As per Robin Press
So the Marrs from the beginning as known to me:-
It seems that Thomas and Mary Marr, living at Bentley near Beverley, North of Hull, had two children to our knowledge. Henry, the founder of the family which is the second stream in this story, was baptised on 30th May 1785 at Lairgate Independent Church in Beverley, which implies that they were Methodists. From a fragmentary tree (DWG has this copy) found in Muriel`s papers we learn that Henry had a sister Hannah, some years his senior, for she was married to John Lee of Gardham, a hamlet close to Bishop Burton, on 12th November 1795. Muriel`s tree was drawn up in 1921 in an attempt to establish the connection between Marrs and Richardsons. The early Marr tree placed in this Chapter, indicates the connection. There may well have been other children in that generation but only Henry and Hannah emerge from our legacy of papers. Derek Marr employed a genealogist to investigate Henry Marr`s parents, with no success.
However, Bentley is some 3 miles south of Beverley, and a mile and half north of Skidby. Henry left fields at Skidby Ings and Skidby Carrs and a ‘close’ at Hull Bank Field, to his son Thomas Norrison (see tree above) in his Will. These lie 3 miles east of Bentley, on the bank of the River Hull. At the beginning of my attempts to discover the history of these families, encouraged by Don Steele’s “Discovering your Family History”, and while we had a daughter and a bed in London, I went to the offices of the Genealogical Society hoping that something would turn up. It was a near disaster. They had moved, said a note pinned to the door, from the Kensington given in the book , to the City. It was lunch time before I found their new home. The next set-back was the realization that far from being allowed to examine their material there was a charge of £2 per hour. The place was full of people who knew what they were doing but no-one prepared to tell us where to start. As I really did not know quite what I was looking for, that was not surprising. I wandered round trying to see whether it was worth joining the Society, and realizing that unless one lived in London the source of information was of little value. But by chance I found a book which listed Wills proved in the East Riding in the 17th Century, and therein were three entries of which I made a note:
12 February 1678 Henry Marr, Dunshill in the parish of Cottingham
20 November 1678 Anne Marr, widow of Cottingham
3 February 1679 Elizabeth Marr, widow of Kingston-on-Hull
It was not until I assembled these papers, that I appreciated that Skidby Ings is on the doorstep of Dunshill. No doubt this is all too vague and coincidental to be taken seriously. The evidence would hold no water in a court-of-law, but consider: Henry farmed at Welton and Bishop Burton, so why did he own a parcel of land at Dunshill if not inherited from his father? The Henry of Dunshill died a century before our Henry was born, so if directly related there must have had two or three generations in between. But “Henry” has persisted in this family through every generation covered by this study, and the ladies mentioned above also bear names which appear in our period. Moreover the Mormon records revealed that a Hannah Marr daughter of George of Skidby was christened on 20 July 1740, and in 1871 Richard Marr at Thornton-le-Dale employed a girl from Cottingham as a governess for his children, and Herbert Marr married a girl from there and his sons, Henry’s great-great-grandsons, were borne there in 1903 and 1906. Thus a thread of connection with Cottingham may be imagined as persisting for many years. It is conceivable that Hannah and Henry had brothers and sisters and that later generations maintained contact with cousins in that locality for many years, yet leaving no trace in our papers
So it is my hunch that “our” Marrs originated from the parish of Cottingham. It is no more than a hunch but I shall hold to it until proved wrong. I know of no evidence linking the family with aristocratic forbears
Henry Marr, my great-great-grandfather, on 6th September 1809, married Martha Johnson. Martha`s mother, Mary (as a pure guess, nee Norrison) Johnson, died aged 86 on 19th December 1845, whilst living with Esther and William Lee at Gardham, so she was born in 1759. The inscription in a bible given to Thomas Norrison Marr (TNM) says she was “late of Welton”. It also says that for 71 years she was a member of the Methodist Society, implying conversion in 1774. (my guess about ‘Norrison’ is an attempt to account for the intrusion of Norrison into the naming of the first-born sons from that time onwards. There was, I believe, a prominent family of that name, at that time, at Willerby just north of Welton
Henry and Martha`s marriage bond, was signed by Henry Marr and John Johnson, and Mary Johnson. The marriage at Welton, just to the west of Hull, was witnessed by Edward Johnson, John Johnson, Ann Johnson and Jane Johnson. Henry was then a farmer at Welton. In 1827 he was a yeoman farmer and church warden at Bishop Burton. When he died in Hull in 1865 he was a gentleman and rich. (To our surprise we found, over the entrance door of the charming Bishop Burton (Anglican) Church, John Wesley’s head carved the tree under which he preached at Bishop Burton. He is said to have travelled 250,000 miles and preached 40,000 sermons, so this discovery is perhaps only of interest in that it shows he was not discarded by the whole of the Anglican Church, in which he began as a priest, and that, if his visit was at the end of his life, Henry Marr could have been in the audience, for Wesley died in 1791. Wesleys father was an Anglican parson at Epworth ner Scunthorpe, just across the Humber ) In 1771, on a map drawn just after the “Enclosures”, John Johnson was shown as having 21 acres near to Bishop Burton on the way to Gardham. Two John Johnsons were listed as farmers at Welton in an 1823 Directory.
