Category: cobbwebs-news-and-views

The village of Trimley to the west of Felixstowe is as important to us as it is single churchyard.  Sadly, St. Mary is now largely unused.  Eight Cobbolds are buried in the churchyard (they are listed below) but perhaps the strangest thing is the pair of stained glass windows in the north and south walls of the church of St. Mary.

One depicting St. Edmund which is ‘given to the greater glory of God and in memory of Ernest St. George Cobbold’ (1840-1895) #199 features his face complete with walrus moustache and the other dedicated to St. George features Ernest’s son, Herbert St. George Cobbold (1871-1944) #323, again with his face and fully grown upper lip.

Buried at Trimly

Sarah Cobbold (1717-1777) #45
Henry Cobbold (1813-1873) #131
Horace Cobbold (1821-1890) #2749
Louisa Cobbold (1813-1894) #146
Emily Cobbold (1809-1902) #129
Katherine Cobbold (1832-1914) #2750
John Dupuis Cobbold (1861-1929 #307
Florence Jane Cobbold (1856-1938) #2859
Ralph Patteson Cobbold (1868-1965) #316

Credit for the two pictures and some of the content gladly given to Simon Knott’s excellent site:  www.suffolkchurches.co.uk

RHW Cobbold #375 and EFW Cobbold #378: Correction 

In our Cobbweb of November 2012 (see Cobbwebs archive) we said that a post card depicting a memorial tablet naming 3 Cobbolds was at Earls Barton and what is worse we said it in a rather self-congratulatory tone!

We are grateful to Mrs Sandy Hall http://5bravemen.weebly.com for pointing out that the memorial tablet is actually in Hitcham, Suffolk.

Once again we have much gratitude to express.

Thank you….

Julian and Sarah Royle for a contribution to the endowment fund and for linking into the family tree; Sarah is #9862.

Lady Kenya Tatton Brown for more information for the family tree.

Mr & Mrs John Moorby for 2 ‘Suffolk’ books and for papers for the archive, particularly those relating to ITFC’s victory in the FA Cup in 1978.

Bernice Mansell for more information on the Boursot family; Commandant Claude Boursot (1769-1846) #6884 was a supplier of Champagne to Napoleon.

Ann Jameson for reminding us of the marriage between banker and Liberal politician, Thomas Tertius Paget (1807-1892) #7865 and Katherine Geraldine McCausland (1827-1869).

We are pleased to report the addition to the trust library of

Parsons and Prisons which is Bina Martin’s book on Temple Chevallier Martin (1842-1933), His ancestors and his descendants.  We have not yet fully digested our purchase but are delighted that it establishes in detail the link between the Chevallier and Edgcumbe families into both of which Cobbolds have married.

We show here a 3 page article by Catherine Larner which appeared in the April 2015 edition of Family Tree magazine.

The Cobbolds say goodbye and signal the end of an era.

This feature by Jane Dismore (author of The Voice from the Garden) appeared in the East Anglian Daily Times on Saturday April 11^th 2015.  Here is a link.

www.janedismore.com/2015/04/17/the-cobbolds-say-goodbye-and-signal-the-end-of-an-era/

The date for the re-opening celebration of Holywells Park, the stables and the conservatory has now been set at 18^th July 2015.

For those who need reminding, Holy Wells (as it was then spelled) was built by John Cobbold (1746-1835) #56 on the family tree, in time for the family to move in just before Christmas 1814.  It remained the principal Cobbold home until the death in 1929 of John Dupuis Cobbold (#307), 4 generations later, when it was bought by Lord Woodbridge who gave it to the Borough of Ipswich.  No other family ever lived there.

The park opened to the public permanently in 1936 but the house was demolished in the 1960s leaving only the stable block and the conservatory standing.  These two buildings and the park itself have received a £3m restoration over the last couple of years which culminates in the re-opening ceremony on 18^th July.

The Cobbold Family History Trust will be exhibiting at the celebrations on 18^th and 19^th July showing, inter alia, the Elizabeth Cobbold paper-cut Valentines alongside a demonstration of paper-cutting by Erica Bülow-Osborne and Loïs Cordelia.

That day will also mark the launch of the Trust’s next book.  First in the Cobbold & Kin series will be Holywells, Home of the Cobbolds by Clive Hodges in paperback format selling at £7.99.  Cleverly designed to show the visitor and the local community all that can no longer be seen it charts the life of Holwells Park from earliest times to the present day.

A set of 8 post cards will be introduced at the same time.  All carry images of how things used to be around 1900, framed in an Elizabeth Cobbold Valentine border.

Please put the date in your diary and watch this website for more details

A Recent article in the East Anglian Daily Times by historian Dr John Blatchly looking at the life of Ipswich ‘Algebraist’ and newspaper proprietor John King junior included a Henry Davy lithograph dated 1856 of Rosehill House in which King lived as tenant of Alan Brooksby Cobbold (1830-1901) #166 on the family tree.  Today the house, divided into two, stands at the northern end of Sandhurst Avenue beyond a roundabout with what may be one of the 4 original Yew trees at its centre.

The lithograph includes two cylindrical observatories for which Dr Blatchly presumes Alan Brooksby gave permission and a free standing telescope which looks too small to have helped John King determine the distance of the sun from the earth which he calculated to 10 decimal places.

This house is of some interest to us.  It is believed but not confirmed that the house was owned by Owen Roe (1770-1825) #2878 who was a gilder, mirror maker and picture dealer with a shop at 2 Upper Brook Street, Ipswich. As it stands on slightly elevated ground it perhaps started as ‘Roe’s Hill.’  Roe’s daughter or possibly his niece Ann (1795-1851) #103 married Charles Cobbold (1793-1859) #102 as a result of ‘matched’ Valentines at one of his mother’s famous balls in 1811.

