The Short and Prescott Families
Researching a family tree is a difficult task. It is a bit like reading a book backwards: the ending is known but the beginning has to be deduced from the ending. When relating the story, however, it is much easier to follow the story from the earliest time through to the present and that is what we have chosen to do.
We will follow mainly the name of ‘Short’ and ignore the many ‘side’ branches.
Our ancestors were not particularly good at recording details of their forebears, although Elizabeth I had decreed that all births, marriages and deaths should be recorded by the church and that the records should be kept by the appropriate bishop. Inevitably, many were lost or destroyed and most that survive give no more than the barest detail. This is not surprising as paper and literate individuals were in short supply. The record is thus fragmentary and difficult or impossible to follow and it is easy to make mistakes. No photographs of the original documents are available so we have to rely on transcripts.
It is an unfortunate fact that women were regarded as second-class citizens for most of the early records. Consequently, our story is somewhat male-dominated. The position is not helped by the fact that women took their husband’s surname on marriage which made them difficult to place in the family tree.
Tracing early ancestors is difficult and error-prone. However, it is possible to find a Samuel Short (b.1690) in Okeford, Dorset.
He married Ann Stainer in Okeford in 1719. They had 7 children including one Robert Short (b.1734) in Okeford.
Robert was a ‘labourer’. In 1759 he married Mary Shepherd. We know of two children: George Short (b.1761) in Hinton St Mary. He in his turn married Ann Rendall in 1790. They in turn produced 4 children – amongst them one named after his father, George Short (b.1793).
George
Short (b.1793).
Aside: Placing George in history
Louis XVI guillotined
France declares war on Great Britain
George was born in Corscombe, Dorset. He was an agricultural labourer.
He differs from his forebears in that he lived long enough to be found in no less than three census records. That from 1841 is reproduced above:
He had married Elizabeth Bartlett (b.1787) from Compton Valence in 1816.
The ages given in the document are not trustworthy. The census taker often guessed the age and rounded to the nearest five years.
They had 7 children:
Henry (b.1820), Geoffrey (b.1821), Jane (b.1823), Thomas (b.1825), Eliza (b.1827), Elizabeth (b.1829), Ann(b.1830).
In the 1851 census above, they are living in “George’s Cottage” in Compton Valence. Elizabeth is described as washerwoman.
Henry Short (b.1820)
Aside: Placing Henry in history
Florence Nightingale born
The eldest son , Henry, Is thus the first ‘certain’ ancestor in the Short tree. He married Margaret Barber in 1851. She was his next door neighbour in the 1841 census reproduced above earlier. She was always referred to as ‘Peggy’ Barber.
We can find them in the 1861 census for Compton Valence:
Henry, like his father, was an agricultural labourer. Of their seven children, we shall only be concerned with the first, Henry James Short (b.1852).
Henry James Short (b.1852).
Aside: Placing Henry in history
California becomes 31st state of US
American civil war starts 1861
Henry James was a quite different person to his father and grandfather. In the 1861 census above he was referred to as ‘scholar’.
In 1875 he married Emily Jane Jones from Wisbech, Cambridgeshire. Sometime after this they moved to Tickhill in Yorkshire where Violet Elsie Emily, (b.1878), Jessie Frances (b.1879) were born.
Then followed a spell in Newhall, Derbshire where Henry Percival (b.1880) appeared.
Finally they moved to Huntspill in Somerset where:
Lionel (b.1881),Dora and Ida (b.1885), Lucy Sybil (b.1886), Arthur G (b.1887), Myash (b.1891) were born.
In the 1901 census we see why Henry was so different:
He was not an agricultural labourer but a ‘certificated’ teacher as was his wife Emily Jane. In practice the whole family seem to have been drummed into teaching at the school. Four out of the five who were older than 19 were described as ‘Assistant Teacher’. The odd man out was Lionel who obviously wanted to be a farmer.
