PART SIXTY-THREE

 

Two Collett Families from Buckinghamshire

 

Section One - An Early Collett-Family of Ivinghoe

 

Section Two – The Stratfold-Collet Family of Wendover

 

Updated October 2023

 

 

The original basic information used to compile this family line was initially provided by Christine Howard of Berlin in Germany.  However, new information received during the first two months of 2014 from Peter Proctor in Australia has identified a major error in 1744 which brought about a significant revision that same year.

 

In its original format this family had a strong link with Part 18 – The Suffolk Line by virtue of the mention of the property known as The Hale at Wendover, which passed from the Collet family to Robert Stratfold (Ref. 63L2) in 1750 on condition he change his name to Robert Collet.  That no longer exists within this family line, which now terminates with the five children of Thomas Collett by his two wives.

 

The details removed from this family line can therefore be found in Section Two – The Stratfold-Collet Family Line of Wendover, which retains the links with Part 18 – the Suffolk line.  It is there, in Section Two, that the ex-mother-in-law of the aforementioned Christine Howard can be found.  She was Joan Stratfold Collet (Ref. 63Q1), while Joan’s father was John Stratfold Collet (Ref. 63P1) who died at Poona in India during 1912, the same year that Joan was born.

 

 

 

Section One - An Early Collett Family of Ivinghoe

 

This family line starts in the Buckinghamshire village of Ivinghoe – to the south of Leighton Buzzard, where the earliest recorded birth was that of Elner [Eleanor] Collett who was baptised there on 17th June 1561, the daughter of Robert Collett.

 

Two years later Maria Collett was baptised there on 23rd December 1563, but with no parents named on the record.  Just three weeks later, at the same church, was recorded the marriage of Thomas Collett and Alice Montague on 14th January 1564, Thomas most likely being the brother of the aforementioned Robert.  Either one of these could have been the father of Maria. 

 

The next records found at Ivinghoe over twenty years later concern Thomas Collett who starts this family line.

 

 

 

63f1

Thomas Collett may have been born at Ivinghoe where his four children were certainly baptised, although each baptism entry in the parish records only included the name of the child’s father.

 

 

 

63g1

Agneta Collett

Born in 1583 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63g2

Anna Collett

Born in 1595 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63g3

Robert Collett

Born in 1597 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63g4

Elizabeth Collett

Born in 1607 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63g1

Agneta Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1583 and was baptised there on 18th August 1583, the daughter of Thomas Collett.

 

 

 

 

63g2

Anna Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1595 and it was there also that she was baptised on 28th December 1595, the daughter of Thomas Collett.

 

 

 

 

63g3

Robert Collett may have been the son of Thomas Collett of Ivinghoe, although no birth or baptism record for Robert has been found.  Likewise, no record of any marriage of Robert Collett has been found, while it is established that he had six children while at Ivinghoe.  One later baptism at Ivinghoe is of particular interest and that was the baptism of Maria Collett on 19th January 1670, the father being named as Richard Collett.  This raises the question as to whether Richard was the son of Thomas Collett (born at Ivinghoe in 1624) the fifth child of Robert and his wife, since the children of the couple’s youngest son Robert are well documented.

 

 

 

Another Richard Collett (born circa 1600) was the father of Ann and Margery and it would appear that he and his family lived to the west of Leighton Buzzard in the village of Stewkley where his two daughters were baptised.  Ann Collett was baptised on 29th August 1624, while Margery Collett was baptised there on 15th June 1628.  A further Collett family around that same time was that of John Collet (Ref. 18I1) of The Hale in Wendover whose family details can be found in Part 18 – The Suffolk Line 1360 to 1745. 

 

 

 

Further to the south, and also around that same period of time, there were two brothers Joseph and Thomas Collett who each had a daughter who was baptised at Great Marlow.  Edith Collett, the daughter of Joseph Collett (born circa 1605) and his wife Ellen, was baptised there on 25th November 1630, and Elenor Collett, the daughter of Thomas Collett (born circa 1615) and his wife Elenor, was baptised on 6th November 1639.

 

 

 

63h1

Alice Collett

Born in 1618 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63h2

Alice Collett

Born in 1619 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63h3

Frances Collett

Born in 1620 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63h4

Dorothea Collett

Born in 1621 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63h5

Thomas Collett

Born in 1624 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63h6

Robert Collett

Born in 1628 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63g4

Elizabeth Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1607, where she was baptised on 26th December 1607, the daughter of Thomas Collett.

 

 

 

 

63h1

Alice Collett was born at Ivinghoe in Buckinghamshire towards the end of 1617, and was baptised on 31st January 1618, the daughter of Robart Collatt (sic).  The fact that Robert’s second child was also named as Alice indicates that his first child died while she was still an infant.  However, there is every chance that they are one and the same.

 

 

 

 

63h2

Alice Collett was born at Ivinghoe during 1618 and was baptised there on 31st January 1619, the daughter of Robart Collatt (sic).  She was baptised on the same day as her deceased old sister in the previous year, after whom she was named, which of course might just be an error in recording and therefore both are the same one daughter of Robert Collett.

 

 

 

 

63h3

Frances Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1620, although she was named as Francis Collett when she was baptised at Ivinghoe on 29th July 1620, the daughter of Robert Collett.

 

 

 

 

63h4

Dorothea Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1621 where she was baptised on 16th March 1621, the daughter of Robert Collett.

 

 

 

 

63h5

Thomas Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1624, and was the first child of Robert Collet to be baptised using the single T spelling of the surname, when he was named on 16th October 1624.  It is possible, although not proved, that Thomas was married and had a son Richard Collett born around 1648 who in turn married and had a daughter Maria Collett who was baptised at Ivinghoe on 19th January 1670.

 

 

 

63i1

Richard Collett – not proved

Born circa 1648 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63h6

Robert Collett was born at Ivinghoe during 1628 and, curiously, he is the only child of Robert Collett for whom no baptism record has been found.  One source says that he was baptised at the Church St Gregory by St Paul in London on 11th December 1628, but that Robert Collett was the son of Richard Collett who died two days after his baptism.  Robert of Ivinghoe is known to have married Anne who was born in 1634 and together they had eleven children.  It is established that their children were born and baptised at Cheddington, the next village to the west of Ivinghoe, to the north of Tring.

 

 

 

It may be of interest that just thirteen miles north-west of Cheddington and Ivinghoe are the villages of Great Horwood and Padbury.  For the latter the children of Thomas Collett (Ref. 63J6) of Ivinghoe were born there between 1722 and 1742, whereas for the former we need to go back to the end of the fifteenth century.  From 1494 another Thomas Collett was a small landowner at Great Horwood until around 1512 and frequently held various manorial offices like constable, ale-taster, chief pledge of a tithing, and juror in the manor court.  After 1511 he temporarily disappeared from the records but was once again living at Great Horwood in 1522 when he was recorded in the Muster Roll.  Joan Collet, mentioned in the records for 1503, may have been his wife.  A second Thomas Collett, presumably the son of the first, was named in the records from 1521 until 1550.  He too was a small landowner, although he never held public office as his father did.  In 1550 he sold his land and was no longer mentioned in the local records. 

 

 

 

In addition to these, there was also a William Collett at Great Horwood in 1498, and he was still there in 1508.  The earliest Collet record at Cheddington was the baptism there of William Collett on 14th July 1576, who was the son of William Collett.

 

 

 

63i2

Mary Collett

Born in 1652 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i3

Robert Collett

Born in 1654 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i4

Anne Collett

Born in 1655 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i5

Richard Collett

Born in 1657 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i6

Elizabeth Collett

Born in 1658 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i7

Dorothy Collett

Born in 1658 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i8

Susanna Collett

Born in 1661 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i9

Sarah Collett

Born in 1663 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i10

John Collett

Born in 1665 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i11

Richard Collett

Born in 1668 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

63i12

Joseph Collett

Born in 1672 at Cheddington, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63i1

Richard Collett was possibly born around 1648 at Ivinghoe and may have been the son of Thomas Collett of Ivinghoe, although this has not been proved.  What is known is that he was married and his daughter Maria was baptised at Ivinghoe on 19th January 1670.

 

 

 

63j1

Maria Collett

Baptised on 19.01.1670 at Ivinghoe

 

 

 

 

63i2

Mary Collett was born at Cheddington in Buckinghamshire in early 1652, where she was baptised on 23rd April 1652, the first child born to Robert and Anne Collett.  When Mary was around twenty-eight years of age she may have married Richard Parker, as their wedding was recorded at Aston Abbots to the west of Cheddington on 22nd October 1678.  However, a later marriage between Mary Collet and Thomas Pipkin of Totternhoe took place at Mentmore, the next village north of Cheddington, on 29th September 1696.

 

 

 

Another connection with the village of Mentmore was in 1698 when the baptism of Martha Collett, the daughter of James Collett (born circa 1675) was recorded there on 6th November that year.  Who James was or where he might be linked to this family line has still to be determined.  It would appear that his wife was Martha and that their subsequent daughter Anne Collet was baptised at Wotton-Underwood to the west of Aylesbury on 5th August 1705.  It was very likely James’ brother was William Collet who married Anne Egleton at Wotton-Underwood on 25th June 1707.

 

 

 

 

63i3

Robert Collett was born at Cheddington during the first half of 1654, the second child and eldest son of Robert and Anne Collett who was baptised at Cheddington on 27th July 1654.  Robert later married Elizabeth with whom he had six children.  Robert was still living in Buckinghamshire when he died on 8th March 1748.

 

 

 

63j2

Elizabeth Collett

Born in 1686 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63j3

Robert Collett

Born in 1687 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63j4

Richard Collett

Born in 1689 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63j5

John Collett

Born in 1690 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63j6

Amy Collett

Born in 1692 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

63j7

Thomas Collett

Born in 1697 at Ivinghoe, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63i4

Anne Collett was born at Cheddington in 1655, and was baptised there on 22nd November 1655, the daughter of Robert and Anne Collett.

 

 

 

 

63i5

Richard Collett was born at Cheddington in 1657, and it was there that he was baptised on 11th June 1657, the son of Robert and Anne Collett.  All that is currently known about Richard is that he probably died sometime between the summer of 1665 and the spring of 1668 for the next son to be born into the family to be given his name.

 

 

 

 

63i6

Elizabeth Collett was born at Cheddington during the first few months of 1658 where she was baptised on 12th April 1658, the daughter of Robert and Anne Collett.

 

 

 

 

63i7

Dorothy Collett was born at Cheddington towards the end of 1658 and was baptised on 5th January 1659, the daughter of Robert and Anne Collett.

 

 

 

 

63i8

Susanna Collett was born at Cheddington in 1661 and it was there also that she was baptised 9th May 1661, the daughter of Robert and Anne Collett.  Susanna Collet later married John Eden of Aston Clinton on 17th April 1693, Aston Clinton being only a few miles south of Cheddington.

 

 

 

 

63i9

Sarah Collett was born at Cheddington in 1663 and was baptised there on 6th August 1663, the daughter of Robert and Anne Collett.

 

 

 

 

63i10

John Collett was born at Cheddington in 1665 where he was baptised on 27th April 1665, the son of Robert and Anne Collett.

