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SULSTON
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This
section is dedicated to my one-name study of the SULSTON (SELSTONE) family.
The
origin of the surname is obscure and there are several variations
in the spelling found in historical documents. These are perpetuated today
as anyone who carries the name knows only too well.
The first
record of a Sulston in Oxfordshire is that of William Selstone (died 1719) who
married Anne Wakelynne in 1705 in Ambrosden church. William may have moved from
Their son
William Selstone (1709-1770) married Sarah Hobcraft in 1730 and they had five
children but two died young. We know from receipts kept in the Oxfordshire
Archives that William was a cottager in Blackthorn and rented farmland from Mr
Thomas Cooper. He paid an annual rent of £1 7s 7d on All Saints’ Day from
1744 to 1760. In 1752, his son John Sulstone (died 1776) was a churchwarden and
overseer of the poor, so the family had reasonable standing in the hamlet.
Blackthorn was an open village and had a high number of poor families who
depended on support from the rest of the community.
In 1762,
William and Sarah’s eldest son William Sulstone (1731-1810) married Mary Pavier
in Bicester and they raised a family of three children to adulthood in
Blackthorn. In 1776, this William was awarded rights to a plot of land of
‘one rood and fourteen perches’ which was enclosed from part of the
common area of land on the green adjoining his homestead. [Enclosure Act for
Blackthorn 1776.] William and Mary’s elder son, William Sulston (born
1764) married Hannah Ratford and moved to Crowell. Their descendants spread out
into Buckinghamshire to Little Hampden, Princes Risborough and Aylesbury. There
are at least two current Sulston families who are descended from him.
I can
trace my direct line from William Selstone
(died 1719) through John Sulston (1765-1857) who was William's great grandson.
John lived at Cowleys Farm in Piddington, Oxfordshire from the late 1700's when
his parents (William and Mary) moved from Blackthorn. His first wife was
Rebecca Tomkins and they had a son John (1795-1860) who married Sarah Syms
(about 1800-1866) in 1820. John and Sarah settled in Long Crendon in
Buckinghamshire and had a family of seven children.
John of
Cowleys second wife was Hannah Haynes. They married in 1804 and had nine
children of whom eight lived to adulthood. Six of their children married and
produced at least 42 grandchildren for John and Hannah. Two of his sons, Andrew
and Richard, remained in Piddington into the beginning of this century. Another
son was Thomas Sulston (1813-1873) who married Anne Hunt in 1850. Thomas and Anne moved to Boarstall in Buckinghamshire
in 1853. Some of their descendants later emigrated to Canada, USA and South
Africa.
John and
Hannah are buried in the churchyard at Ambrosden, with two of their children.
The gravestones are still intact and readable. When John died in 1857 he left a
detailed will which has been used to reconstruct the family relationships,
using additional information from his father’s will of 1810 and the
parish registers of Ambrosden and Piddington.
From 1705
to 1942, members of the Sulston family were farmers in the South East corner of
Oxfordshire. Go to Tale of Four Farms.
NEWS ITEMS - SULSTON babies and pictures of the
Sulston gathering in Boarstall in 2002
If you
can contribute to the study in any way, contact me at: sulston@one-namenospam.org (please
remove nospam before sending)
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