By the 1911 census his resistance had been worn down:
He was now described as ‘Assistant Teacher’. Lionel is a key figure in our story.
It is a sad fact that child mortality at this period was high. Emily is recorded as giving birth to 11 children but 5 died.
Also on the census form is Ernest Watts(b.1904), described as grandson. He was the offspring of Violet who married Anthony Frank Watts in 1902.
Lionel Clifford Short (b.1881)
Aside: Lionel George in history
Billy the Kid is shot by Pat Garrett
California gold rush starts
Lionel married Ella Hampton Prescott from Norton St Philip in 1912. She was the daughter of Charles and Annie Prescott. Charles was a builder. Ella, however, was a school teacher. We can speculate that perhaps Lionel found school teaching was quite a good occupation – at least some of the time. 
Lionel and Ella had four children. Gerald (b.1912), the eldest, died of meningitis aged two . Jean Mary Ella was born in 1916, Dora (b.1918) who also died young in1928 from scarlet fever and lastly Philip Lionel (b.1923). Thus Lionel and Ella sadly followed Lionel’s parents in losing half of their children before adulthood.
Jean, Philip and Dora
In 1939, with the outbreak of war, the government realised that the scheduled 1941 census would not take place so it hurriedly undertook an abbreviated census called the 1939 register. We can find Lionel and Ella on this document.
They are living at Dunkerton House in Norton St Philip.
More surprising are the people staying with them at the time. We find daughter Jean Mary Ella with her husband Leslie Gale. He is described as school master and ARP warden, Dursley.
Dunkerton House today
Lionel is described in the 1939 register as a ‘Farm Inspector with United Dairies’. The teaching did not last long! As a Farm Inspector, he had the use of a car which was somewhat unusual in those days. Ella’s employment is “unpaid domestic duties”!!!
Wiltshire Times & Trowbridge Advertiser 1927Owning a car was not without its drawbacks.
Lionel died in 1957 after several years in hospital due to circulation problems.
Ella was very involved in village life. She played the church organ and trained the choir. She also organised everything from Jumble Sales to the village cricket team.
Ella moved to Dursley to be near daughter, Jean, and for the delights of grandchildren who called her not ‘Granny’ but “Dear”.
She died in 1963 and was buried with Lionel in Norton St Philip churchyard.
Jean Mary Ella Short (b.1916)
As a child Jean was quite a rebel at times – she talked of going to the corner shop at around the age of 14 and doing odd jobs in exchange for a few cigarettes, then smoking them in the outside toilet so that her parents wouldn’t know.
She attended grammar schools in Trowbridge and in Frome, moving schools after the death of her sister.
She spoke of cycling to catch the bus for school and of often being late – when the bus driver would see her coming and wait for her. She would leave her bike against a hedge ready to collect it in the evening.
When she left school she went to Cannings Secretarial College in Bath and after qualifying she got a job as a secretary to one of the directors of R A Lister in Dursley,Gloucestershire. It was in Dursley that she met Leslie Gale. He was teaching at the Church School in the town and they married on 3 August 1937.
They moved to Stoke Gifford, Bristol when Les was appointed head of the school there in the early 1940s, but they let the house in Dursley as they intended to return – which they did in 1944 when Les was appointed head of the Church School in Dursley.
Jean took up flower arranging becoming well-known for her Japanese Ikebana arrangements. She became secretary of the Dursley Flower Society and was a member of NAFAS – the National Association of Flower Arrangers. She made a lot of new friends and became very involved in flower arranging festivals in different parts of the country. Her displays were always dramatic and would take weeks of thinking and planning beforehand. When in her eighties, Jean was made the first honorary president of Dursley Flower Society.
Jean loved gardening and knew the names of most flowers. Her garden was immaculate – weeds just weren’t allowed and the whole garden was hoed every week…Les had his vegetables – in someone else’s garden!! .
Jean did not want to be called ‘Grandma’ when grandchildren came along. If her mother had the title ‘Dear’ then she would have something else. She was called ‘J’ .
