Thomas Ellerby 1790 - 1837

Thomas Ellerby
My interest in genealogy was kindled by the family bibles that my late father had. One was a two volume set beautifully bound with a fine red leather label inside with 'Thomas Ellerby Skinningrove' inscribed in gold. As a teenager, I loved looking through these old books, not only for the information inside, but for the feel and smell of those old books. Of course there was a wealth of genealogical information in the front of this bible and the other bible which had the same information written in. Even when I started researching the Ellerby family in earnest in 2001 I knew almost nothing about the provenance of these bibles. The two volume set I eventually realised had almost certainly been given to Thomas Ellerby on the occasion of his wedding and the other had been given to his son on the occasion of his wedding by the Pennyman family of Ormesby Hall, near Middlesbrough. I can surmise this because there is a book plate bearing Sir William Pennyman's name in the front of the bible and further research led me to discover that Thomas' son worked for the Pennyman's.

But of Thomas Ellerby I knew very little and in fact it took several years to find out the basic facts of his baptism, marriage and death. Eventually I discovered that he was baptised on the 1st April 1790 in the parish of Skelton in Clevelandand he married Hannah Foster on the 13th April 1825 by licence in Brotton Chapel. their son, John Foster Ellerby was born on the 6th September in the same year according to the bible although he wasn't baptised until November.

Thomas was the son of Joseph Ellerby and Mary Andrew and was almost certainly a farmer. Certainly his widow was farming in the 1841 census and Joseph appears to have been a small time farmer in the muster rolls. Thomas didn't marry until he was 35.

It look nearly 10 years to find out when Thomas died. I knew that he had died before the 1841 census and also before 1839 as his father-in-law's will left money to his widowed daughter. I couldn't find a reference for his death in the indexes so I guessed that he had died before 1st July 1837. Thomas appeared in the Land Tax records until 1836 so I could narrow down his death to late 1836 to early 1837. The only burial record in the area for a Thomas Ellerby was in St Nicholas' church in Guisborough but this was for someone aged 75 according to the records.

Fate stepped in fortunately. One day I was in Guisborough and had 10 minutes to spare whilst waiting for something to be ready so I wandered along to St Nicholas Church and had a look round the churchyard. It wasn't long before I came across some Foster ancestors and there, next to his father-in-law was Thomas Ellerby, late of Skinningrove, died 3rd February 1837 aged 46. The record in the parish register was wrong! There are still plenty of questions to be answered such as how did he die? Was it an accident or illness? Why was he buried in Guisborough rather than Great Ayton which was his home parish?

Thomas and Hannah lived in Tunstall near Nunthorpe. At that time both these places were in the parish of Great Ayton although there was a Chapel of Ease in Nunthorpe which I believe was later rebuilt as a proper church and Nunthorpe is now a parish in its own right. After Thomas' death Hannah continued farming in Tunstall and in 1847 she married William Barr.