 

 

 

 

63i11

Richard Collett was born at Cheddington in 1668 and was baptised there on 28th May 1668, the son of Robert and Anne Collett.

 

 

 

 

63i12

Joseph Collett was born at Cheddington in 1672 and was baptised there on 18th April 1672, the last child born to Robert Collett and his wife Anne.

 

 

 

 

63j2

Elizabeth Collett was born at Ivinghoe in Buckinghamshire in 1686, the eldest child of Robert Collett from Cheddington and his wife Elizabeth, who was baptised at Ivinghoe on 8th August 1686.

 

 

 

 

63j3

Robert Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1687, where he was baptised on 17th May 1687 the son of Robert and Elizabeth Collett.  A record for the death of a Robert Collett has been found in Buckinghamshire on 8th March 1748, which was very likely this Robert, who would have been 61, rather than his father Robert, who was have been 94 – a remarkable age in those days, so not very likely.

 

 

 

 

63j4

Richard Collett was born at Ivinghoe in 1689, the son of Robert and Elizabeth Collett, and was baptised during the month of January 1690.

 

 

 

 

63j5

John Collett was born at Ivinghoe on 22nd December 1690, the son of Robert and Elizabeth Collett, who was baptised there during January 1691.

 

 

 

 

63j6

Amy Collett was born at Ivinghoe on 4th September 1692, where she was baptised one month later on 5th October 1692, the youngest daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Collett.

 

 

 

 

63j7

Thomas Collett was born at Ivinghoe on 30th July 1697, where he was baptised later that same year, the last child born to Robert Collett of Cheddington by his wife Elizabeth.  Thomas was married twice when he married (1) Mary, who died after the birth of their second child, following which Thomas then married (2) Elizabeth Russell of Pitchcott, near Aylesbury, in that village on 1st January 1729.  All of his five children were born in the village of Padbury one mile from the town of Buckingham.  Thomas Collett died at Padbury on 20th October 1778 at the age of 81.

 

 

 

63k1

Elizabeth Collett

Born in 1722 at Padbury, Bucks.

 

63k2

Edward Collett

Born in 1724 at Padbury, Bucks.

 

The following are the three children of Thomas Collett by his second wife Elizabeth Russell:

 

63k3

Catherine Collett

Born in 1733 at Padbury, Bucks.

 

63k4

John Collett

Born in 1737 at Padbury, Bucks.

 

63k5

William Collett

Born in 1741 at Padbury, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63k2

Edward Collett was born late in 1724 or early in 1725 at Padbury near Buckingham where he was baptised on 26th February 1725, the son of Thomas and Mary Collett.  It may have been just after the birth, or at the time of the birth of the next child, that Mary Collett died, following which Edward’s father married for a second time.

 

 

 

 

63k3

Catherine Collett was born at Padbury during 1733 and was baptised there on 2nd September 1733, the first child born to Thomas Collett by his second wife Elizabeth Russell.  Despite what was previously written here concerning her death at Padbury on 28th September 1868, it now appears that she was still an infant when she died later that same year and was buried at Padbury on 29th October 1733, the daughter of Thomas Collett.

 

 

 

 

63k4

John Collett was born at Padbury, to the south of Buckingham, in 1737 where he was baptised on 24th April 1737, the son of Thomas and Elizabeth Collett.  John later married Mary Davey at Thornton, just north-east of Buckingham, on 12th May 1761.  The marriage produced two sons for the couple, who were both baptised at Padbury on the same day, which may or may not indicate that they were twins.

 

 

 

63l1

Thomas Collett

Baptised on 30.03.1767 at Padbury

 

63l2

William Collett

Baptised on 30.03.1767 at Padbury

 

 

 

 

63k5

William Collett was born at Padbury in 1741 and it was there that he was baptised on 1st July 1741, the son of Thomas and Elizabeth Collett.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Section Two – The Stratfold-Collet Family of Wendover

 

 

 

The earliest date for Wendover relates to Richard Colet of Wendover (Ref. 18A1) who was born around 1380 and who died in 1461.  The property known as The Hale at Wendover features prominently here in this second section of Part 63, but also in Part 18 –The Suffolk Line.  Not only that, there are a great many references to The Hale within the Centre for Buckinghamshire Studies: Colet Estate, in particular for the years from 1296 to 1860, including Deeds and Manorial Documents.  The aforementioned Richard Colet, tenant farmer, was the first member of the family to be addressed as being of The Hale, and mentioned in the documents covering the period 1310 and 1544.  However, The Hale was not owned by the Colet family until 1503, when it was purchased by Sir Henry Colet (Ref. 18C5).  At the start of the next century a dispute over a rabbit warren ended up in court in a case of arbitration and award for Colet versus Baldwin as recorded in 1606.

 

 

 

It has been suggested by Eve McLaughlin, author of the ‘McLaughlin Guides for Family Historians’ and Secretary of Buckinghamshire Genealogical Society that “This branch of the Collett family can be traced back to (Harry) Henry and his wife Elizabeth/Isobel, married and with their first two children Henry and Gabriel born at Newbury in Berkshire prior to 1538.  There are four more children born in Newbury.  Research, hints and leads point back further to a John Colet (Will proved 1461) who was married to Alice with whom he had issue”.  The first three of these are now included in Part 23 – The Wiltshire to Australia Line.  Harry starts off that line (Ref. 23D1), followed by his two eldest sons Henry (Ref. 23E1) and Gabriel (Ref. 23E2).  The four more children referred to by Eve McLaughlin, are Harry’s four youngest children, Richard, Annys, Richard and Robert.

 

 

 

For the second major update of this family line in February 2014, we have to thank Peter Proctor in Australia whose wife Ann is a direct descendant of Robert Stratfold Collet (Ref. 63N5).  In his notes Peter confirms that Professor Albert Charles Chibnall who, in 1973 edited ‘The Certificate of Musters for Buckinghamshire in 1522’, believed that the branch of the Colet/Collett family at The Hale in Wendover (depicted in Part 18 and here in Part 63) is “the best documented yeoman’s family in all of England”.  Listed within The Certificate of Musters is John Collett who was buried in Buckinghamshire during March 1522.

 

 

 

This section starts with the Kipping family which is also mentioned in documents at the Centre for Buckinghamshire Studies: Colet Estate.  One of them refers to the purchase of The Hale Farm by Mr Kipping from Mr Holloway in a bundle dating from 1537 to 1704.  Another document for 1647 makes reference to settlement of the Kipping Estate, including property at Wendover, Weston Turville, and Whitchurch.  Later on, two documents dated 1751 brought together the two families for the Settlement of Estates of Robert Kipping and Robert Collet at Wendover and Weston Turville.

 

 

 

 

 

 

63I1

John Kipping was married and had a number of children who were born at Wendover, three of whom had a connection with the Collet family of Wendover.  It seems highly likely, that John’s wife was Hannah, with the Will of Hannah Kipping made in 1708 which today, is held by the Centre for Buckinghamshire Studies: Colet Estate.  In the same batch of documents is the Will of William Collet 1670-1735 (Ref. 18K6) of The Hale in Wendover

 

 

 

63J1

Hannah Kipping

Born before 1689 at Wendover

 

63J2

Elizabeth Kipping

Born in 1689 at Wendover

 

63J3

Robert Kipping

Born in 1691 at Wendover

 

 

 

 

63J1

Hannah Kipping was born at Wendover before 1689, the daughter of John Kipping and his likely wife of the same name.  She may have been their first child, and was the older sister of Elizabeth and Robert Kipping.  Hannah married Richard Stratfold who was born in 1672 and their son Robert was born at Bierton near Aylesbury during 1710.  It is interesting the deeds for tithes in Wendover, Bierton and Aston Clinton are held by the Centre for Buckinghamshire Studies: Colet Estate, which possibly related to Robert Stratfold senior. 

 

 

 

63K1

Robert Stratfold

Born in 1710 at Bierton

 

 

 

 

63J2

Elizabeth Kipping was born at Wendover in 1689, the daughter of John Kipping, and was the younger sister of Hannah Kipping (above) and the older sister of Robert Kipping (below).  Elizabeth married William Collet of Wendover around 1712 and they had four children at Wendover between 1716 and 1726.  William Collet (Ref. 18K6) was born at The Hale in Wendover in 1670 and was baptised there on 14th November that year.  Sadly, only his youngest child, Robert Collet (Ref. 18L5), survived to adulthood and it was he who inherited The Hale.  However, upon his premature death in 1750, when he was unmarried at twenty-four and with no heir, The Hale at Wendover was passed to Robert Stratfold, the grandson of Hannah Kipping (above) and her husband Richard Stratfold.

 

 

 

The details of the family line of William Collet and Elizabeth Kipping

can be found in Part 18 – The Suffolk Line 1360 to 1745

 

 

 

 

63J3

Robert Kipping was born at Wendover in 1691, the son of John Kipping, and was the brother of Hannah and Elizabeth Kipping (above).  Not a great deal is currently known about Robert Kipping except that (a) on 14th May 1737 at the Archdeaconry Court of Buckinghamshire he was granted administration of the personal effects of Mary Collet (Ref. 18K2) who was buried at St Mary’s Church in Wendover on 30th January 1735, (b) he was named as the first guardian of Robert Collet (Ref. 18L5) who was born in 1726 and made an orphan in 1735, the last Collet of the Manor of The Hale of Wendover, and (c) that he died in 1746.

 

 

 

 

63K1

Robert Stratfold was born at Bierton just east of Aylesbury in 1710, the son of Richard Stratfold and Hannah Kipping, and was baptised there on 7th January 1711.  It was on 14th June 1744 at Stoke Hammond that Robert Stratfold married Elizabeth Smith at Potsgrove near Leighton Buzzard where Robert was a dairyman and a churchwarden.  Robert’s aunt Elizabeth Kipping (his mother’s sister) had married William Collet (Ref. 18K6) of The Hale in Wendover with whom she had four sons between 1716 and 1726.  However, all four sons died before producing an heir who would have inherited The Hale, which was eventually passed in trust to Robert’s eldest son and namesake Robert Stratfold (1747-1824) on the condition that he adopt the Collett surname.

 

 

 

Therefore the first three children of Robert Stratfold and Elizabeth Smith had already been born and baptised by then under the name Stratfold, while all of their remaining five children were baptised using their new ‘Collet Stratfold’ surname.  In accordance with the written instructions it was their eldest son Robert Stratfold who became known as Robert Collet who was married in 1770 prior to occupying The Hale in Wendover where all his ‘Collet’ children were born.

 

 

 

The 1750 Will of Robert Collet (Ref. 18L5), the fourth son of William Collet and Elizabeth Kipping included the following passages:  “I Robert Collet, gentleman of the Hale in the Parish of Wendover, give and devise unto my cousin Robert Stratfold [written as Stretfold] the elder, all and every manors, messuages, cottages, lands, tenements, tithes, hereditaments and estate whatsoever lying in the several parishes of Wendover, Weston Turville, Ellesborough, and Aston Clinton or elsewhere in the County of Bucks” and continued “The said Robert Stratfold the son [his cousin’s son], to procure an Act of Parliament for changing his name to Collet when of age or sooner; also that he and his heirs shall hereafter use the name and arms of my family”. 

