Introduction

I am very fortunate that my father-in-law, and his father before him, were avid family genealogists. However, and perhaps understandably, their research concentrated almost exclusively on the male lineage. So what really fascinated me about John Fretwell’s will were the references to his nieces and nephews. And the more I read the will the more intrigued I became to find out something about these family ‘offshoots’ who, for whatever reason, had been accorded scant attention or had not featured at all in any of the family records.

The Will

John Fretwell's will was divided into two sections - the first dealt with the disbursement of John’s goods and chattels. The second part concerned what he described as :

...all my freehold estate situate on the West side in Briggate Leeds called “The Talbot Estate” consisting of the Talbot Inn 3 Shops etc and my estate called Dawbridge in Hunslet Lane usually called by me “the Railway Foundry Estate” with the Railway Foundry Workshops and other Buildings^[1] together with all my ready money and securities for money upon trust…

which he instructed his Executors to sell and, from the proceeds, to provide for various annuities and legacies.

I appreciate that a list of bequests might be considered rather tedious reading but the following extracts from John Fretwell’s will are provided to show how valuable they were to me in trying to piece together something about the beneficiaries, and to show how these snippets gave some tantalising, if sometimes somewhat obscure leads for my research into what may be called the Fretwell family “also-rans”. I have sorted the haphazard order of bequests listed in the original document into ‘family’ groupings. I have also included the information gleaned from John’s choice of executors, George Newton, Charles and Isabella Todd, and Henry May.

Clearly some beneficiaries did rather better than others in the disbursement of the dwellings, goods and chattels. Ann Newton and her children were guaranteed somewhere to live for the immediate and longer future. Isabella Todd and her 4 daughters too were well catered for with a house and the bulk of John Fretwell’s belongings. John had been concerned that Mary Kay would be able to care for her stricken husband Edward and, as he was presumably unable to earn a living, to have the means of supporting their children. Others such as the children of John and Mary Kay, and the Hollings and Mayking families were less well provided for in the short term.

It should be noted also that, however benevolent John may have been, he was ever the business man. Three of his relatives owed him money. There was an outstanding amount of £90 owing by to the John Dixon and Partner and his great nephew George Newton owed him £350.^[11]

More heavily indebted was Charles Todd, to the tune of £635, for the purchase of one new steam Engine, and two boilers. These amounts were to be recovered before various bequests were paid out.

It is of some significance, perhaps, that John specified that the annuities provided for Isabella Fawcett, Mary May and Eliza Hollings were to be free of their respective husband’s control.^[12] It was not until the 1870 and 1882 Married Women’s Property Acts were passed that women were granted rights to property whether secured before marriage or not. Either John was sensitive to the inequities of the prevailing legalities, or perhaps, more speculatively, he harboured misgivings about the husbands of these women!

A number of John’s relatives were also to benefit from the final winding up of the Talbot and Foundry (Residuary) Estates. They could look forward to a substantial windfall, but they probably did not realise that they would have to wait so long before these funds became available to them. The terms of management for the Estates’ investments stipulated that the final disbursement of funds could not occur until the death of the last surviving annuitant. This was John’s great niece, Eliza Hollings, who died on the 19th October 1899, just short of her 90th birthday. Only then could the accountants, W.S. Blackburn & Co of Benson‘s Buildings, Leeds get to work on their sums. There was a further delay while they tidied up all the loose ends, and the fruits of their labours were two documents. Account ‘A’, dated 28th August 1890, detailed the “Talbot Estate Capital Account, with Income from the date of death of Mrs. Eliza Hollings, the last surviving annuitant”. Account ‘D”, dated 3rd September 1890, set out the “Division of Funds arising from the Talbot Estate and Residuary Estate”.

From a family history perspective these two documents are very helpful in supplementing the information gathered from John Fretwell’s will. Where the will does not always identify family members by name, the Accounts actually give the names of all beneficiaries together with the married names of the great nieces – which is particularly helpful for those who had married after the will had been drawn up. Furthermore, because Eliza lived to such a good age, she outlived a fair percentage of the beneficiaries, which establishes that they had died by August 1890. As with the will, some families fared better than others when the day of final reckoning came, and (apart from the children of John’s brother William) the May children were the only ones listed in Account ‘D’.

Those who were included in Account ‘A’ only (together with the amount received) were :

In addition to receiving £462-18-9 from Account ‘A’, each of the May children also received a further £919-8-9 from Account ‘D’, totalling £1,382-7-6 each. But, as the following list indicates, they did not all live to benefit personally.