KETTLE OF WORCESTER

 

Census returns indicate that Susanna (Kettle) Harrison was born about 1798. The 1841 returns indicate that Susanna and her husband James Harrison were not born in Worcestershire[1] but the limited birthplace information in the 1841 entry is inaccurate for several members of the family,[2] and the 1851[3] and 1861[4] returns both state that Susanna was born at Worcester. The baptism of a Susanna Kettle, daughter of John and Sarah, in 1797, is recorded in the registers of St Peter, Worcester. There was a Susanna Kettle who married William Jones at nearby Claines in 1818. However, the 1851 census returns for Claines show Susanna, wife of William Jones, as being aged sixty-three and born at “Martin” in Worcestershire.[5] William’s wife would therefore be the Susanna, daughter of William and Susanna Kettle, who was baptised on 2 August 1789 at Martin Hussingtree.[6]

 

John Kettle and Sarah Page were married at Claines in 1792, when one of the witnesses was William Kettle, whose signature allows him to be identified as the William Kettle who witnessed the married of Mary Kettle and William Grafton at Claines in 1792, and as the William Kettle of St Swithun, Worcester, cordwainer, whose bond for marrying Ann Hodges was made in 1788. Another clue to the family background is that William Kettle of St Swithun, cordwainer, took on Richard Kettle as an apprentice in 1790.[7] Children of appropriate ages named William, Mary, John and Richard are found in the family of William and Mary Kettle.

 

The marriage of William Kettle and Mary Prichard took place at St Nicholas, Worcester, in 1765. There were some earlier Kettles in the area who might be members of William’s family. However, the 1765 marriage allegation, which states that William was “of the age of twenty four years and upwards”, describes him as “of the Parish of St James in the City of Bristol, Servant”.

 

A family possibly connected to Susanna (Kettle) Harrison is that of James Kettle and Sarah Clark who were married at St Clement, Worcester, in 1787. They seem to be the parents of children baptised at Hanbury in 1788, 1790 and 1792, Stoke Prior in 1794 and 1798, and Bromsgrove in 1800 and 1804. Richard Kettle, son of James and Sarah, lived at Kington in Herefordshire in the 1830s and that is where James and Susannah (Kettle) Harrison also moved in the 1830s and is where their son George Harrison and his family later lived. Derek Vincent Davies, a great-great-great-grandson of James and Susanna (Kettle) Harrison, has a 9 cM DNA match with a great-great-great-great-grandchild of James Kettle who was a son of James and Sarah (Clark) Kettle. There is also another DNA match which seems to be relevant here. Derek Vincent Davies has a match of 24 cM with a descendant of Mary Bounds, baptised in 1824 at Almeley, Herefordshire, illegitimate daughter of Martha Bounds. The 24 cM match is a common match for Derek and for a descendant of Reuben, son of James and Susannah (Kettle) Harrison. It therefore appears that the link with the 24 cM match is through James or Susannah. The father of the Mary Bounds baptised in 1824 has not been definitely identified, but the widow of her mother’s brother Richard Bounds married Richard Kettle (son of James and Sarah) in 1832, which is suggestive of a connection through the Kettle family.

 

Another link suggested by DNA matches is with William Kettle of Cork in Ireland. William was born about 1816[8] and the record for his second marriage in 1885 gives his father as John Kettle, a glove cutter.[9] This occupation is suggestive of a connection with the Kettles of Worcester, where the glove industry was very significant in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Derek Vincent Davies has a 16 cM match with a descendant of William Kettle of Cork and the descendant of William is also a DNA match with another descendant of James and Susannah (Kettle) Harrison through a different one of their children.

 

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KETTLE

 

1          WILLIAM KETTLE,[10] servant, married on 17 February 1765 at St Nicholas, Worcester, MARY PRICHARD,[11] victualler.[12]

 

Children of William and Mary (Prichard) Kettle:

i               WILLIAM KETTLE of Worcester, cordwainer, bap 25 Mar 1767, All Saints, Worcester;[13] m 19 Jun 1788, St Swithun, Worcester, ANN HODGES.[14]

ii              EDWARD KETTLE of Claines, victualler, bap 5 Mar 1769, All Saints, Worcester,[15] d 14 Jun 1828, bur 18 Jun 1828, Claines;[16] m 20 Aug 1793, Claines, MARY GRAINGER.[17]

iii             MARY KETTLE, bap 28 Jan 1771, Claines;[18] m 30 Jan 1792, Claines, WILLIAM GRAFTON.[19]