 

 

 

Robert Stratfold senior was still residing at Potsgrove in 1764 where he was recorded as a dairy farmer taking part in a ceremony of beating the parish boundary.  It was there ten years later that his death was recorded on 30th June 1774 at the age of 63, following which he was buried at Potsgrove Church although there is a memorial inscription on the church floor at Bierton where he was born.  The inscription confirms that “he was a dairyman of Potsgrove, the son of Richard and Hannah Stratfold of this parish”. Elizabeth Stratfold nee Smith survived her husband by eighteen years when she passed away at Potsgrove during 1792 and, like her husband, she too has a memorial stone in the floor of the church at Bierton.

 

 

 

63L1

Sarah Stratfold

Born in 1745 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

63L2

Robert Stratfold

Born in 1747 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

63L3

Hannah Stratfold

Born in 1748 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

63L4

John Collet Stratfold

Born in 1751 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

63L5

Richard Collet Stratfold

Born in 1753 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

63L6

Elizabeth Collet Stratfold

Born in 1755 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

63L7

William Collet Stratfold

Born in 1757 at Potsgrove, Bucks.

 

 

 

 

63L1

Sarah Stratfold was born at Potsgrove near Leighton Buzzard in 1745, where she was baptised on 21st July 1745, the eldest child of Robert Stratfold and Elizabeth Smith.  She was five years old when her father adopted the name Collet Stratfold to allow him to inherit the Manor of The Hale in Wendover.  It was also at Potsgrove where Sarah married Thomas Branson on 26th April 1781.  Sarah was still alive in 1824, as confirmed by the Will of her brother Robert (below).

 

 

 

 

63L2

Robert Stratfold was born at Potsgrove in 1747 and was baptised there on 20th May 1747, the second child and eldest son of Robert and Elizabeth Stratfold.  When he was three years old his father’s cousin Robert Collett (Ref. 18L5) died at the age of 24, being the last Collett at The Hale in Wendover, and it was his father Robert Stratfold who inherited the Manor of The Hale.  However, in order to accept his inheritance Robert Stratfold was required to change his name to Robert Collet.  Therefore, Robert Stratford junior was baptised with that name and it was later that he became Robert Collet.  As a consequence, it was as Robt Collet that he married Ann Penn at Aston Clinton in Buckinghamshire on 27th September 1770, with whom he had eight children who were born at The Hale in Wendover.  Ann was the daughter of the Reverend Richard Penn and Ann Jebb and was born at St Leonard’s Tring near Wendover on 29th September 1747.

 

 

 

It was as Anne Penn that she was baptised at Tring on 30th October 1747 when her parents were confirmed as Richard and Anne Penn.  It is interesting that in order to comply with the conditions of his father’s inheritance the baptism records for his own children only used the Collet surname, with no mention of Stratfold, which was later added as second forename.  The children’s individual baptism records confirmed their parents as Robt and Anne Collet on four occasions and as Robert and Ann Collet for the other four.  Ann Collet nee Penn died at Wendover in 1805, while her husband survived her by nineteen years when Robert Stratford Collet died during the first two weeks of 1824 and was buried at St Mary’s Church in Wendover on 14th January 1824.

 

 

 

The Will of Robert Stratfold Collet provides information that some of his siblings were still alive at the time of writing.  It referred to three sisters – two of whom were married, they being Sarah Branson and Elizabeth Morris although not named, Hannah being the unmarried sister, his brother William Stratfold and his sister-in-law Mary Stratfold, the widow of his brother Richard.

 

 

 

63M1

Robert Stratfold Collet

Born in 1771 at Wendover

 

63M2

Thomas Stratfold Collet

Born in 1773 at Wendover

 

63M3

John Stratfold Collet

Born in 1775 at Wendover

 

63M4

Henry Stratfold Collet

Born in 1777 at Wendover

 

63M5

Elizabeth Stratfold Collet

Born in 1780 at Wendover

 

63M6

Richard Stratfold Collet

Born in 1782 at Wendover

 

63M7

William Stratfold Collet

Born in 1784 at Wendover

 

63M8

Susannah Stratfold Collet

Born in 1787 at Wendover

 

 

 

 

63L3

Hannah Stratfold was born at Potsgrove at the end of 1748 and it was there where she was baptised on 21st January 1749, the daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Stratfold.  She never married as confirmed by the 1824 Will of her brother Robert (above) when she was still a spinster at the age of 75.

 

 

 

 

63L4

John Collet Stratfold was born at Potsgrove on 10th May 1751, where he was baptised on 17th August 1751, the first child of Robert Stratfold and his wife Elizabeth Smith who was given the name of Collet following his father inheriting the Collett estate at The Hale in Wendover.  It would appear that John married (1) Anne Beazer at Langley Marsh in Buckinghamshire on 30th August 1773, although they had no children.  When Anne died John Stratfold Collet married for a second time in 1789, although by that time his first child and been born two months earlier but had tragically died just four days before the wedding.

 

 

 

John Collet Stratfold was thirty-eight when he married (2) Martha Sambee [Gamby] at Husborne Crawley, near Woburn in Bedfordshire, on 22nd July 1789.  Martha was born at Husborne Crawley in 1766 where she was baptised on 4th January 1767, the daughter of Daniel Gamby and his wife Elizabeth Hart.  The marriage produced eleven children who were all born and baptised at Woburn.  John Stratfold Collett died at Woburn in 1811, the same year that his last child was born there and where he was buried on 13th March 1811.  In the Bailey’s British Directory of 1784 John Stratfold Collet was listed as a grocer.  It is possible, although not proved, that Martha Collett Stratfold nee Gamby passed away prior to 1824, since she was not mentioned in the Will of her brother-in-law Robert Stratfold Collet (above).

 

 

 

63M9

Elizabeth Stratfold

Born in 1789 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M10

Sarah Stratfold

Born in 1791 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M11

John Stratfold

Born in 1793 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M12

Mary Stratfold

Born in 1794 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M13

Robert Collet Stratfold

Born in 1797 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M14

William Collet Stratfold

Born in 1798 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M15

Richard Collet Stratfold

Born in 1800 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M16

Susan Collet Stratfold               twin

Born in 1801 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M17

Joseph Collet Stratfold             twin

Born in 1801 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M18

Martha Stratfold

Born in 1804 at Woburn, Beds.

 

63M19

Anne Stratfold

Born in 1811 at Woburn, Beds.

 

 

 

 

63L5

Richard Collet Stratfold was born at Potsgrove in 1753 and was baptised there on 10th April 1753, the son of Robert and Elizabeth Stratfold.  He married Mary Hoar at Potsgrove on 21st November 1801 and died just over sixteen years later and was buried at Potsgrove on 8th February 1817.  It was Mary Stratfold nee Hoar who was named in the 1824 Will of Richard’s older brother Robert Stratfold Collet in which she was described as sister-in-law.  It was therefore another Mary Stratfold who was buried at Woburn on 4th October 1821.

 

 

 

 

63L6

Elizabeth Collet Stratfold was born at Potsgrove in 1755 and it was there that she was baptised as Elizabeth Stratfold on 9th August 1755, the daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Stratfold.  It was also as Elizabeth Stratfold that she later married John Morris (or Harris) at Potsgrove on 7th May 1796, when her brother Richard Collet Stratfold was one of the witnesses.

 

 

 

 

63L7

William Collet Stratfold was born at Potsgrove around the end of 1757 and was baptised at Potsgrove on 8th February 1758, the last child born to Robert Stratfold and his wife Elizabeth Smith.  All that is known about him is that he (a) died at Potsgrove on either 10th January 1837 or 14th January 1838, was (b) listed in the Poll records for the parish of Bierton in 1804, and (c) was listed as being a resident within the parish of Haddenham, near Aylesbury, in the Poll records of 1818.  At the time of the death of his older brother Robert Stratfold Collet in 1824 William was named in his brother’s Will as William Stratfold.

 

 

 

 

63M1

Robert Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1771, the eldest son of Anne Penn and Robert Stratfold who had become Robert Collet in order to inherit the Manor of The Hale from his uncle.  However, it was on 22nd September 1771 that he was baptised at St Mary’s Church in Wendover with the name Robert Collet, when his parents were recorded at Robt and Anne Collet.  It was as Reverend Robert S Collett that he died during 1796.  It is possible, although not proved, that Robert may have married at some time during his short life, since a copy of the Marriage Settlement of Robert Stratford Collett is held by the Centre for Buckinghamshire Studies: Colet Estate.  If not, it may refer to his father.

 

 

 

 

63M2

Thomas Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1773 and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 25th February 1773 as Thomas Collet the son of Robert Collet (formerly Stratfold) and his wife Ann Collet.  Thomas never married and enlisted for military duties in the Napoleonic Wars.  Such was the trauma of the war that Thomas deserted and returned home to England although he was later re-enlisted.  He was subsequently demobbed from the army after the war and at that time he retired to his farm at Wendover.

 

 

 

He was still living at Wendover at the time of the census in 1841 when, as Thomas S Collett, he had a rounded age of 65, and again in 1851 when his age was more accurately recorded at 78 when he was named in the census return that year as Thos Collet, a retired army surgeon.  It was six years later that Thomas Stratfold Collet of The Hale died at Wendover on 12th June 1857.  During his life he served with the English Army in Spain, Italy and Egypt.

 

 

 

 

63M3

John Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1775, the son of Robert Stratfold and Anne Penn.  Like all of his siblings he was christened at Wendover with the surname Collet when he was baptised there on 8th May 1775 as John Collet the son of Robert and Anne Collet.  He was only 26 years old when he died at Westminster on 3rd February 1801.

 

 

 

 

63M4

Henry Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover on 8th May 1777 and was the fourth son children of Robert Stratfold and Anne Penn.  It was on 29th May 1777 that he was baptised at Wendover as Henry Collet the son of Robt and Anne Collet.  He later married the much younger Susanna Fountain in 1817, possibly at Wendover, where their seven children were born.  Tragically Henry died less than two years after the birth of his last child, when he passed away at Weston Turville midway between Aylesbury and Wendover on 23rd October 1828 at the age of 51.  However, it was at St Mary’s Church in Wendover that he was buried on 30th October 1828.  At the time of writing his Will he was living in Weston Turville, the Will being proved at Canterbury in March 1829. 

 

 

 

Ten years after the death of her husband Susanna, who was born in 1796, married Robert Allen in 1838 and continued to live in the village of Weston Turville, where they were living at the time of the census in 1841.  Susanna had living with her at Worlds End Farm in Weston Turville her youngest son Henry Stratfold who was 15 together with some of her daughters.  It was the move to that village, when the children were still very young, that likely prompted some of them to assume that they had been born at Weston Turville, which was named as their place of birth in later census returns.

 

 

 

Sadly for Susanna, her second husband passed away during the 1840s.  Susanna Allen, formerly Collet, nee Fountain, survived both of her husbands by many years when she died at Wendover on 7th January 1866.  It was one year later that the letters of administration for her and her first husband’s estate were signed off in favour of her son Robert Stratfold Collet of The Hale in Wendover on 8th January 1867.

