this blog she is still being researched and what follows are my "work in progress" notes. She was known in early 1739 (Ginn wills) to have been the widow of a Humphrey Hill and in 1742 to have been the wife of someone with the surname Hermon.  I tried to trace her, considering Essex the most likely bet and had no success at all.

In 2012 I purchased the trade token of her gt. uncle Richard Ginn (who had had the “Half Moon” Alehouse) and whether this brought me spooky luck or not I have no idea, but exactly the next day after it arrived I traced her.

I was idly writing up the notes of her sister Martha (above) when I noticed that on the same page as the marriage of Martha in St Leonards Shoreditch there was the marriage of a Mary Bridges to a Humphrey Hill, scarcely a common name.  I then did a search for a marriage of a Mary Ginn to a Bridges and found a Fleet marriage.  Then, having scoured the transcribed Fleet Chapel registers (which had helpfully been incorrectly indexed) I found the original marriage entry.  A chinese puzzle solved !!

Mary Ginn married John Bridges (a gardener from Cheshunt in Hertfordshire) at the Fleet in London in 1724.  She was 19 and thus under age which may have led her to the Fleet as the marriage may not have met with Mum’s approval.  The Minister (if indeed he was a proper minister) was John Evans so the couple likely married at the tavern called “The Fighting Cocks” in Fleet Lane, Evans apparently doing a lot of his business there.

John Bridges was likely born to Peter and Susan (nee Walker) at Cheshunt in 1699 and there is no evidence the couple returned to Herts.  They likely settled in London.  No children have been traced but John Bridges died in the late 1720s, possibly dying at Eagle Street, Holborn in 1726 or maybe (even) being the John Bridges transported for grand larceny (Old Bailey records) in 1728, in any event his being off the scene by 1730 or so.

In 1731 Mary married Humphrey Hill at St Leonard’s Shoreditch.  By 1737 the couple were at St Nicholas Olave in the City where they had a daughter Mary that year. This church (on the west side of Bread Street Hill) had in fact burnt down in the Great Fire and was never rebuilt but the churchyard was used and the parish combined with St Nicholas Cole Abbey. From what I can gather, Humphrey was a good deal older than Mary  (26 in 1731) Humphrey being entitled to be entered into the Company of Merchant Taylors but  actually entered into the Company of Weavers in 1704 and it seems likely he was a middle aged widower and known to her sister or one of the other tailors or weavers in this family. Unfortunately Humphrey Hill  died at St Nicholas Olave in 1738 and Mary was a widow again. She either married or unofficially got together with someone with the surname Hermon by the year 1742 but I have not traced her again yet. In fact I was delighted to trace her at all 

                  Bread Street Hill with St Olave churchyard to right

Susanna - the second of her name, was still a spinster in 1739 when she was 28.  She may have gone to London with her sisters and died  at Holy Trinity the Less in 1745 - it is speculation.

Philip - two sons of this name died in infancy

Grace - one died in infancy and though the second survived she was dead by 1739. 

William - died in infancy