Will of the Month: Mary Partridge, an orchard, but no pear tree

Posted by e.m.vine@exeter.ac.uk

Our project is analysing a sample of 25,000 wills, and when writing each ‘Will of the Month’ post, it can be difficult to know how to select just one to write about. For December’s post, we wanted to write about a will with a loosely ‘Christmassy’ theme. Because the names of all the testators whose wills were proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury are searchable, we were able to search for the wills of people with Christmas-related names. Accordingly we could have written about the will of Christmas Evans, a milkman of Bermondsey, Richard Christmas, a cloth worker, or about the lives of Gingerbread Johnson, Thomas Merry, Elizabeth Holly, Joan Stocking or Theophila Sledges, or, our personal favourite, a distiller named ‘Frostan Snow’. Yet we’ve settled on a testator who had both a Christmas-adjacent name and who made a range of interesting bequests, and this is one Mary Partridge.¹

Left: Anonymous (1780). First page of the carol ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ from Mirth without Mischief.

A pear tree?

Mary Partridge was a spinster from Somerset who died in November 1786, six years after the first known publication of the words to the carol ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’.² Unfortunately, Partridge did not make a bequest of an individual pear tree, but she did leave shares in orchards, gardens, and land she held in her native town of Chard. As well as using her will to transfer her shares in land, Partridge distributed money, household furnishings, and personal possessions to friends and family. Unmarried and without children, Partridge’s closest living relative appears to have been her nephew John Pope, who she left ‘my household Goods and ffurniture’. At first this seems a fairly comprehensive bequest of everything in her house, and indeed many wills lumped together ‘all household goods and furniture’ in one bequest, without itemising individual ‘moveable’ property such as beds or chairs.

But like many testators, Partridge drew a distinction between household goods and some specific items of tableware or personal possessions, which were set aside for other beneficiaries. It is notable that many of these itemised bequests were left to other women. Partridge gave to one Susanna Harcombe ‘my China together with my Silver Table and Tea Spoons’. She appeared to have set aside the more valuable or decorative items of silverware or tableware as distinct from the residue of her household goods.

A ‘M^rs Hannah Cannicott’ received ‘one hundred pounds and my wearing apparel’. As with the bequest of ‘my household Goods’, this was a blanket bequest of all clothing, rather than an itemised list of gowns, hats, petticoats, or gloves as sometimes appear in other wills. One of the main purposes of wills was to provide sufficient description to ensure that the correct bequest was identified and given to the correct beneficiary – a newly-purchased pair of leather gloves to a favourite sister, a red petticoat to an eldest daughter, a best hat to a most valued friend. (For more examples of ‘best’ hats, see our blog post about a Gloucester capmaker). But in cases where all ‘wearing apparel’ was left to the same beneficiary, there was of course no need to itemise or describe each item.

Five gold rings?

Having established that Mary Partridge did not bequeath a pear tree, it would have been fitting perhaps if she had instead owned swans, geese, or perhaps five gold rings. Unfortunately, Partridge only left one ring, but another of our recent blog posts discusses a will which mentioned three. This singular ring was left to Susanna Harcombe, abovementioned recipient of china and silver spoons, and was described only as ‘my ring’. From the lack of description, and as there were no other rings mentioned as among Partridge’s possessions, we can assume that this was Partridge’s only ring. Equally, neither its materiality (my gold ring), nor function (my seal ring) were mentioned. It is ‘my ring’ not ‘a ring’, and its location is not specified (e.g. ‘the ring in my jewellery box’). As such we might infer that this ring was worn by Mary Partridge, that it could be found about her person, and that she was never usually parted from it.

A lack of description might suggest that an item could be easily identified amongst an individual’s possessions. Yet occasionally seemingly unique or clearly identifiable items were described in greater detail. Partridge gave to Mary Edwards ‘my Gold Watch which was her Aunts M^rs Warrys’. As well as being a valuable and fashionable item, the description hints at the personal connection between Partridge, Edwards, and Mrs Warry. Without further information we can’t be sure of the relationship between these women. Yet Partridge’s will is an example of how small, valuable personal possessions, such as rings and watches, moved between female friends and relatives. The value of the gold watch was enhanced by it having once been a prized possession of Mary Partridge, and before that of Mrs Warry.

While only one ring was owned by Mary Partridge, another was mentioned in the will. Partridge left a bequest ‘unto M^r Robert James One Guinea to buy him a Ring’. This money would be left to James to purchase a mourning ring designed to be worn in remembrance, but mourning rings also held monetary value and were a means of transferring wealth. ‘Mourning’ was also mentioned in the will’s most poignant bequest. Partridge gave ‘Mourning unto Mary Harcombe and Betty Silvester Daughter of George Silvester as a reward for the care they have taken of me during my Illness’. Although no further detail is given other than ‘mourning’ this was likely again money set aside so that Mary and Betty could buy suitable mourning clothing, or perhaps a ring. This bequest was a recognition of Mary and Betty’s labour in caring for Partridge during what was likely the illness that prompted her to make her will.

Ladies and Maids?

Mary Partridge’s will was fairly standard in many ways, and it acts as an insight into the life of a woman about whom we know only a tantalising amount. She was a spinster, but a relatively wealthy woman – with hundreds of pounds and shares in land, a gold watch and some decorative china to disperse. The only relative that Partridge identifies is her nephew, John Pope. Pope’s mother, presumably Partridge’s sister, does not appear to be mentioned, yet it is possible that, if living, she had remarried and had a different name. Several surnames were repeated in the will, and several women were named as beneficiaries, but we do not know from the will alone if any of these were relatives by blood or marriage.

The care between these women is most tangibly expressed in the nursing of Mary Partridge during her sickness and the bequests of personal possessions within this female network. For a loosely Christmas-themed blog post that set out to find connections with the ‘Twelve days of Christmas’, we’ve largely failed to find evidence of pear trees and geese. But, along with some gold rings, it is gifting, and considered bequests as expressions of love, that wills provide plentiful evidence for.

1. PROB 11/1147/220, Will of Mary Partridge, Spinster of Chard, Somerset, 13 November 1786 ↩︎
2. Anonymous, Mirth Without Mischief. Containing The Twelve Days of Christmas; The Play of the Gaping Wide-Mouthed-Wadling Frog; Love and Hatred; The Art of Talking with the Fingers; and Nimble Ned’s Alphabet and Figures (London, 1780) ↩︎