 

 

 

Footnote:  It was also at Wendover during the 1950s that the new John Colet School was established which was named after Dean John Colet (Ref. 18D12).  See Part 18 – The Suffolk Line for more details.

 

 

 

63N1

Anne Stratfold Collet

Born in 1817 at Wendover

 

63N2

Susannah Stratfold Collet

Born in 1819 at Wendover

 

63N3

Rebecca Stratfold Collet

Born in 1820 at Wendover

 

63N4

Hannah Stratfold Collet

Born in 1822 at Wendover

 

63N5

Robert Stratfold Collet

Born in 1823 at Wendover

 

63N6

Mary Stratfold Collet

Born in 1825 at Wendover

 

63N7

Henry Stratfold Collet

Born in 1826 at Wendover

 

 

 

 

63M5

Elizabeth Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1780 and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 16th April 1780 as Elizabeth Collet the daughter of Robert and Ann Collet.  Tragically she died later that same year.

 

 

 

 

63M6

Richard Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1782 and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 4th May 1782 as Richard Collet the son of Robert and Anna Collet.  He was only in his early thirties when he died and was buried at Wendover.  The record there confirmed that Richard Stratfold Collet was buried on 6th September 1814.

 

 

 

 

63M7

William Stratfold Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1784 and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 7th March 1784, when he was recorded simply as William Collet the son of Robert and Ann Collet.  A book at the Bodleian Library in Oxford “A Biographical Database of Members of the London Book Trade 1701-1800” includes the name of William Stratfold Collett who was a Stationers' Company apprentice in the book/paper/printing trades.  It was on 31st August 1822 that he married Mary Phillips who died ten years later giving birth to their second child.  According to the Poll records for 1837 William Stratfold Collett was living in the Buckinghamshire parish of Aston Clinton where he was the owner of a freehold house and land in Tring. 

 

 

 

Four years after that he was still residing at Aston Clinton where he had living with him his daughter.  On the day of the census in June 1841 he was simply recorded as William Collet when he had a rounded age of 60, while his daughter Caroline Collet was 17.  It was just nine years later that William Stratfold Collet died in 1850. 

 

 

 

63N8

Caroline Stratfold Collet

Born in 1824 at Wendover

 

63N9

William Stratfold Collet

Born in 1832 at Wendover

 

 

 

 

63M8

Susannah Stratfold Collet was born The Hale in at Wendover during 1787 the last known child of Robert Stratfold and Anne Penn.  However, under the conditions that her father accepted when he inherited Manor of The Hale she was christened with the Collet surname, as were her seven older siblings (above).  It was therefore as Susannah Collet that she was baptised at St Mary’s church in Wendover on 9th September 1787, the daughter of Robert and Ann Collet.  The burial record of Susanna Stratfold Collet states she was buried at St Mary’s Church on 2nd September 1815.

 

 

 

 

63M9

Elizabeth Stratfold was born at Woburn in Bedfordshire on 27th May 1789 two months before her parents John Collet Stratfold and Martha Gamby were married, but sadly she died on 18th July that same year just four days prior to the couple’s wedding day.

 

 

 

 

63M10

Sarah Stratfold was born at Woburn on 15th July 1791 and was baptised there on 10th August 1791, the second child of John and Martha Stratfold.  She was under three years of age when she died at Woburn on 6th April 1794.

 

 

 

 

63M11

John Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn on 8th January 1793, the eldest son of John and Martha Stratfold. John was under four months old when he died on 29th May 1793 and was buried at Woburn.

 

 

 

 

63M12

Mary Stratfold was born at Woburn on 8th January 1794 and died there on 31st May 1794, the daughter John and Martha Stratfold.

 

 

 

 

63M13

Robert Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn on 8th August 1797, the eldest surviving son of John Collet Stratfold and Martha Gamby.  He later married Mary Millard at Woburn on 15th April 1822 with whom he had five children, all of them born at Woburn.  By the time of the census in 1881 Robert C Stratfold from Woburn was 83 when he was a widower and a boarder at the home of Louisa Kipling at Wing Road in Linslade near Leighton Buzzard.  Louisa was a solicitor’s widow and housekeeper of the boarding house, while Robert was described as a retired general merchant and artist painter.  It was just over five years later that Robert Collett Stratfold passed away in Bedford on 22nd September 1886 at the age of 89.  His death was recorded at Bedford register office (Ref. 3b 194) and an announcement was published on page one of The Times newspaper on 25th September 1886.

 

 

 

63N10

Marian Collet

Born in 1823 at Woburn

 

63N11

Matilda Collet

Born in 1824 at Woburn

 

63N12

Caroline Collet

Born in 1830 at Woburn

 

63N13

Susannah Elizabeth Collet

Born in 1831 at Woburn

 

63N14

Robert Duncan Collet

Born in 1839 at Woburn

 

 

 

 

63M14

William Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn on 6th September 1798, where he was baptised on 9th October 1798, the eldest son of John and Martha Stratfold.  It was almost exactly one year later that William died at Woburn on 15th October 1799.

 

 

 

 

63M15

Richard Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn on 12th April 1800 and it was there also that he was baptised on 13th May 1800, the son of John and Martha Stratfold.  Less than one month after he was baptised he died at Woburn on 9th June 1800.

 

 

 

 

63M16

Susan Collet Stratfold was a twin born at Woburn on 30th September 1801 and baptised there with her brother Joseph (below) on 3rd November 1801 the same day that she died.

 

 

 

 

63M17

Joseph Collet Stratfold was a twin born at Woburn on 30th September 1801 who was baptised in a joint ceremony with his sister Susan (above) on 3rd November 1801.  Unlike his sister who passed away just after being baptised, Joseph was thirty-three years of age when he died at Woburn on 18th October 1834.

 

 

 

 

63M18

Martha Stratfold was born at Woburn on 15th September 1805 where she was baptised on 5th November 1805, the daughter of John and Martha Stratfold.  Martha married Charles Henry Broughall at Woburn on 22nd April 1828.  Charles was born around 1806 at St Gregory by St Paul in London and died in 1846, while Martha Broughall nee Stratfold died at Luton during April 1884 aged 79.  During the short time they spent together Martha presented Charles with nine children, most of whom were born and baptised at Woburn.

 

 

 

They were Mary Ann Broughall, born on 21st December 1828 and baptised on 4th March 1832, as was Margaret Broughall who was born on 30th June 1831, Henry Collet Broughall, born on 7th February 1834 who was baptised on 13th April 1834, Martha Broughall, born on 14th November 1835 who was baptised on 13th December 1835, Eliza Broughall, born on 1st April 1838 who was baptised on 13th March 1842, as was Catherine Broughall who was born on 29th November 1839 and Emma Broughall who was born on 6th February 1842.  The couple’s last child Ann Broughall was born while they were living in Luton, where Ann was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 1st November 1846, the same year that her father died.

 

 

 

 

63M19

Anne Stratfold was born at Woburn on 13th March 1811 and was baptised on 26th July 1811, the last child of John Stratfold Collet and his wife Martha Gamby.  It is believed that she suffered an infant death.

 

 

 

 

63N1

Anne Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover in 1817 where she was baptised on 23rd November 1817, when her parents were named as Henry Collet and Susanna Collet.  One source says she was baptised at Lee, to the south-east of Wendover, which today is referred to as The Lee.  She was twenty-one when she married William W Read in 1838.  He died in 1879 while Anne passed away in 1884.  Three years earlier the widow Anne Stratfold Read was 63 and a widow from Wendover who was managing a 179-acre farm at Saunderton in Buckinghamshire where she had living and working with her, her nephew Stratfold Read aged 26, one of eight men employed on the farm.  He was the youngest of the two sons of Anne’s younger sister Hannah Stratfold Collet (below) and John Read who may have been the brother of Anne’s husband William Read.

 

 

 

 

63N2

Susannah Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover in 1819, and was baptised there on 18th April 1819 when, according to the parish register, she was recorded as the daughter of Henry and Susanna Collet.  Susannah later married William Geary Linnell during 1846 and in the census of 1851, when Susanna from Wendover was 32 and William was 36 and a railway goods agent, they were residing in Kingston-upon-Hull in Yorkshire.  By 1861 the couple was living at 75 Culford Road in Hackney, London, where they had living with them their niece Susannah Stratfold Collet.  She was seven years of age and was the daughter of Henry Stratford Collet (below) and his late wife Sarah Ives who had died during the previous year.  Susannah S Linnell from Wendover was 42 and a commission agent’s wife, while visiting the family on that day was her sister Anne S Read (above), a farmer’s wife who was 43.

 

 

 

On the occasion of the next Hackney census in 1871 Susannah was 52 and William was 56 and described as a financier interest of money, by which time they employed a domestic servant Esther Slater who was 18.  Ten years later the couple was residing in Ellesborough in Buckinghamshire where William was a farmer of 126 acres employing five men and one boy.  Supporting the couple on at that time was general servant Ellen Atkins aged 19.  William Geary Linnell was born at Bletchley on 22nd February 1815, the son of William Linnell and Mary Geary, and he died at Little Hampden in Buckinghamshire on 16th April 1885. His Will was proved in Oxford on 5th June 1885 when his personal estate was valued at £1,249 12 Shillings and 11 Pence and he was described as being formerly of 75 Culford Road in North Kingsland in Middlesex, but late of Little Hampden, while it was his widow Susannah who was the sole executrix.

 

 

 

Following the death of her husband, Susannah went to live with the widow of her younger brother Henry Stratfold Collet.  That was confirmed in the Monks Risborough census of 1891.  Head of the household Ann Collett, nee Ives, had living there with her, her daughter Edith Collet, her stepdaughter Ann Stratfold Collet, and her niece Sarah Ives, together with her sister-in-law Susannah Linnell, a widow of 72 from Wendover who was living on her own means.  It was six years later when widow Susanna Stratfold Linnell nee Collet died at Aylesbury on 18th March 1897, her Will proved in Oxford on 12th April that same year.  Susannah’s address at the time of her death was stated as being Kingsbury Square in Aylesbury when her estate was estimated to be worth £1,349 11 Shillings and 7 Pence.

 

 

 

 

63N3

Rebecca Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover in 1820 and was the third daughter born to Henry and Susanna.  It was also at Wendover where she was baptised on 2nd July 1820, the daughter of Henry Stratfold Collet and his wife Susanna.  Sadly, she was around one year old when she died at Wendover, where she was buried at St Mary’s Church on 6th June 1821.

 

 

 

 

63N4

Hannah Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover in 1822 and it was there that she was baptised as Hannah Stratfold on 3rd March 1822, when again her parents were named in the parish register as Henry Stratfold and Susanna Collet.  She later married John Read in 1850 with whom she had three children, the eldest of which was John Henry Read who was involved in the proving of the Will of his uncle Henry Stratford Collet (below) who died in 1879.  Robert Read was very likely related to William Read who married Hannah’s eldest sister Anne (above); perhaps they were brothers.  The couple’s second child was Stratfold Read who had two sons who were killed during the Great War, while the third was a daughter Mary Read who appears not to have survived as she was not living with her parents in 1861 or 1871.

