1. JOHN WARMINGTON (b C1764 ; d. 25 May 1837) ; married Amelia (b C1762; died 30 Oct 1843). John & Amelia are buried at Bidford-on-Avon; their gravestone is (or was) a flat stone in the churchyard alongside the Avon. Says John was late of Marlcliff.

As well as John (2) they had a daughter, Elizabeth, who married William Barllam, but who died aged 23. They also had four children, William, Mary, George and Richard, who died in infancy (All this from the tombstone). Possibly other children as well

2. JOHN WARMINGTON, second son of (1); was born in Bidford in 1790 and baptised on 2nd May. He was married on 4 June 1814 in St Martin’s Church, Birmingham, to Frances, daughter of Joseph Price, possibly landlord of the Swan Inn, at Wilmcote near Stratford-on-Avon, and his wife, Ann. (The Prices seem to have come originally from Birmingham).

.Either before or after his marriage, John settled in Wilmcote, where he worked as a stone mason for up to 20 years, probably in the quarries there. The Stratford Canal had just opened and the quarries were expanding, sending stone to the midlands during the building boom.

However, before he was 50 John had become a farmer and innkeeper, having apparently inherited the Swan from his father-in-law. (The Swan was until recently known as the Swan House Hotel, but has now changed its name to Arden House Hotel after Shakepeare’s mother, Mary Arden,who was born in Wilmcote). There are records in the Shakespeare Memorial Centre Record Office of incidents during John’s tenure of the Inn.

At the 1841 census, John’s mother, Amelia, was living with them at the Swan, the year before she died. He and Frances had nine children altogether : Ann, (b1815) Henry, George, John, Caroline Amelia, Elizabeth, Charles, William (b 1827), and James. It appears that Caroline Amelia, Charles and James may all have died in infancy.

By 1851 John is called an innkeeper and maltster. I have not looked at the 1861 census returns for Wilmcote. John and Frances were both buried in Wilmcote churchyard. The gravestone is flaked, and John’s date of death cannot be read. Frances died in 1869.

3. WILLIAM WARMINGTON, eighth child and fifth son of (2). Born in 1827 he was still living at home in Wilmcote in 1851, when he was described as a maltster, presumably working for his father.. He then seems to have moved to Dorsington, and he married Prudence Grace Parker in Badsey on 15th June 1854. Their eldest son, William John was born in Dorsington on 17th October. William was described on his marriage certificate as a farmer.

After their marriage William Warmington and Prudence moved, first to Cleeve Prior, where their second child, Frances Mary, was born in 1856. (She died when she was six years old). They then moved to Badsey, where William took over the Bell Inn in Baker Lane. He later added farming to innkeeping as an occupation. He remained at the Bell until his death in July 1900, aged 73. The inn was then taken over by his youngest son, Walter, and still later by Walter’s sons. It now no longer exists.

William and Prudence had six children, the last four all born at the Bell. After William John and Frances Mary came Henry George (b.1859), Prudence Grace (b.1862) Helena Augusta (b.1864) and Walter Richard (b.1866).

WILLIAM’S DESCENDANTS :

WILLIAM JOHN (known as John) was apprenticed to a builder when he left school and eventually became a master carpenter (though he also practised market gardening in the Badsey area and possibly later at Campden). He married Rose Anne Bennett in 1885. He had five children : John Joseph, known as Joseph (1888-1964), Kathleen Grace (1892 - 1978), William Henry known as Harry (1895 - 1979), Norah Augusta (1900 - 1980), and Dorothy Mary (1902 - 1986?). John’s wife, Rose, had been brought up in Campden by an aunt and uncle, Joseph and Jemima Restall, and her two eldest children also spent much of their childhood with the Restalls. The whole family moved to Campden in 1904 where Joseph and Harry spent the rest of their lives. The three girls married and moved away.

FRANCES MARY died in Badsey aged only 6

HENRY GEORGE WARMINGTON. Born in Badsey in 1859, he married a girl called Mary E. Cureton. He seems to have moved to South Staffordshire, near Lichfield, where he was either an innkeeper or a baker. They had four sons, Henry, Arthur, Leonard and Cyril. Henry became a baker in Lichfield and his three daughters are still alive. Arthur became a sign writer in Erdington. Cyril was killed in the first world war, and Leonard died soon after.

PRUDENCE GRACE never married, but she had a daughter, Grace, b 1894 who married a --- Williams. Prudence and her daughter moved away to Bubbenhall, near Coventry. (However she is said to have been living at Aston near Birmingham during the first world war.)

HELENA AUGUSTA (known I believe as Gussy) married Henry Ruck (of Badsey?) in 1887 and they had two sons and two daughters. Henry Ruck was at first a farm bailiff in Broadway, and from about 1890 he farmed at Blackminster. He died when he was only 37 and was buried in Badsey. It appears that his widow also moved to Bubbenhall, where there are still Rucks living.

WALTER RICHARD in his early life was a farmer and he was also Assistant Overseer of the Poor in Badsey for a considerable period. For a time, too he was the paid Rate Collector for the parish. He seems to have taken over the Bell Inn from his father. He married Jecolia Ann Smith and they had 4 or 5 children, Richard Smith Warmington (b 1889), Prudence Jecolia, known as Jecolia, (b 1891), Thomas Walter (Tom), (b 1893) Gwendoline Augusta (Gwen) (b 1894) and Albert Edward (Bert) (b 1902). Of these, Richard is said to have had eleven children or more, and Jecolia married a Jack Bennett and had two sons and three daughters.

 

It is striking how frequently the names Prudence, Grace Augusta and Jecolia crop up among the girls, the first two inherited from the Parkers.

Among the boys, William and John tend to alternate. My son’s first name is John and mine is William (Both of these are coincidences) But my fathers. first name was John, and his father was William John. These are all names of the eldest son. William John’s father was William whose father was John. Before that Johns tend to proliferate.

Notes compiled by Allan Warmington, February 2004.