2              iv             JOHN KETTLE (1772-1825); m SARAH PAGE.

v              JAMES KETTLE, bap 8 Aug 1774, Claines.[20]

vi             RICHARD KETTLE of Worcester, bap 26 Dec 1776, Claines;[21] m 13 Feb 1798, St Helen, Worcester, HANNAH SHIPMAN.[22]

 

2          JOHN KETTLE of Worcester was baptised on 3 May 1772 at Claines,[23] died at Worcester and was buried on 14 June 1825 at St Oswald, Worcester.[24] He married on 22 April 1792 at Claines, SARAH PAGE.[25]

 

Children of John and Sarah (Page) Kettle:

i               JAMES KETTLE, bap 19 Apr 1793, St Peter, Worcester.[26]

ii              SARAH KETTLE, bap 3 Jul 1795, St Peter, Worcester.[27]

iii             SUSANNA KETTLE, gloveress, b Worcester, bap 24 Aug 1797, St Peter, Worcester,[28] d 10 Apr 1866, Worcester;[29] m 13 Sep 1818, Wednesbury, Staffordshire, JAMES HARRISON[30] (see here).

iv             JOSEPH KETTLE, bap 14 Mar 1800, St Peter, Worcester,[31] bur 17 Apr 1801, St Oswald, Worcester.[32]

v              ANN KETTLE, bap 27 Oct 1802, St Peter, Worcester.[33]


[1] 1841 census returns, Worcester (National Archives, HO 107/1209/9, fol. 18).

[2] Among James and Susanna’s children, the entry indicates that Joshua, Matilda and Charlotte were not born in Worcestershire, and that Reuben, Henry and Daniel were born in Worcestershire. In all these cases, the information is contradicted by other sources.

[3] 1851 census returns, Worcester (National Archives, HO 107/2042, fol. 459).

[4] 1861 census returns, Worcester (National Archives, RG 9/2095, fol. 16).

[5] 1851 census returns, Claines (National Archives, HO 107/2046, fol. 192).

[6] Martin Hussingtree parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[7] National Archives, IR 1/66.

[8] Ireland, Prison Registers, 1790-1924 (online at www.ancestry.com).

[9] Marriage record for William Kettle and Hanora Murphy.

[10] The parish registers of St Helen, Worcester (online at www.ancestry.com) show a William Kettle buried on 5 Jun 1778.

[11] St Nicholas, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com); Worcestershire Marriage Licenses, 1661-1949 (online at www.ancestry.com). She signed the register as “Mary Prichard” but her surname is spelt “Pritchett” in the listing of parties. The allegation describes her as “aged twenty three years and upwards [and] a Spinster”. She may be the Mary Kettle aged 83 whose burial on 2 Apr 1820 is recorded in the Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com) as having taken place “at St Oswalds”. This was the burial ground of St Oswald’s Hospital. The marriage of an Esther Pritchard to John Jones in 1772 at Claines was witnessed by William Kettle.

[12] Mary Kettle is listed as a victualler of the Queen’s Head in the Tything in The Worcester Directory (Worcester, 1788), 18. Edward Kettle was living at the Queen’s Head in 1809 (Berrow’s Worcester Journal, 18 May 1809).

[13] All Saints, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[14] St Martin, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com); Worcestershire Marriage Licenses, 1661-1949 (online at www.ancestry.com).

[15] All Saints, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[16] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com); Berrow’s Worcester Journal, 26 Jun 1828.

[17] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[18] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[19] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[20] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[21] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[22] St Helen, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[23] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[24] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com); Berrow’s Worcester Journal, 16 Jun 1825.

[25] Claines parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com). A Sarah Kettle of St John’s parish was buried at St Clement, Worcester, on 21 Apr 1834, aged 65 (St Clement, Worcester, parish registers, online at www.ancestry.com).

[26] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[27] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[28] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com); 1851 census returns, Worcester (National Archives, HO 107/2042, fol. 459).

[29] Death certificate.

[30] Wednesbury parish registers (online at www.findmypast.co.uk). The identity of the James Harrison and Susannah Kettle married at Wednesbury with the James and Susannah Harrison whose children were baptised at Worcester and Kington is proved by the birth certificate of Daniel Harrison (born in 1838) which gives his mother’s maiden surname as Kettle.

[31] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[32] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[33] St Peter, Worcester, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).