 

 

 

It the census of 1851 the childless couple was living at Princes Risborough, but ten years later they and their family were recorded at Turville as follows.  John Read from Haddenham was 43 and a farmer of 125 acres employing three men and three boys, Hannah from Wendover was 39, John H Read was seven and Stratfold Read was six.  Over the following decade John extended the farm which by 1871 measured 200 acres on which he employed four men and two boys.  By that time neither of their two sons was living with them at Ellesborough near Princes Risborough.  Ten years later the couple were recorded as farming at Illmer near Princes Risborough.  It was nine years after that when Hannah Stratfold Read nee Collett died in 1890 at the age of 69, her death recorded at Wycombe register office (Ref. 3a 420) during the last three months of that year. 

 

 

 

Also in 1881 their son Stratfold Read from Turville Heath was 26 and was living at Saunderton where he was working for his mother’s widowed sister Anne Stratfold Read on her farm of 179 acres.  By 1891 Stratfold Read, aged 44, was running his own farm at Saunderton, by which time he was married with three children.  His wife Sarah Louisa (nee Ives), recorded as Louisa Z Read was 47, and their children were William Stratfold Read who was 11, Hilda Mary (Stratfold) Read who was nine and Arthur John Read who was six.  Living with the family was widower John Read who was 83 and a retired farmer.  It was just over one year later that the death of John Read was recorded at Aylesbury register office (Ref. 3a 465) during the second quarter of 1902 when he was 84.

 

 

 

William Stratfold Read, Private 1012 with the Household Cavalry of the Royal Bucks Hussars died at Gallipoli on 21st August 1915, while his brother Arthur John Stratfold Read, Corporal 205204 with the Household Cavalry of the Royal Bucks Hussars was killed in Palestine on 15th November 1917.

 

 

 

 

63N5

Robert Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover in 1823, the eldest son and fifth child of Henry Stratfold Collet and his wife Susanna.  At his baptism in St Mary’s Church on 8th June 1823 he was named simply as Robert Collet, the son of Henry Stratfold Collet and his wife Susanna.  Robert later married Elizabeth Hailey of Little Kimble during April 1849 who presented him with a number of children.  The first three children were born at Weston Turville, with the remainder when the family was residing in Wendover.  On each occasion the children’s parents were named as Robert Stratfold Collet and his wife Elizabeth.  The census of 1851 placed the young family at Weston Turville where Robert Collet was 28, his wife Elizabeth was 29, and their first child Henry was still under one year old.  Three years later the Cravens Directory for 1854 described Robert as a coal merchant and agent working from premises at Leighton Street, near the Market Square in Wendover.

 

 

 

In the census of 1861 the family’s surname was incorrectly recorded as Cottet.  By that time Elizabeth had presented Robert with seven children although only five of them were living with the couple at Wendover on that occasion.  The census return in 1861 listed the family as Robert S Collet who was 38, Elizabeth Collet who was 40, Mary Ann Collet who was nine, Rebecca Collet who was seven, Thomas Collet who was four, Harriet Collet who was three, and Elizabeth Collet who was not yet one year old.

 

 

 

Six years later on 8th January 1867 the letters of administration for Robert’s mother, who had died one year earlier, were signed off in favour of Robert Stratfold Collet of The Hale in Wendover, the estate being valued at £1,500.  Four years later, in early April 1871, he and his family were confirmed as residing at Hale House in Wendover where Robert Collett, aged 48, was a farmer of 230 acres employing ten men and six boys.  His wife Elizabeth was 49, and the three children living there with them were their three youngest daughters Elizabeth Collet, who was 13, Harriet Collet, who was 10, and Minnie Collett who was six years old.  Every member of the household had been born at Wendover, including the two servants.  Ruth King was 18 and John Rodgers was 16 and was described as an indoor farm servant.

 

 

 

It is of interest that the dwelling immediately adjacent to Hale House was referred to as The Hale, which was occupied by the large young family of labourer Job Hearn who was very likely one of the ten men employed by Robert Collet.  The property on the other side of Hale House was simply named as Water Sluice and was home to labourer Joseph Wells and his family.  It is also very interesting that the census of 1871 revealed Maria W Collett aged 20, the eldest daughter of Robert Stratfold Collett and Elizabeth Hailey aka Mary Ann, was staying at the home of her uncle John Hailey and his wife Harriet at Westlington Farm at the Buckinghamshire village of Dinton near Aylesbury.

 

 

 

Nine years after the census day in 1871, it was Robert Collet who sold the former Collett estate at The Hale in Wendover to the Rothschild Family in 1880 – see the following note.  Dean John Colet [Ref. 18D12] left the Manor of the Hale, in trust to the Mercers' Company for the benefit of St. Paul's School which he had developed around 1510.  The Hale House was commonly referred to as the Court or Manor House and was part of the estate of the Colet family and later belonged to Robert Stratfold Collet [1823-1890] of Hale House.  In 1880 the Hale estate was purchased from Robert Stratfold Collet by Alfred Charles de Rothschild, Esq., for the sum of £16,000.

 

 

 

One year later, according to the census in 1881, retired farmer Robert S Collet from Wendover was 60 (rather than his actual age of 58), his wife Elizabeth from Kimble in Buckinghamshire was 58, when they were described as visitors at Westlington Farm in Dinton, the home of Mrs H Bull of Stewkley in Buckinghamshire, the former widow of John Hailey.  It seems highly likely that the couple’s permanent home by that time in their lives was a private house on the High Street in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, where Henry’s and Elizabeth’s three children, Henry, Elizabeth and Minnie were recorded in 1881.

 

 

 

It was nearly nine years later that Robert Stratfold Collet died at Rickmansworth on 1st January 1890, following which his body was buried in the grounds of St Mary’s Church in Wendover.  After his death his widow was still living at a private house on the High Street in Rickmansworth according to the census in 1891.  The house, which was next door to West End Villa the home of Baptist Minster Henry Dyer, may well have been the same house her three children had been living in ten years earlier.  Living there with Elizabeth was her youngest daughter Minnie, both of them recorded under the surname Collett (sic).  Elizabeth Collet from Little Kimble was 69, while Minnie A Collet from Wendover was 26.  Elizabeth Stratfold Collet nee Hailey survived her husband by nine years, when she passed away at Wendover on 6th March 1899.

 

 

 

63O1

Henry Stratfold Collet

Born in 1850 at Weston Turville, Bucks.

 

63O2

Mary Ann Collet

Born in 1851 at Weston Turville, Bucks.

 

63O3

Rebecca Collet

Born in 1854 at Weston Turville, Bucks.

 

63O4

Thomas Penn Collet

Born in 1856 at Wendover

 

63O5

Harriet Susannah Collet

Born in 1857 at Wendover

 

63O6

John Dean Collet

Born in 1858 at Wendover

 

63O7

Elizabeth Helen Collet

Born in 1860 at Wendover

 

63O8

Minnie Anna Collet

Born in 1864 at Wendover

 

 

 

 

63N6

Mary Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover during the last few months of 1824, and it was there where she was baptised on 2nd January 1825 under the name of Mary Collet, the daughter of Henry Stratfold Collet and his wife Susanna.  According to the census in 1851 Mary was living and working with her brother Henry (below) at 36 Beech Street in Cripplegate, London.  However, it was during the following year that Mary married John Chapman with whom she had five children before John died in 1868.  Tragically his widow Mary died in 1869 when their children were still minors.  What happened to them after losing both parents is not currently known, but they were William, John, Elizabeth, Edith and Ernest Edward Chapman.

 

 

 

 

63N7

Henry Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover in 1826 and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 31st December 1826, the last of seven children born to Henry Stratfold Collet and his wife Susanna Fountain.  According to the census in June 1841 Henry was with his mother, his sisters, and his stepfather Robert Allen on the small family farm at Worlds End in Weston Turville.  By the time of the census in 1851 Henry Collet was 24 and was living and working in a large tenement building at 36 Beech Street in Cripplegate near the Barbican in East London, which was home to four families.  On that occasion Henry gave his place of birth as Weston Turville when he was described as an eating house keeper.  In the style of the day his front room was used as a public eating house and living and working there with him in March 1851 was his older sister Mary Collet (above).  The siblings were also employing a team of two, and they were William Kitchener aged 21 who was a cook, and Harriet Springfield aged 17 who was a servant.

 

 

 

Just less than one month later Henry married his neighbour’s daughter (1) Sarah Ives from Stoke Mandeville in Buckinghamshire, the wedding taking place by licence at the parish church in Stoke Mandeville on 24th April 1851.  The entry of their marriage was signed by the bride and groom and confirmed that bachelor Henry Stratfold Collet was an eating house keeper from 36 Beech Street in London whose father was Henry Stratfold Collet, a gentleman.  Sarah Ives was of full age, a spinster and a gentlewoman from Stoke Mandeville whose father was Thomas Ives, a farmer.  Henry was confirmed as living at 36 Beech Street in the City of London when he applied to be admitted into the Freedom of the City of London, which was granted on 17th October 1856.  The application stated that he was the son of the late Henry Stratfold Collett of Worlds End in Buckinghamshire, a gentleman, and that Henry‘s occupation was that of an Ealing House Keeper.  The form, sign by Henry, included the words “I hereby declare that I am not an alien, nor am I the son of an Alien and that I am above the age of twenty-one years”.

 

 

 

Four years earlier Sarah gave birth to a daughter at 36 Beech Street in Cripplegate during 1852, and she was followed by the birth of two further children, Susannah and Henry.  Sadly, the latter died nine months after he was born.  Sarah never really recovered from the shock of losing her son, and it was at 36 Beech Street that she died in 1860.  Having lost his son and then his wife, Henry took his eldest daughter Anne to live with her maternal grandparents near Amersham, where Anne Stratfold Collet was living in 1861.  On that same census day Henry’s younger daughter Susannah Stratfold Collett was seven years old when she was living in Hackney with her aunt and uncle Susannah Stratfold Linnell formerly Collet (above) and her husband William G Linnell.  Where Henry was in 1861 has not been determined although his eating house in Beech street was being managed by Martha Fountain a relative of his mother.

 

 

 

The full census details for Beresford Barn Farm in the hamlet of Coleshill near Amersham in 1861 confirmed that Anne Stratfold Collett from Cripplegate was eight years old when she was living there with her grandfather Thomas Ives who was 64 and a farmer of 190 acres employing five labourers and one boy.  Her grandmother Esther Ives was also 64, and living with the couple was their unmarried son Thomas Ives who was 41 and their unmarried daughter Anne Ives who was 27 and born at Stoke Mandeville.  In addition to Anne S Collet there were two other grandchildren living with the family and they were William Ives who was 17 and Sarah Ives who was 15, both of whom had been born at Great Hampden.  The family had two farm servants and they were William Payne, aged 20, who was a carter, and James Haynes, aged 15, who was a plough boy.