She died in 2011.
Philip Lionel Short (b.1923)
Philip read English at Bristol University but the war intervened before he finished and he was drafted into the army. He was posted to India where he had a relatively quiet and enjoyable life.
On returning to the UK he completed his studies by taking a Psychology degree at Oriel College, Oxford. Philip called these times some of the happiest in his life.
After Oxford he did post-grad research in Psychology at the Burdon Institute near Bristol. Psychology led to marketing and he moved on to work for first Unilever and then British American Tobacco. These jobs made Philip a much-travelled man. He visited countries all over the world.
By this time he was living with his partner, John Swingler, in Hampstead. They later moved to Poole. Philip became increasingly incapacitated. First, circulation problems made the amputation of a leg necessary and then macular degeneration caused near total blindness.
Eventually he moved to a care home where he died in 2012. He is buried with his parents.
Ella Prescott’s family
We will start at the earliest ancestor we can find:
Philip Prescott ( b.1756) in Norton St Philip
At this point we run into the problem of no census returns. We know that a Philip Prescott married a Mary Eames in Norton St Philip in 1779. We also know that Philip and Mary had a son, Henry born 1799. Otherwise we know very little about Philip Prescott.
Henry Prescott (b.1799) in Norton St Philip
Henry was a carpenter. He, too, lived in Norton St Philip. In 1819 he married an Elizabeth Westlake who came from Wellington, Somerset. They had six children:
Harriet (b. 1820), James (b.1822), Henry (b.1824) , Mary (b.1828), Sarah (b.1832), Anna M. (b.1837).
In the 1861 census, Henry is described as Carpenter. Son Henry was a mason. These trades continued in succeeding generations.
In the 1871 census below, we learn that Anna was a shoebinder.
Henry lived a long time. He died in 1880 and Elizabeth in 1893.
James Prescott (b.1822)
We can find Ella’s grandparents on the 1851 census shown above:
They were James Prescott and his wife, Eliza.
James was also a carpenter and lived in Norton St Philip. In 1846 he married Eliza Jane Hampton in St Mary Redcliffe church in Bristol. Her surname is doubtless the origin of Ella’s middle name.
They had five children:
Frederick (b.1847) – a mason. He married Martha Roberts and lived in Buckland Dinham.
Charles Prescott (b.1849) – a mason (see below)
Alfred Prescott (b.1852) – a carpenter. He married Ann Rich and lived in Norton.
Harriet (1856) married Frank Curtis, carpenter and lived in Norton.
Elizabeth Jane (b.1859) , a teacher, married Charles Allwood, a carpenter, and lived in Norton.
Charles
Prescott (b.1849)
Charles was a builder/mason. In 1879 he married Ann Bell, the daughter of James and Sarah Bell. James was a carpenter and lived in Dunkerton House, Norton St Philip. They had five children:
Charles (b.1877), Edward (b.1881), George (b.1883), Ella Hampton (b.1885) and Harry James (1889).
An Aside
Charles junior (b.1877) married Emily Day (who came from Corsham) in 1901. Their romance is a nice story.
In 1886 Emily moved to Bath as a servant in the household of a surgeon, Richard Fowler. The Fowlers were a well-to-do family and employed three servants – in the 1891 census above they employed a cook, Emily aged 23 (parlour maid) and a Charles Prescott aged 16 (Page). What went on ‘above stairs’ we don’t know, but 15 years later Charles and Emily married.
Charles became a stone mason.
On leaving Bath Emily was presented with this clock inscribed with “For 7 years faithful service, 1893”.
The clock – which still goes!
Of the other children, Edward became a carpenter. He married Helen Davidson of Hampstead and
they lived there.
George became a blacksmith. He married Louisa Burrows and they lived in Norton.
Harry James is on the census form below.
Daughter, Ella was still living at home in 1911. Note that she was a school teacher.
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