[At this point I must quote from a letter sent by Henry’s great grandson, Joseph Waide Marr to the Yorkshire Evening Post in about 1935. It is in Mary Marr’s cutting book. There had been correspondence regarding farming familes, a certain family claiming that 5 sons and 4 daughters cultivated 2000 acres between them; Joe spoke up for the Marrs. I shall refer to the bulk of the letter later, when it will be more relevant, but he ended his letter by saying “if you like to go back further, my great-grandfather was the Squire of Marr, near Doncaster, and he had 7 sons. He came under the influence of John Wesley. He sold the estate when he got older and divided it up among his 7 sons, and they all became farmers.” Henry died 12 years before Joe was born, but he will have known his grandfather for 17 years, and might have known more than we do. However enquiries to the archivist of Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council, the local authority, have failed to confirm any connection with the place and “Marrs” between 1760 and 1830. Of Henry’s 5 known sons, 3 were farmers, the fourth died aged 27 the fifth at 21, careers unknown.]
As may be seen from the tree, children were born to Henry and Martha at Welton from 1810 to 1816, and from 1817 to 1824 at Bishop Burton. Thomas Norrison came first, and was born 20th July, baptised 25th August 1810. He was apprenticed to Samuel Ross and John Burton, chemist and druggists in Hull on 25th May 1825, ‘to be taught, learnt and instructed in the trade, art and mystery of a chemist and druggist’ on payment of £80. We have indenture, on the back of which is written ‘having served more than 4 years of his apprenticeship, serious imposition caused him to return home for the fresh air, which, with God`s blessing, preserved him from the danger which threatened, yet he was never so far restored as to be able to live in a large and close town again.’ This was dated 19th September 1831: yet he lasted for another 63 years! There is no indication of how he occupied himself from 1831 to about 1841, presumably on the Bishop Burton farm.
A Diary in the possession of David Marr records on the 9th July 1839 the payment “to wine and brandy £1 2s 6d”: some special occasion? A little later it says on 7th January 1840 “I have this day dedicated myself to God”. It adds “there are only 4 of us in the class at Bishop Burton”. For a time I thought that the drink might have referred to his wedding, but he did not marry Abigail Wright (nee Larder), a widow who hailed from Louth in Lincolnshire, until 29 April 1841. Thanks to Philip Marr I am able to quote a letter Abigail Wright wrote to Thomas Norrison on 4th January 1841, 4 months prior to their marriage on 29th April 1841. It was addressed simply Mr Thos. N. Marr, Bishop Burton, folded, sealed with wax and posted with a penny black stamp When she died in 1888 her Memorial card proclaimed that she had been a member of the Weslyan Society for over 60 years. One cannot know if his conversion was influenced by the lady. Three of Abigail’s sisters married Longbottoms, one of whom was an ironmonger in Doncaster. An earlier (Barnard) Longbottom had been one of Wesley’s companions and preachers. It is said that he figures in Wesley’s diaries, and that they split up because Longbottom fell in love with the daughter of a banker called Carter, with whom they stayed at Selby, and married her, and also that Barnard was apt to lie late in bed, which Wesley could not abide. There are several Carter Longbottoms later.