 

 

 

Ten years earlier Annie Ives had been 17 when she had been living with her parents in Stoke Mandeville, just a mile from Weston Turville, where Ann had been baptised on 4th August 1833, the daughter of Thomas and Esther Ives.  When Henry Stratfold Collet eventually returned to Buckinghamshire to be reunited with his daughter in the mid-1860s it seems that he fell in love with his wife’s sister (2) Ann Ives, whom he married at St Pancras Old Church in London on 29th August 1867.  It was also at St Pancras that their two daughters were born, although tragically the first of them died shortly after she was born.  All of that was confirmed by the next census in 1871 when the family was residing in the Camden Town area of London at the Crimea Tavern at 36 Inkerman Road in Kentish Town.  By that time Henry’s two eldest daughters Annie and Sue had left home to seek work.  So the remaining family comprised Hy S Collet from Weston Turville who was 44, his wife Ann Collet from Stoke Mandeville who was 37, and their daughter Edith M Collet who was still under one year old.

 

 

 

Living with the family was servant Henry (Hy) Smith who was 19 and from London St Marylebone, plus two others.  The first of them was the couple’s niece Sarah Ives, aged 24 and from Great Hampden, who was 15 in 1861 (above) and the daughter of one of Ann’s siblings.  The other was Hy S Collet, aged 20 and from Weston Turville, who was Henry’s nephew and the eldest son of his older brother Robert Stratfold Collet (above).  As regards Henry’s two absent daughters, Annie was staying with relatives in Buckinghamshire, while Susannah Stratfold Collet died three years later meaning that only two of his five children reached the age of twenty-one.

 

 

 

It was on 5th June 1879 that Henry Stratfold Collet died at the Crimea Tavern, following which his Will was proved on 19th June 1879 by his eldest daughter Annie, and her cousins Henry Stratfold Collett and John Henry Read.  The first of them was the eldest son of Henry’s brother Robert Stratfold Collet (above), while the other was the son of Henry’s sister Hannah (also above).  Perhaps as a consequence of the death of her father, Henry’s eldest daughter Ann had returned from Buckinghamshire and was living with his widow at 21 Park Street in St Pancras in the census of 1881.  Also, still living with Ann for the third consecutive census was her niece, Sarah Ives. 

 

 

 

So the family comprised Ann Collet (recorded as Collett), aged 47, who was conducting a fancy repository (a reference to someone involved in the storing and selling of fancy goods), her niece and stepdaughter Annie S Collet who was 28, and her daughter Edith M Collet who was 10.  Also living with them was Ann’s niece Sarah Ives who was 34 and an assistant to Ann with her fancy repository, the same occupation as Annie S Collet.

 

 

 

All four of them were still living together ten years later when they were running a summer boarding house at Askett, Monks Risborough, to the north-east of Princes Risborough in Buckinghamshire.  The census return for 1891 contained two errors, the misspelling of the Collet surname and the name Stratfold.  Head of the household Ann Collit (sic) was 57 and a widow living on her own means, and living there with her was her daughter Edith M Collit who was 20, her stepdaughter Ann Statfold (sic) Collit who was 38, and her niece Sarah Ives who was 45.  In addition, the widow of William Geary Linnell, Susannah Stratfold Linnell nee Collet, was staying with them and she was the older sister of Henry Stratfold Collett and therefore the sister-in-law of head of the house Ann Collet.  Apart from the absence of Susannah Linnell, who passed away in 1897, it was exactly the same situation in 1901 when the same women were still residing at Monks Risborough, where Ann Collett (sic) from Stoke Mandeville was 67, Edith M Collett from St Pancras was 30, Ann S Collett from Cripplegate was 48, and Sarah Ives from Great Hampden was 55.

 

 

 

According to the census conducted in April 1911 the widow Ann Collet was 77 and the head of the household at Askett near Monks Risborough, although by then her niece Sarah Ives had left the group or had passed away.  Still living with her was Ann Spratfold (sic) Collet who was 59, and Edith Mary Collet who was 40.  It was two years later that Ann Stratfold Collet, the eldest daughter of Henry Stratfold Collet, died at Askett during 1913, and she was followed three years after by the death of Ann Collet in 1916.  It is currently not known what happened to her daughter Edith Mary Collet following her death, for which further research is needed.

 

 

 

The probate record for the Will of Henry Stratfold Collet read as follows:  “The Will of Henry Stratfold Collett formerly of 5 James Street, Camden Town, but late of The Crimea Inn, 36 Inkerman Road in Kentish Town, both in the County of Middlesex, licenced victualler who died 5 June 1879 at The Crimea was proved at the Principal Registry by Ann Collett of The Crimea, spinster, and  Henry Stratfold Collett of 69 Gresham Street in the City of London, lace merchant, and John Henry Read of 2 Market Terrace Upper Holloway in the said County, chemist and druggist, the nephews of the deceased, the Executors.”  The personal estate of Henry Stratfold Collet was valued at under £6,000.

 

 

 

63O9

Ann Stratfold Collet

Born in 1852 at Cripplegate; died 1913

 

63O10

Susannah Stratfold Collet

Born in 1854 at Cripplegate; died 1874

 

63O11

Henry Stratfold Collet

Born in 1856 at Cripplegate; died 1856

 

The following were the children of Henry Stratfold Collet and his second wife Ann Ives:

 

63O12

Sarah Stratfold Collet

Born in 1868 at St Pancras; died 1868

 

63O13

Edith Mary Collet

Born in 1870 at St Pancras, London

 

 

 

 

63N8

Caroline Stratfold Collet was born at Wendover during 1824 and was baptised there at St Mary’s Church on 24th October 1824, the eldest of the two known children of William Stratfold Collet and Mary Phillips.  She was eight years old when her mother died giving birth to her brother and in the census of 1841 Caroline Collet was 17 years of age and living with her father William, aged 60, at Aston Clinton.  Her father was not with her ten years later when Caroline Collett (sic) was 26 and still residing within the Aston Clinton area of Buckinghamshire.  It was just after that time when Caroline married Benjamin Lake with whom she had daughter Henrietta.

 

 

 

 

63N10

Marian Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn in 1823 and was baptised there on 8th April, one year after her parents Robert Collet Stratfold and Mary Millard were married there.  Marian was twenty-one when she married Samuel Saunders at Woburn on 30th September 1844.  Their only known child was born two years later at Woburn on 13th September 1848.  That child was Duncan Collet Saunders and he later married Agnes Caroline Reeve at Woburn on 28th July 1870.  Agnes, who was born on 4th October 1850, was the older sister of Amy Reeve who was born at Leighton Buzzard in May 1855, they being the daughters of Charles Reeve and Frances Mary Deverell.  It was six years later in 1876 that Amy Reeve married Prince William Thomas Beechey (Ref. 39O21) the son of William Collett Beechey (Ref. 39N11) and the grandson of Mary Collett (Ref. 39M8) and James Beechey, all of whom can be found in Part 39 – The Clanfield Oxfordshire Line.

 

 

 

However, the marriage of Duncan Collet Saunders and Agnes Caroline Reeve only last a short while, when Duncan died two years later in 1872.  Agnes, with no children from her first marriage, remained a widow for nearly twenty years until, that is, she married William Flitton at Leighton Buzzard in 1889.

 

 

 

 

63N11

Matilda Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn in 1824 where she was baptised on 14th December 1824, the second child of Robert Collet Stratfold and Mary Millard.  Matilda was still in her teenage years when she married Frederick Blagg Hampton at Woburn on 25th October 1841 and their children continued to carry the Collet name as a second forename.  Frederick was born on 9th November 1813 at Bedford, the son of Robert Hampton and Eliza Blagg, and one of his children was Robert Collet Edwin Hampton whose marriage produced a daughter Mattie Edith Hampton, the grandmother of Bob Thompson of Brisbane in Australia. 

 

 

 

Matilda Hampton was living at 20 Hurst Lane in March, Cambridgeshire, at the time of the census in 1851.  Her husband Frederick was the Chief Constable at the nearby Isle of Ely.  Nine of the couple’s ten children were born in England after which, in 1856 Frederick and Matilda sailed to Australia on board the ‘Prince Alfred’ where their last child was born.  However, it appears that Frederick was only 45 when he died at Brisbane on 26th February 1859, just before to the birth of his last child.  Prior to his death he was a Captain of Artillery at Rockhampton in Queensland.  Matilda survived for another thirty-three years, when she passed away at Brisbane on 14th August 1892 aged 67.  The death notice confirmed her address as Brook Street in South Brisbane, the widow of the late Captain Frederick Blagg Hampton K I C, B A L.

 

 

 

The couple’s eldest child was Robert Collet Edwin Hampton who was born at March during 1842 and he later married Margaret McNeil at Rockhampton on 12th April 1868.  Tragically he was killed in a mining accident at the Gold Valley Mine in Kanowna, Western Australia, on 12th April 1899 when he was 57.  The aforementioned Mattie Edith Hampton was his youngest child, who was born at Thargominda in Queensland on 8th March 1886, and she married William Henry Thompson on 4th November 1914 at Boulder in Western Australia.

 

 

 

 

63N12

Caroline Collet Stratfold was born at Woburn during the first half of 1830 and was baptised there on 30th June 1830.  Sadly she was just over four years old when she died there on 27th October 1834.

 

 

 

 

63N14

Susannah Elizabeth Collet Stratfold was baptised at Woburn on 4th February 1831 the youngest daughter of John and Martha Collet Stratfold.

 

 

 

 

63N13

Robert Duncan Collet Stratfold was the last child of John Collet Stratfold and his wife Martha Gamby.  He was baptised at Woburn on 10 November 1839 and was six years old when he died there on 23rd February 1846.

 

 

 

 

63O1

Henry Stratfold Collet was born at Weston Turville near Wendover on 26th May 1850, the first child of Robert Stratfold Collett and his wife Elizabeth Hailey.  In the census the following spring his place of birth was given as World’s End, which lies just south of Weston Turville.  When Henry was 20 years of age he was staying with his uncle Henry Stratfold Collet at his home in St Pancras, London, as confirmed in the census of 1871.  He was listed as Hy S Collet from Weston Turville, the nephew of Hy S Collet and his wife Ann.  Sometime after that Henry’s family moved to Rickmansworth where he was living with two of his sisters in 1881, while his parents were recorded as visitors in the village of Dinton near Aylesbury.  According to the Rickmansworth census return that year unmarried Henry S Collet from Weston Turville was a lace manufacturer living at premises on the High Street where, in the absence of his parents, he was named as head of the household at the age of 30.  Curiously his two sisters, Elizabeth and Minnie (below), were incorrectly described as his daughters, even though they were 20 and 16 respectively.

 

 

 

It was at Tring in Hertfordshire, just over a year later, that on 23rd July 1882 he married Mary Jane Clarke, the daughter of Joseph and Emma Clarke who was born at Tring in 1858.  Once married the couple settled in Pinner, near Harrow in Middlesex, where they were living in 1891, 1901 and 1911.  Missing from the family in 1891 were their two eldest children who were staying with different relatives in Tring and Wendover respectively, most likely because Mary was preparing for the birth of her daughter Gwendolen.  Only their youngest daughter Olive, who was three years old, was living with the couple at Pinner in 1891.  However, the complete family was together again by the time of the census in 1901, when lace manufacturer Henry was named in error as Henry S Collett, aged 50 and from Wendover. 

