The Fearn Family of Allestree Written by Andrew Thurman

Alice was the daughter of Leonard and Sarah Fearn, my great grandparents. The family name Fearn appeared in Allestree BMD records from 1790 when George Fearn and Elizabeth (nee Gregory) baptized George Fearn, the first of their eight children at St. Edmund’s Church Allestree.

The eight children of George and Sara Fearn, all baptised at St. Edmunds Church Allestree:

■ George Fearn Baptised Allestree 5 Sept 1790

■ Lydia Fearn Baptized Allestree 13 Jan 1793

■ George Fearn Baptised Allestree 17 Sept 1797

■ Elizabeth Fearn Baptised Allestree 17 Sept 1797

■ Hannah Fearn Baptised Allestree 11 Aug 1799

■ John Fearn Baptised Allestree 25 April 1802

■ Edmund Fearn Baptised Allestree 29 Sept 1804

■ Samuel Fearn Baptised Allestree 2 April 1807

Perhaps George Fearn born in 1790, died in childhood as another George was baptised in 1797. It was a common practice in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to name another child after a deceased sibling.

George Fearn senior was born in 1765 and he married Sarah Gregory at Quarndon in 1785, he came from Cromford or Wirkswirth in Derbyshire. Lydia Gregory married William Buxton (born in 1778) at Allestree on 21st November, 1799.

The family names Buxton, Fearn and Gregory appear on St. Edmund’s Allestree BMD records in the 1780’s to the 1790’s. The roots of these families are interconnected by marriage and later in 1851, Thomas Buxton married Martha Fearn on 4th October, 1851 and then history repeated when a another couple of these old Allestree names and same first names married at St. Edmunds in September 2014.

Buxton Family – Allestree

■ William Buxton born 1778 married Lydia Gregory 21 Nov 1799 at Allestree

■ Thomas Buxton Married Mary Foard 13 Sept 1800 at Allestree

■ Edmund Buxton born 1758 Buried 13 Feb 1790

■ Charles Buxton, John Buxton & son Luke were all Bricklayers 1851 census

■ Charles in 1861 census was a Bricklayer and John was Bricklayer and a publican at the Red Cow Inn

The three interconnected families by marriage are not the oldest family names found in St. Edmund’s Allestree, BM D records. The name Fletcher can be found at Allestree since at least 1538 and who knows their timeline could extend back before then?

I suspect or have a haunch that the Buxton’s, Fearn’s and Gregory’s appeared in Allestree around the time, the following advertisement featured in The Derby Mercury in 1787:

The three families were likely some of the first of Darley Mill’s workers, who were provided with housing in Allestree in the early days, beginning in the 1780s. I found James Gregory of Allestree, a “Cotton-mill hand” on the 1861 census.

The Darley Abbey mill workers cottages were built in phases stating with part of Darley Street, followed by Hill Square and The Flat Square, New Road, Brick Row, The Four Houses, Lavender Row and then Mile Ash Lane. So as each phase finished, housing mill workers at Allestree reduced, although a few families continued living in Allestree. The Evans family did not own Darley Village when the mill was built, Robert Holden was Lord of the Manor and Allestree Hall was bought by Evans circa 1805. So the Evans y didn’t own Allestree either when they established Darley Mill. Some of the Allestree housing was no doubt transferred to those in service at Allestree Hall and for workers of the Evanses Allestree tenant farmers.

The 1851, 1861 and 1871 census shows the Buxton’s were builders and John Buxton was also a publican at the Red Cow Inn Allestree. The following Derby Mercury advertisements shows the tools of their trade being sold off following the death of John Buxton in 1872 and again the same items being sold again by Mr. Smith who decided to move away. It is interesting that the brewing and running of an inn seems like an incidental business compared to the building trade and livestock. Livestock Buxton’s kept wasn’t mentioned in the censuses.

I surmise that Samuel Fearn bought the Red Cow Inn from Mr. Smith in March, 1875. I can’t be certain that the new publican at the Red Cow Inn was the same one born in 1807. It is possible but Samuel Fearn publican held a license for the Red Cow from 1875 to 1897, meaning he was 90 when he retired. So Samuel the publican may have been from the next generation of Allestree Fearn’s. Samuel Fearn the publican was also a “horse-breaker” (seen in trade directories). There were two sides to Samuel; there was a respectable Samuel who attended Oddfellows meetings at the Joiners Arms, Quarndon. Samuel Fearn and H. Buxton were members of The Royal Scarsdale Lodge of The Grand Order of Oddfellows. Seen in Derby Mercury, February 20, 1889. There was another side to Samuel and he was frequently “in the soup” but he was a survivor.

Samuel Fearn had a very colourful twenty-two years at the Red Cow Inn. This included being temporally blacklisted by Derby Brewster Sessions for allowing drunkenness on the premises and being drunk serving behind the bar. The following report by the Derby Mercury is one of many citing that Samuel was convicted by the courts or temporally blacklisted by Derby Brewster Sessions. There is a typo in the report and it should say Red Cow, Allestree and not Dun Cow. It is interesting to see the name Benjamin Gregory and that he was also convicted whilst he was publican of the Cock Inn, Muggington.

In 1877, he was called to explain himself at the inquest held the National-schoolroom, Allestree of his wife, Mary Beneditta Fearn. Rumors spread that Samuel murdered his wife. Witnesses at the inquest confirmed that Samuel treated her kindly and was tolerant of her when she had too much to drink. The father of the deceased accused Samuel of being violent towards Mary but his testament was unreliable. It transpired that Mary suffered from fits and Samuel and his mother had to hold her down to stop her from injuring herself and this accounted for bruises to her forearms. Other witnesses stated that Mary had assaulted Samuel, once with a dirty beer slops cloth and he just took it. Also, Samuel’s Mother lived with them at the Red Cow and she’d been seen fighting with Mary Beniditta, many times.

