Third Generation

He presumably took some interest in the affairs of his local church, and shared the enthusiasm of the parishioners for the planned extensions, for which Thomas Cockshutt, incumbent, had sought permission from the Archbishop of York which was granted as follows:

then passed through a number of hands until it came into the hands of Robert, who had already purchased the tannery.

There had been a tanning enterprise at Potterton for some time before Robert took over the business. Before him, the Vevers family had been connected with tanning in Potterton—the first known being one Richard Vevers, a tanner who in 1608-9, acquired by fine from John Gascoigne lands in Potterton including a messuage, a barn, garden, orchard, 47 acres of land, 3 acres of meadow, 30 acres of pasture, and common on turbary and pasture, paying the sum of £60 sterling. Another Richard Vevers, probably a grandson of the former, received from John Gascoigne of Parlington, on 20^th July 1706, an assignment of a small part of the lord’s waste in Potterton, presumably for the purpose of extending the tanning yard. In 1732 Richard Vevers mortgaged this enclosure to John Shackleton of Ripon for £100 and he, in 1744, sold it to Robert Fretwell who also bought from Shackleton other lands which had been mortgaged to him in 1732 by the Rev. William Vevers. Robert settled the tanning yard and these other estates on his wife, Alice.

Parish Church - Barwick in Elmet

As a mark of his social standing and the esteem in which Robert was held, or perhaps because he could afford the honour or it was his by right of ownership, he was, in 1749, allotted a pew in the Parish Church. The citation reads:

Hall Raw (Royd?) Farm
From a selection of John Nattes Drawings of Cawthorne (1808-1809
 reproduced in Barry Jackson, Cawthorne 1790-1990

This financial disgrace was further compounded when he was removed from the ranks of the Conservators of the Tadcaster Wharfe, a position he is recorded as holding in 1758.

From these legal transactions we learn that Robert must have died some time between 1766 and 1771 in Chittagong. What he did there, and the circumstances under which he lived and died, are not known. Nor is there anything yet discovered as to what happened to Alice, left no doubt in straitened circumstances. Similarly, we have yet to find out what happened to their four children, although we know that at least Thomas was still alive in 1771.

Mary Fretwell

Mary was the first born of Johannes (John) Fretwell and Ann (née Woodhead), and was baptised in December 1689 (or 1690, as there are two references) at the All Saints Church, Cawthorne.

MARY FRETWELL baptized Decem the 28^th
MARY FRETWELL bapt December the 27

Just two months before her 18^th/19^th birthday, on 23^rd December 1707, she married, the event being recorded in the Cawthorne Parish Register.

THOMAS FAWLEY & MARY FRETWELL. Octob’r the 23^nd

Thomas Ffawley, is described as Yeoman, of Hollinhouse and High Hoyland, a parish-town situated a mere 1½ miles from Cawthorne, and, in another source, as Thomas Fawley of Hall House, yeoman. I have postulated 1681 as the year of his birth from an entry, the only one for a Thomas in the appropriate time-frame, in the Cawthorne Parish Register, but have no confirmation that this is a correct assumption.

THO FAWLEY bap Decem the 1

In fact, we know virtually nothing about Mary, and not much more about her husband Thomas, except that the Fawleys were well established in the district. An earlier born Thomas was one of the Churchwardens who attested, on July 9^th 1689, to the collection of funds for the “Just Protestants” referred to earlier. The Fawleys were also connected to the Webster family, and thus to the Halliley family, who, in turn, were one-time owners of Bickerton Hall near Bilton. Subsequently, Mary’s brothers Francis and John, were the owners of the Hall.

George Webster was the administrator of the estate of John Fawley of Cawthorne. John Fawley had married Ellen Webster, George's sister in about 1668. George's nephew, Thomas Webster of Featherstone, later of Bickerton, signed the bond as well as George, presumably after the death of John Fawley. Thomas Webster’s wife Elizabeth, née Halliley, probably inherited the Bickerton Estate around 1700 from her father, Robert or Thomas Halliley.

Thomas Fawley was, in all probability the son of the above mentioned John Fawley of Barnby in Cawthorne and Ellen née Webster. If this was so, then Thomas Webster and Thomas Fawley were cousins, and Ellen was Mary’s mother-in-law. It is interesting to note that the continuing Webster-Fawley-Fretwell links continued through to at least the next generation. Anthony Webster son of Thomas and Elizabeth, and Mary’s nephew by marriage, was appointed as Executor of her brother John’s Will. Definitely a case of ‘keeping things in the family’.

According to her brother Francis’s will, drawn up in 1727, by which bequests were made inter alia to the children of his sisters Mary, Grace, and Ann, there was at least one child, and maybe more, from the marriage of Mary and Thomas Fawley, which, if they lived together until Mary’s death, lasted almost 30 years. But there is nothing in the family papers to indicate who the offspring may have been. But, given the date of the above-mentioned will, it is reasonable to assume that there were some children of Mary and Thomas still living in 1727. Mary died in 1736 aged 47, and her burial was recorded in the Cawthorne Parish Register.

MARY wife of THOMAS FAWLEY (from Hoyland) June 24^th

If we accept the 1681 birth date, widower Thomas would have been in his mid-50s when he married for a second time, to Marg(a)ret Hirst of Cawthorne, in 1737/38.