 

 

 

The remainder of the family residing in Pinner during March 1901 was recorded as, his wife Mary J Collett, who was 42 and from Tring, and his five Pinner born children.  John S Collett was 17, Beryl Collett was 16, Olive Collett was 13, Gwendoline (sic) S Collett was nine, and Joseph P Collett was eight years old.

 

 

 

Ten years later in April 1911 Henry was recorded in error as Henry Shatfold Collet who was 60 and from Weston Turville.  Still living at Pinner with him on that occasion was his wife Mary Jane Collet, who was 52, and four of his five children.  They were Beryl Collet, who was 26, Olive Collet, who was 23, Gwendolen Susannah Collet, who was 19, and Joseph Penn Collet who was 18.  Lace merchant Henry Stratfold Collet died at Hatch End in Pinner on 29th September 1920, and it was there just over seven years later that his widow passed away on 18th February 1928.

 

 

 

As had often happened before, his second forename was incorrectly recorded during the probate process for his Will, when the official notice read as follows.  “Collet, Henry Stratford, of Woodriding, Hatch End, Middlesex, died 29 September 1920.  Probate London 19 November to Mary Jane Collet, widow, and the Reverend Joseph Penn Collet, clerk.  Effects £1,360 10 Shillings and 8 Pence.”  His widow Mary Jane died eight years later in 1928.

 

 

 

63P1

John Stratfold Collet

Born in 1882 at Pinner, nr Harrow

 

63P2

Beryl Stratfold Collet

Born in 1884 at Pinner, nr Harrow

 

63P3

Olive Stratfold Collet

Born in 1887 at Pinner, nr Harrow

 

63P4

Gwendolen Susannah Collet

Born in 1891 at Pinner, nr Harrow

 

63P5

Joseph Penn Collet

Born in 1892 at Pinner, nr Harrow

 

 

 

 

63O2

Mary Ann Collet was born at Weston Turville on 30th November 1851, the eldest daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Collet.  Although nothing much is known about her as Mary Ann, it would appear from successive census returns that she adopted the name Maria or Marion Collet.  By the time she was twenty she was no longer living with her family at Hale House in Wendover but was living at Westlington Farm in Dinton, the home of her mother’s brother John Hailey.  After a further ten years she was a governess and school mistress living and working at the Durham County Asylum in Sedgefield near Stockton-on-Tees.  The asylum was managed by Doctor of Medicine Robert Smith from Scotland, who was supported by his Canadian wife Jane McDiarmid Smith and his three eldest sons who were all students in medicine.  On that occasion in 1881 Mary Ann was referred to in the census that year as Marion (Marian) Collett aged 29 who was born at Wendover, while it was her parents who were visitors at Westlington Farm on that same day.

 

 

 

By the time of the next census in 1891 Marian Collett from Wendover was 39 when she was living and working in the Prestwich registration district of Lancashire.  After a further ten years she was described within the census of 1901 as Marian Collet from Wendover who was 49 and a housekeeper in Lancaster in Lancashire.  All of this indicates that Mary Ann Collett never married, and once again in the next census in 1911 she was an unmarried lady at the age of 59 when she was recorded as Marion Collet from Wendover who was employed as a housekeeper at the Prestwich Asylum in Lancashire.  It was seventeen years later when Marian Collett died at Rickmansworth on 30th April 1928.

 

 

 

 

63O3

Rebecca Collet was born at Weston Turville on 21st February 1854, the daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Collet.  It was as Rebecca Collett (sic), aged 17 and from Weston Turville, that she was a visitor at the Islington St Clements home of Isabella Huxtable in 1871, which may have been a school for young ladies judging by the lack of any males amongst the 25 females boarding there.  Ten years later, at the time of the next census in 1881, Rebecca Collett (sic) from Weston Turville was 27 when she was a visitor at the home of the Alcroft family in Frodingham, Lincolnshire.  By 1891 she was described as a boarder at Hove near Brighton in Sussex, when she was named as unmarried Rebecca Collet aged 37 from Wendover within the Steyning & Shoreham registration district census that year. 

 

 

 

Rebecca was still a single lady by the time of the census in 1901, by which time she had left the south coast of England and was living in Rickmansworth with two of her younger sisters.  All three sisters were named with the single T spelling of the surname, were confirmed as having been born at Wendover, rather than Weston Turville, and all three of them were described as the principal of a private school.  At that time in her life unmarried Rebecca Collet was 47, and the two sisters living and working there with her were named as Henrietta and Minnie, instead of Harriet and Minnie (below).

 

 

 

Rebecca Collet, aged 57 and from Weston Turville, was still residing in Rickmansworth in 1911, with just her unmarried sister Harriet still living there with her.  It was almost exactly five years later that Rebecca Collet died at Rickmansworth on 28th March 1916, although it was at St Mary’s Church in Wendover that she was buried.  Probate of her personal effects was granted to her two unmarried sisters Harriet Susannah and Minnie Anna (below).

 

 

 

 

63O4

Thomas Penn Collet was born at Wendover during 1856, where he was baptised on 1st June 1856, the son of Robert and Elizabeth Collet.  In 1871 he was boarding with a family in Southwark within the St Mary Newington district of London and must have walked across one of the bridges over the River Thames on his way to school at the Mercer’s School in Cheapside.  Ten years later he was living at 358 Edgware Road within the St Marylebone area of London when he was recorded as Thomas Collett (sic), aged 24 and from Wendover, who was a greengrocer.  In addition to this the census return also gave his status as married, which was incorrect.  On that occasion the census return in 1881 included the names of servants who were employed by him and they were married couple Thomas and Sarah Franklin from Wendover. 

 

 

 

It was three years later in 1884 when Thomas left England and emigrated to Australia where he married Kate Skerritt in 1885.  That marriage produced four children for Thomas and Kate, although their eldest child died eighteen years before his father and twenty-one years before his mother.  Thomas Penn Collet was living at Wonboyn, Eden in New South Wales, Australia, when he died in 1934, and it was three years after that when Kate Collet nee Skerritt passed away in 1937.

 

 

 

63P6

Robert Stratfold Collet

Born in 1886 in Australia

 

63P7

Elizabeth Hailey Collet

Born in 1888 in Australia

 

63P8

Henry Stewart Collet

Born in 1891 in Australia

 

63P9

Marian Kathleen Collet

Born in 1896 in Australia

 

 

 

 

63O5

Harriet Susannah Collet was born at Wendover on 6th June 1857, and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 2nd August 1857, the daughter of Robert Stratfold Collet and his wife Elizabeth.  In 1871 she was living at Wendover, and twenty years later in 1891 she was living and working in Barnsley, Yorkshire, where she was described as Harriet S Collet, an unmarried servant aged 33 and from Wendover.  It may have been her older sister Rebecca (above) who persuaded Harriet to move to Rickmansworth, where the sisters were living in 1901.  Also by that time Harriet was described as the principal of a private school, where she worked with her sisters Rebecca and Minnie (below) who were both described in the same way. 

 

 

 

However, Harriet was recorded in the census that year as Henrietta Susannah Collet, aged 43 and from Wendover.  Ten years later she was still unmarried at the age of 53 when she was named as Harriette Susannah Collet from Wendover who was still residing in Rickmansworth in 1911.  By that time her sister Minnie was no longer living and working with her, so she only had her older sister Rebecca still living and working there with her.  It was also in Hertfordshire that she was living when she died on 27th March 1946.

 

 

 

It is well documented that it was Harriet Susannah Collet, known within the family as Sue and Auntie Sue, who was the custodian of the manor chest for the manor of The Hale estate at Wendover.  It is also thanks to Harriet that much of the details of the Collet family of Wendover has been compiled and preserved.  Upon her death the chest was passed to her nephew the Reverend Joseph Penn Collet (Ref. 63P5) who donated it to the Buckinghamshire Records Office in 1976, two years before he passed away.

 

 

 

 

63O6

John Dean Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1858, and it was there that he was baptised in St Mary’s Church on 3rd October 1858, another son of Robert Stratfold Collet and his wife Elizabeth.  Tragically he was just over one year old when he died at Wendover on 16th October 1859.

 

 

 

 

63O7

Elizabeth Helen Collet was born at The Hale, Wendover on 8th September 1860, the daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Collet who was baptised at St Mary’s Church in Wendover on 7th October 1860 when her parents were confirmed as Robert S Collet and his wife Elizabeth.  In the census of 1881 Elizabeth H Collet from Wendover was 20 when she was living at the family home on the High Street in Rickmansworth with her unmarried brother Henry (above) and her younger sister Minnie (below).

 

 

 

It was almost exactly two years later when she was 22 that she married physician of Wendover Edwin Goodburn Woollerton at Bloomsbury in London on 26th April 1883, and it was at Wendover that Elizabeth Helen Woollerton nee Collet died on 19th September 1928.  Edwin was born at Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire during the third quarter of 1851, and it was in 1935 that he died at Aylesbury.  The couple was living at Wendover in 1871 and 1891, and it was there also that all of their five children were born.  Some records inaccurately described Edwin as a surgeon.

 

 

 

They were: Guy Percival Woollerton who was born in 1884, who died at Sutton in 1966 and who married Phyllis Stone in 1914; Maud Elizabeth Woollerton who was born during the third quarter of 1885 and who married Max Onslow Ford in 1912; Gladys Victoria Woollerton who was born on 16th March 1887 and who died at Camden in 1979; Robert Collet Woollerton who was born in the second quarter of 1890, who died at Wycombe in 1949 and who married May G Mead nee Maddock in 1925; and Edwin Norman Collet Woollerton who was born in 1896, who died in 1942.

 

 

 

 

63O8

Minnie Anna Collet was born at The Hale in Wendover during 1864 and was baptised at St Mary’s Church on 1st May 1864, the last known child of Robert Stratfold Collet and Elizabeth Hailey.  By the time of the census in 1871 she was still living in Wendover at the age of six.  However, sometime during the next decade her father retired from farming and is believed to have purchased a private house on the High Street in Rickmansworth, and it was there that she was living with her brother Henry and sister Elizabeth (above) in 1881.  Minnie A Collett (sic) from Wendover was 16 on that occasion, when her parents were away visiting farmer and widow Mrs Bull at Dinton near Aylesbury.

 

 

 

It was at the same private house on the High Street in Rickmansworth that Minnie was living with her widowed mother in April 1891, following the death of her father one year earlier.  The census return listed both of them incorrectly under the Collett spelling of the surname, when Minnie A Collet from Wendover was 26.  Upon the death of her mother in 1899 Minnie continued to live at the house, and was recorded there in March 1901 at the age of 36.  However, during the first decade of the new century she left Rickmansworth, when she moved to Horsham in Sussex where she was recorded in the 1911 census simply as Minnie Collet, aged 46.  The establishment where she was residing was described as an institution, which may have been a hospital where she was employed as a nurse.  It was at Wendover that she was buried with other family members, following her death on 19th January 1947.