There was no question of Samuel being charged with the death of his wife aged 27 years, so she was born in 1850, making it unlikely she was married to a man 43 years older.

I think there was never a dull moment at the Red Cow Inn, when Samuel pulled the pints.

After Samuel Fearn’s stint as the landlord of the Red Cow Inn, came Leonard Fearn (born 1857) and Leonard was my great grandfather. I found no auction notices in the press for the sale of the Red Cow in 1877, so I surmise Leonard and Samuel came to an arrangement privately to transfer the ownership.

Previously Leonard was a gamekeeper at Allestree Hall, working at first for Sir William Evans and then for the Gisborne’s. There is a slight touch of irony with Allestree appointing a Fearn gamekeeper as in December 1826, the London Chronicle and the Manchester Guardian reported that “Walter Fern” of Allestree with Benjamin Green was conveyed to the house of correction in Derby for three months for the offence of “using snares for the destruction of game”.

This account in the Mercury described a brutal incident when Leonard and a policeman were confronted by a gang of men armed with sticks. Several poachers ended up in a hedge bottom with a blooded head. My grandfather, Arthur Thurman had an Oak walking stick cum-cudgel that belonged to Leonard. My granddad Arthur gave it to me when I was a lad but my Mum made me give it back, as it was riddled with woodworm.

In 1895, there was a terrible accident and Leonard doubled-up as a beater at a pheasant-shoot at the hall when Lionel Gisborne shot the pheasant that Leonard scared out of a hedge and Leonard was shot in the head, unseen by Mr. Gisborne on the other side of the hedge.

Stills from the 1984 film by Geoffrey Reeve, “The Shooting Party” based on a novel by Isabel Colegate (No copyright infringement intended).

QUOTE: “It is ungentlemanly to point your gun horizontally when shooting game.”

As far as I know, only one photo exists of Lionel Gisborne with Allestree Cricket Club C. 1892: Photo is curtsey of Allestree Cricket Club website (no copyright infringement intended).

I suspect that Mr. Gisborne was accident prone as detailed in this old local newspaper report: Leonard Fearn was 38 years old when he was blinded and due to the munificence, of Mr. Gisborne he had the means to pull pints behind the bar of the Red Cow Inn, if not the means to see when the pint pots were properly filled. I know only a little about Leonard’s time at the

Red Cow Inn, Allestree. The little bit I gleaned was when eavesdropping on a conversation between my grandfather Arthur Thurman, my father, Harry Thurman and my two Thurman uncles, Arthur and Reg. When they saw (?) I was interested; they shut up and changed the subject. They seemed to say that Leonard didn’t have the business acumen needed to run the Red Cow and that Leonard’s weakness that cost him dearly was betting at the Allestree Plate and Derby races. I heard that he was often collected by fair-weather friends and he took a purse of gold sovereigns and would ride to the races on his pony and trap. Who was it that said “Gambling is a Mugs Game;” Leonard rarely won and in the longer term he lost most of his money.

This notice in the Derby Daily Telegraph 18th December, 1901 confirms my worst fears for Leonard:

He died in 1903 and his burial was at St. Edmunds Allestree 7th March, 1903. There was no public announcement in Newspapers of his death and his age was 46 years. I think my great grandmother, Sarah Fearn ended up back in service at Allestree Hall.

Sara Fearn was “Mighty” and a “Winner” when she was a septuagenarian according to the Derby Daily Telegraph in 1933. If only she had asserted herself at the Red Cow and kept a better grip on Leonard, then she may have found herself in a more comfortable position later instead of a struggling widow. Sarah had the unusual and probably unique experience of living at both Allestree old pubs; The Red Cow as the publican’s wife and after Leonard died, she lived in a cottage that was a row of cottages that was formally the New Inn.

It’s possible that she and Leonard also lived there when he was the gamekeeper at Allestree Hall. When the end of feudalism came to Allestree and Allestree Hall and the estate was passed to the County Council, they decided to widen Duffield Road opposite the park gates (known as Allestree Corner) and the row of cottages, converted from the former New Inn were demolished in 1933.

The council did not reckon on being held up by a stubbornly tough woman in her late seventies and even though the other cottages were demolished, her end of the terrace stood defiantly with traffic being directed around it as the cottages stood in what is now the middle of Duffield Road. The newspaper article reported that she would not move until she got what she wanted?

I think that something was a not an insubstantial amount of money for those times, as Sarah’s daughter, Alice Thurman (nee Fearn) left my grandfather Arthur Thurman a bit more than couple of hundred pounds in 1952 and I can’t imagine where else the money came from.

Some Delightful Pictures of Bygone Allestree:

The following scenes would have been much the same when my Fearn ancestors lived and worked in Allestree. This post Edwardian photo shows a houses and the single story building housed the blacksmith’s forge that stood at the top of Park Lane and in the garden a pair of whales jawbones formed a decorative archway. The aptly named Samuel Pounder was here as the local blacksmith in 1870 (seen in Harrod and Co. Directory). From “Allestree Remembered” no copyright infringement intended.

Leonard and Sarah Fearn probably knew these locals at the Red Cow Inn. From “Allestree Remembered” no copyright infringement intended.

This was taken 20 or so years after Leonard and Sarah Fearn left the Red Cow and they brewed their own beer and there was no separate lounge bar in their day.

The source of this photo is unknown to the author. No copyright infringement intended.

Article written by Andrew Thurman