THOMAS FAWLEY of High Hoyland and MARGRET HIRST of Cawthorne by Banns publish’d certify’d by Mr Burton Cur’t marry’d by me Tho: Cockshutt Jan.31st

Francis Fretwell

The ‘hatched, matched and duly dispatched’ information for the second child and first son of Johannes Fretwell and Ann Woodhead, Francis Fretwell of Bickerton, in the County of the City of York, Gentleman, is : baptised 24^th October 1691, married in late 1718; buried on 26^th January 1727/28. Here we have another Fretwell who was ‘going places’—and in every sense, since Bickerton and Bilton are more than a stone’s throw away from the Cawthorne district, lying some 30 miles north east as the crow flies.

Francis, by the age of 33 when his father died, was a ’man of substance’. Confirmation, as we have seen, of Francis’s relatively comfortable position is found in the terms of his father’s will. John Fretwell of Cinder Hill, Cawthorne left to his son Francis one penny "as he was so well provided for". As indeed he was, for not only did he inherit Bickerton Hall, but five other properties one of which, in Messingham, he acquired by marriage.

In late 1718, when Francis was 27, he married Elizabeth Huntington of West Stockwith, Co. Notts., a widow who had lost her first husband four years earlier. Dates for her birth and death are not known but the latter event would have occurred after Francis’s death on 9^th January 1727/28. It was likely that the ceremony was held at Bilton as the marriage was commemorated with a Marriage Tablet in the chancel near the south wall of the Bilton. Unless there was a big disparity in age between herself and her first husband, Elizabeth would have been some years older than Francis.

William Huntington, the second son of John and Mary Huntington, died on 24^th December 1714, aged 41 years and three days later was buried, at Misterton. Some years after this, on 1^st October 1722 his body was removed to his own chapel at West Stockwith. The consecration of the new chapel and the relocation of its patron’s remains is recorded by James Fretwell (a scion of another Fretwell family) who wrote in his diary :

“Sunday, September 30th, 1722. - My brother John and sister Mary went to Stockwith, to see the ceremony of the consecration of the new chappel, built there pursuant to the will of the late Mr. William Huntington ship-wright, whose body was removed from the parish church of Mysterton and laid in his own chappel, the following day.”

The reason for this relocation is interesting. An inscription around the basement of a marble effigy in the chapel reads :

Here lieth the body of William Huntington, late of this place, ship carpenter, second son of John and Mary Huntington: who, by his last will and testament after the death of his mother and the marriage or death of his widow, gave seven hundred and forty pounds for ye building of ye chappall and hospital round about it, and for ye support of a minister, school-master, and ten poor ship carpenters' widows, and other charitys, bequeathed all his lands in West Stockwith, Gunhouse and Misterton, for ever. He dyed Decembr. the 24th, 1714, aged forty-one years. The executing of his will was committed by ye founder to ye care of William Sampson, junr., gent., Matthew Sampson, gent., Thomas Donekin, mercht., Henry Shaw, gent. of Gainsborough.

Before their marriage Francis entered into a Bond, dated 18^th October 1718, with William Sampson Jnr of Gainsborough County, Lincoln, Gentleman, and Matthew Sampson, brother of the foregoing, in the sum of £2,000 that he would leave his wife, if she survived him, £1,000, and all such goods and chattels, as she was possessed of before her marriage with him.

After a no doubt comfortable, but, seemingly, childless marriage of just less than 10 years, Elizabeth was once more a widow, with the death of Francis in his mid-30s, a young age even for those days. His passing was commemorated by a monumental inscription on the floor of the South Aisle of St Helen’s Church:

Mr Francis Fretwell (37) of Bickerton Hall, died 8 Jan 1728

and from the Burial Certificate :

“Burials in the Parish of Bilton-in-Ainsty, in the County of York, in the year one thousand seven hundred and twenty eight. Mr Francis Fretwell of Bickerton was buried Jan^y 9^th.”

Only two months before his death at the Francis drew up his will on 10^th November 1727. Sole Executor was his brother John Fretwell, Gentleman, and the Witnesses were William Carrick, William Carrick Jnr., and Richard Turner. The will was proved on 26^th January 1727/28. Not only was Francis true to his bond, but he also left to Elizabeth all his lands in Messingham.

Apart from the bequests made to Elizabeth, Francis provided for other members of his family. Among those to benefit were :
John and Francis Fretwell -  brother and nephew, son of John
Mary, Grace and Ann -  sisters, and wives respectively of Thomas Fawley, George Walker, Stephen Arnold
Mary Fretwell -  niece, daughter of John
Matthew Fretchwell  - uncle

The beneficiaries also included the children of his sisters Mary, Grace, and Ann, and his cousins Robert and Susannah - son and daughter of Robert, and William and Ann — children of Matthew. And Francis did not forget the loyalty and service of his servants, William Bell and Ann Clithers, who were also provided for.

John Fretwell

John Fretwell of Bretton, and later of Bickerton Hall, in the parish of St.Helen’s, Bilton, Co of York, Gentleman, was baptised according to the Cawthorne Parish Register in October 1693.

JOHN son of JOHN FRETWELL bap Octob’r the 19^th

He married Mary, about whom nothing is known at present, probably around 1723, at the relatively late age of around 30. John was another Fretwell to move away from home territory, following his elder brother Francis to Bickerton. Over a period of 9 years four children were born to John and Mary.