 The Trust has both the ‘successful’ Valentines and a silver snuff box given to Charles in 1839 prior to his leaving Ipswich for Edinburgh.  The reason for this move is not understood.  Charles and Ann had 4 children of whom only Alan Brooksby out lived his father.  Alan’s son Charles Augustus Cobbold (1871-1915) #169 was a Captain serving with 7th Bn. the Suffolk Regiment when he was killed.  He is commemorated on the Loos Memorial and his death plaque is held by the Trust.

Redwood Appeal for Ipswich Arboretum

The Friends of Christchurch Park have launched an appeal to give Ipswich Arboretum its very own ‘mini’ Redwood Grove.  The Giant Redwood is the largest species of tree on earth and the Coast Redwoods the tallest so the choice of tree is spectacular.

Ipswich Arboretum was laid out in 1851 and opened to the public (the first to do so) in 1855 so the choice of venue cannot be bettered.  Given the Cobbold family’s long association with Ipswich in general and Christchurch Park in particular The Cobbold Family History Trust is delighted to be one of the first to sponsor a magnificent Redwood to the tune of £200.  If any family member would like to contribute please get in touch.

Thank you………

So much information is being offered to the trust and so many questions are being asked of it that we have a serious problem keeping up.  Firstly, apologies if replies have not been received as quickly as you would have liked and secondly it has become impossible to publicly thank information donors in detail so we show below the names of this month’s donors with apologies if any names have been inadvertently omitted:

Neville Cobbold
Prim Cobbold
Mike Cavanagh
Lesley Steinitz
Debbie Barnes
Adrian Howlett
Henry Spence
Virginia van de Lande
Phil Spencer
John Mansell
Mark Norris

Thank you all.

Reports on the 50th anniversary of this epic event will not have escaped our readers.

What is not so well known is that the event was organised with outstanding military precision by Col. Paul Freyberg 2nd Baron Freyberg (1923-1993) who is #2079 on the family tree. (He is the author of his father’s biography; no mean task given that his father was arguably the most decorated soldier in the British Army). Paul served with the New Zealand Division in Greece in 1941 and the Long Range Desert Group in the Middle East in 1941-42, then with the Grenadier Guards in Tunisia and Italy 1942-45 where he won his MC. After the war he was with the British Army of the Rhine 1950-51 and following postings in the Ministry of Defence he was commander of the Honourable Artillery Company, Infantry Battalion in 1965 when Sir Winston died.

The world famous former Prime Minister’s death occurred during the time that Cameron Cobbold 1st Baron Cobbold (1904-1987) #490 was Lord Chamberlain (1963-1971). He had been Governor of the Bank of England from 1949 to 1961.

His responsibilities to the Monarch required his attendance at the funeral in St Paul’s and our photograph shows him (back left with an umbrella) leaving the cathedral with the Royal Family and Heads of State including President de Gaulle (circled), Sir Winston’s wartime ally.

Gwen (#396 in the family tree) was born in Ipswich on 14^th October 1887 eldest daughter of Alfred Townshend Cobbold (#253) and Alice Bessie Nunn.  In 1891, by which time Gwen had two younger sisters, Margaret and Joan, the family was living at 222 Woodbridge Road, Ipswich.  Their father was a Solicitor who later took on significant civic responsibilities.  By 1901 they had moved to The Rookery in Sproughton and Gwen had acquired three brothers, Rowland, Sterling and Mike, the last member of the family, Prim, being added the following year.

In April 1915 Gwen went to train as a nurse at Endell Street Military Hospital in London.  Endell Street was set up by the Women’s Hospital Corps led by two suffragist doctors, Flora Murray and Louisa Garrett Anderson.  The WHC had successfully set up and run hospitals in France for the Croix Rouge but when British casualties were being evacuated back to the UK in 1915 they offered their services to the British Army.  The Army accepted the offer and Endell Street, which opened in May 1915, was born under the auspices of the Royal Army Medical Corps but was staffed almost entirely by women.

Gwen’s brother, Rowland who had gone to work in Argentina before the war returned on the outbreak of hostilities and was commissioned into the Royal Field Artillery.  Whilst trying to re-establish communications with his battery from his forward observation post he was killed instantaneously by shrapnel on 25^th September 1915.

 Two months later Gwen transferred to the Post Office Home Hospital, Kensington Palace Gardens for six weeks before going to the Hospital d’Alliance, Yvetot, France for six months which was followed by eight months at the Hospital Temporaire d’Arc-de-Barrois.  This latter hospital had been set up by four English sisters to help with the chronic shortage of medical facilities and trained nurses in the French military.

Records show her back in England from 12^th to 24^th July 1917 by which time her family was at Bramford House near Ipswich.  Gwen was posted to Gifford House Auxilliary Hospital, Roehampton before returning to France, probably in Etaples for an unknown period during which she was fortunate to survive a bombing raid on the hospital where she was working.  Her career of great dedication as a VAD nurse ended in 1919

At some stage around 1917 Gwen became a Catholic and anecdotal evidence suggests that she relished her life in France and particularly enjoyed nursing French soldiers.  It was probably around this time that she was diagnosed with cancer from which, after a spell in remission in Menton, France, she died in 1926.  Her funeral was held at the Catholic Church, Crown Place, Woodbridge and she was laid to rest there in the new Cemetery.

Note

The considerable contribution made by Kelvin Dakin of the Bramford Local History Group is acknowledged and appreciated.

The picture which shows the 7 children, from bottom to top, Gwen, Margaret, Joan, Rowland, Sterling, Mike and Prim is reproduced by kind permission of The Martin Shaw Trust Archive.