 

 

 

 

63O13

Edith Mary Collet was born at St Pancras in London either at the end of 1870 or early in 1871, since her birth was registered there (Ref. 1b 199) during the first quarter of 1871.  She was the second of the two daughters of Henry Stratfold Collet and his second wife Ann Ives.  Edith was only a few months old on the day of the census in 1871 when the family was residing in the Camden Town area of London at the Crimea Tavern at 36 Inkerman Road in Kentish Town.  By that time her older sister had already suffered an infant death, and Edith was only eight years old when her father died at Crimea Tavern.  During the next two years Edith and her widowed mother Ann moved to 21 Park Street in St Pancras, where Edith M Collett was ten years of age in 1881.

 

 

 

After a further ten years, Edith and her mother had left London and were living in the hamlet of Askett, just east of Monks Risborough, within the parish of Princes Risborough in Buckinghamshire.  Their surname was recorded as Collitt, when Edith M Collitt from St Pancras was 20 years old, but without a stated occupation.  However, her mother and head of the household was managing a seasonal boarding house, where Edith most likely played a supporting role, as was Edith’s older stepsister Ann Stratfold Collett, one of the three children from her father’s first marriage.

 

 

 

It was virtually the same situation in 1901, but by then it was unmarried Ann Stratfold Collett who was head of the household, who was taking in summer boarders.  Described as her stepsister, Edith M Collett was 30, while Edith’s mother Ann Collett nee Ivens was 67.  Still staying there with them was Edith’s cousin Sarah Ivens, her mother’s niece, who had also been living with them in 1891.  A postcard from Edith to her friend Miss Daisy Chapman in London dated 21st December 1904, identified the house address in Askett as Willowdale Cottage on Crowbrook Road, which is still there to this day.  

 

 

 

According to the next census in 1911, the three main members of the family were again living in Askett, with Edith Mary Collett from London being 40, her mother Ann aged 77, and Ann Stratfold Collett aged 59 and living on private means. 

 

 

63P1

John Stratfold Collet was born at Woodridings Avenue in Pinner near Harrow during the third quarter of 1882, the eldest child of Henry Stratfold Collet and his wife Mary Jane Clarke.  Mary Jane was already well advanced in her pregnancy on their wedding day in Tring during the last week of July that year, and it may have been out of embarrassment that the couple immediately moved from Hertfordshire to Middlesex.  That same embarrassment may have been the reason behind the delayed publication of the birth of their son John, when the announcement of his birth was on printed in The Times newspaper on 5th June 1883. 

 

 

 

According to the census return completed on 5th April 1891 John S Collet from Pinner was only seven years old, rather than nine years of age, when he was living with his aunt and uncle in Tring.  At the family home in Pinner John’s mother was expecting the imminent arrival of her fourth child, and that may have been the reason that John was staying with his relatives in Tring who, perhaps, were unaware of his actual age.  John was educated at St Paul’s School where he was awarded a subsizarship to Emmanuel College in Cambridge in 1901.

 

 

 

After the birth of his sister Gwendolen, John returned to his family in Pinner, where he was recorded in the next census of 1901 when John S Collett from Pinner was 17 and it was later that same year that he first attended university in Cambridge.  Five years later he was appointed to the Indian Civil Service after passing the entry examination in 1906.  He arrived in India on 22nd November 1907 and served as assistant collector and manager at Bombay in the land Revenue & General administration department.  His absence from the census in Britain in April 1911 was very likely due to him still being in India.  However, his bride-to-be was living with her widowed mother, two brothers and a sister in the Hendon area of north London.  Harriet Fellie (Jessie) Forbes from Chile was 29, while her mother was Helen Lilian Forbes, aged 59.  Her brothers were Carlos aged 26, and Santiago aged 24, who were both born in Chile, and her sister was Roberta Elena who was 21.

 

 

 

It was in Middlesex, possibly at Hendon, sometime after 2nd April 1911 that John Stratfold Collet married Harriet Jessie Forbes, the daughter of James Keith Forbes and Helen Lilian Place.  Following the birth of their daughter in London during the next year, John tragically died at Poona, Bombay in India while he was still employed by the Indian Civil Service.  He died on 27th January 1912 at the age of 29, the cause of death being enteric fever.  By the time his Will was passed through probate in 1921 his widow had remarried and was Harriet Jessie Montagu, the wife of Monthermer Stanley Hume Montagu, whom she had married in 1913.  That second married resulted in the birth of three further children, Olivia Millicent Jane (1914-1997), Walter Bernard St John (1915-1992) and Charles Sydney Beattie (1918-1942).  Harriet had been born at Valparaiso in Chile on 5th February 1882, and it was at Mombasa in Kenya that she died on 25th June 1959 five years after he husband Monthermer who died in Nairobi in 1954.

 

 

 

63Q1

Joan Stratfold Collet

Born in 1912

 

 

 

 

63P2

Beryl Stratfold Collet was born at Woodridings Avenue in Pinner during 1884, but was baptised at West Drayton on 14th September 1884, the eldest daughter of Henry and Mary Jane Collet.  When she was six years old the census in 1891 placed Beryl Collet from Pinner as her living with her aunt and uncle in Wendover and not with her family in Pinner.  Also absent from the Pinner home was her older brother John who was staying with relatives in Tring.  It is assumed that both siblings had been temporarily sent away while their mother was preparing for the birth of the family’s fourth child, who was born shortly after.  However, in 1901 when she was 16 and again 1911 she was residing with her family in Pinner when she was recorded in error as Beryk Collet who was 26.  Beryl Stratfold Collet died while at North Dorset during December 1977.

 

 

 

 

63P3

Olive Stratfold Collet was born at Woodridings Avenue in Pinner during April 1887 and just like her older sister Beryl (above), she too was baptised at West Drayton on 26th May 1887, the birthday of her father Henry Stratfold Collet.  Unlike her older brother and sister (above) Olive was the only child living with her parents at Pinner in 1891 when she was three years old. 

 

Just a few weeks later Olive’s just sister Gwendolen (below) was born into the family, following which her older siblings returned to the fold.  In 1901 she was still living at Pinner with her family, when she was recorded as Olive Collett who was 13 and from Pinner, and she was again there in 1911 when she was 23.

 

 

 

The only other detail known about Olive is that she died during 1968.

 

 

 

 

63P4

Gwendolen Susannah Collet was born at Woodridings Avenue in Pinner on 17th May 1891, and was also baptised at West Drayton on 13th June 1891, the youngest daughter of Henry and Mary Collet.  The census of 1901 included Gwendolen S Collett from Pinner who was nine years of age, when she was living there with her family, and ten years later she was still there under her full name of Gwendolen Susannah Collet, aged 19.  She continued to live at Pinner over the next twenty years, and by 1927 she was known to be residing at Hendon in Middlesex. 

 

It was during December 1977 that she passed away when she was 86 and was living in North Dorset.

 

 

 

 

63P5

Joseph Penn Collet was born at Woodridings Avenue in Pinner on 17th November 1892 and was baptised at West Drayton on 16th February 1893, the last child born to Henry Stratfold Collet by his wife Mary Jane Clarke. 

 

According to the Pinner census of 1901 Joseph P Collett from Pinner was eight years old when he was living there with his family, as he was ten years later in 1911 when he was named as Joseph Penn Collet, aged 18.  He continued to live with his parents who were residing at Woodridings Avenue in Pinner (Hatch End), Middlesex, in 1920 the year that his father died.  The gained a Master of Arts at Cambridge.

 

 

 

In the official notice relating to the probate process for his father’s Will in London he was named as a joint executor of the Will with his widowed mother Mary Jane Collet, when he was described as the Reverend Joseph Penn Collet, a clerk (in Holy Orders).  Following the death of his father he continued to live in Pinner with his mother and was still living in Middlesex in 1933.  It was at Poole in Dorset that he died during March 1978.  Two years earlier the Reverend Joseph Penn Collet had presented the Buckinghamshire Records Office with the manor chest from The Hale in Wendover containing hundreds of documents dating back to the 1200s which had been with the family for over 400 years and previously held by his Auntie Sue - Harriet Susannah Collet (Ref. 63O5).

 

 

 

 

63P6

Robert Stratfold Collet was born in Australia during 1886 the eldest child of Thomas Penn Collet and Kate Skerritt.  In 1916 he married Ada E Watts but was killed in action the following year when he died on 15th July 1917.  He was Private R S Collet service number 2782 with the 35th Battalion of the Australian Imperial Infantry Force perhaps.  His name, as R S Collet, appears on the Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres.  It was thirteen years after the death of her husband when Ada Collet married Alf G Mallett in 1930.  The death of Ada Mallett formerly Collet nee Watts was recorded in 1988.

 

 

 

 

63P7

Elizabeth Hailey Collet was born in Australia during 1888 the eldest daughter of Thomas and Kate Collet.  It was during 1914 that Elizabeth married Frederick Royer and they had three children.  Frederick Royer died in 1967 and five years after that his widow Elizabeth Royer nee Collet passed away in 1972.

 

 

 

63Q2

Frederick John Royer

Born in 1916

 

63Q3

Beryl Royer

Born in 1919

 

63Q4

Richard Penn Royer

Born in 1921

 

 

 

 

63P8

Henry Stewart Collet was born in Australia during 1891 the son of Thomas and Kate Collet.  He was married twice in his life, both marriages providing with one child.  He first married (1) Elizabeth E Weber during 1927 but fourteen years later he married (2) K Eleanor West in 1941.  Henry Stewart Collet died during 1980 while his second wife survived him by fourteen years, when she passed away in 1994. 

 

 

 

Although not confirmed, it seems very likely that it was from one of the couple’s two child that the wife of Peter Proctor of Australia is connected to this family line.

 

 

 

63Q5

Geoffrey Collet

Born after 1927

 

63Q6

Lenora Collet

Born after 1941

 

 

 

 

63P9

Marian Kathleen Collet, who was known as Kathleen, was born in Australia during 1896 the last child born to Thomas Penn Collet by his wife Kate Skerritt.  She married Robert I Robb in 1916 and their marriage produced three children for the couple.  They were Betty K Robb, Alan M Robb, and R Max Robb.  Robert Robb died in 1947 and it was twenty-nine years after that Marian Kathleen Robb nee Collet passed away in 1976.

 

 

 

 

63Q1

Joan Stratfold Collet was born in London during September 1912, the same year that her father John Stratfold Collet died at Poona in India.  Joan married Cecil William Howard at the Church of St Paul in Mombasa on 25th September 1937.  The marriage certificate confirmed that Cecil was a farmer at 24, and that Joan was 25, and that they were residing at Kiamara, Kiambu.  The groom’s father was named as William Howard, a land agent, while the bride’s father was recorded as John Stratfold Collet, deceased, of the Indian Civil Service.  Cecil was born at Brentford on 1st June 1913, the son of William Lewis Watkins Howard and his wife Gladys Gwendoline Tucker, and he died at Southwark in London during November 1992, while his wife had died over thirty years earlier at St Marylebone in London on 5th August 1962 at the age of 49.

 

 

 

The marriage of Joan and Cecil produced two sons; Peter William J Howard was born around 1940 and he married Susan J Betty in December 1969 at Weston-Super-Mare, and Anthony Walter Howard who was born in Nairobi on 26th November 1941.  Anthony married Anne Christine James, although they were later divorced after the birth of two daughters, and it was Christine who kindly helped in the construction of this family line.