John Langbridge and Harriet Hutchings

This couple lived in Moretonhampstead, a town about 12 miles WSW of Exeter. The Moretonhampstead History Society kindly provide a searchable database of baptisms, marriages and burials transcribed from the Parish Registers, and a baptism search for children of John and Harriet Langbridge finds five baptisms:

John Langbridge, 9/2/1824,
John Langbridge, 7/8/1825,
Harriet Langbridge, 31/1/1828,
Mary Ann Langbridge, 27/6/1830,
William Langbridge, 21/5/1831.

They also had another daughter

Louisa Langbridge

whose birth was registered in the September quarter of 1837. The son John born in 1824 died in infancy and was buried on 21/2/1824.

The daughter Harriet is discussed further on another page. On her marriage certificate her full name is given as Harriet Hutchings Langbridge; this provides some evidence that her mother's maiden name was indeed Hutchings. Unfortunately I have not been able to find any parish register record of the marriage of John and Harriet.

The Parish Register entries for the baptisms listed above include the father's occupation: it is given as as "hmn" – "husbandman" I guess – on 9/2/1824, 27/6/1830 and 21/5/1831, as "collier" on 7/8/1825 and as "innkeeper" on 31/1/1828. It is also recorded that Mary Ann was 10 months old at her baptism.

Moretonhampstead was the scene of the murder of Jonathan May, which occurred in 1835. It is notable for the fact that – in a rare example of the British justice system admitting that it might have made a mistake – one of the two men convicted of the crime was pardoned 43 years later. Harriet Langbridge gave the following evidence at the trial: "My husband and I kept the Golden Lion Inn at Moreton. On the evening of the 16th of between 7 and 9 o'clock, I was in my cellar. Turpin came and asked me to give him a cork, which I did. I am certain the prisoner is the man. I observed he had lost a tooth or two." Turpin is the man who was subsequently pardoned, and maintained that he was never in Devon.

A map of Moretonhampstead produced for the trial shows the location of the Golden Lion (no.16, between Back Lane and Cross Street). The smaller image of the town center section of the map is a little clearer than the image of the full map.

It is interesting that the Langbridges were running the inn in 1835 even though John's occupation in 1831 and also in 1841 (see below) was given as collier.

At the 1841 census the Langbridge family's address is Forder Street, Moretonhampstead. The daughter Harriet is missing from the household, but all the others are there with ages that are consistent with the baptism records. At the 1851 census only the son William is to be found with his parents. John's occupation is given as charcoal burner; William is an apprentice mason.

Although the 1851 census record gives John Langbridge's birthplace as Moretonhampstead, the Moretonhampstead Parish Register does not include a record of his baptism. However, the Ipplepen Adams Family website (compiled by Ian Wright) has a substantial quantity of information about the Langbridges, and its John Langbridge page says that he was born in Bridford – a few miles from Moretonhampstead – on or about 24/8/1786. His parents are named as Edward Langbridge and Elizabeth Mortimore, and several other children of this couple are also listed:

Richard (9/1/1780),
Sarah (23/6/1782),
John (12/6/1784),
Mary (14/9/1788),
Joseph (19/6/1791,
Elizabeth (25/12/1793),
Edward (1796),
Sophia (1800),

all born in Bridford. No doubt Ian Wright has seen Bridford Parish Register records of the baptisms of these children. Note that the approximate birth date of 24/8/1786 for John is consistent with his age as given in 1851.

For all the information known to me, it is perhaps possible that this Bridford John Langbridge and the Moretonhampstead John Langbridge were two different people who were born about the same time. There certainly were Langbridges living in Moretonhampstead, since the name appears several times in the Moretonhampstead Parish Registers in the 17th and 18th centuries. There is also an interesting entry in Silvester Treleaven's diary of events in Moretonhampstead from Saturday 10th November 1804: "Died aged 84 John Langbridge, he lived in the House that he died in upwards of 50 years, and had been blind twelve years." It is conceivable that this John was the grandfather of our John.

Harriet Hutchings was baptized in Moretonhampstead on 20/4/1800; her father's name was Samuel. There were several other children of Samuel Hutchings baptized in Moretonhampstead between 1789 and 1815:

Ann (13/12/1789),
Sally (4/11/1792),
Elizabeth (27/12/1795),
George (26/10/1817), born 2/1798, father's occupation: farmer, mother's name: Elizabeth,
William Soby (10/1/1802),
Anna Maria (9/10/1803),
John (7/15/815), age: 13 years 6 months, father's occupation: woolcomber, mother's name: Betty,
Samuel (9/11/1806),
Samuel (19/2/1809),
Samuel (9/9/1810).

However, there are two different families here, since there were two men named Samuel Hutchings married in Moretonhampstead in 1788. One of them married Mary Soby on 1/5/1788, the other married Betty Matthews on 10/6/1788. Obviously William Soby Hutchings was the son of Samuel and Mary, while George and John were sons of Samuel and Betty. For Ann, Sally, Elizabeth, Harriet, Anna Maria and the three Samuels it is not clear which couple were the parents.

Harriet, the daughter of John and Harriet who was missing from her parents' household in the 1841 census, shows up – we think – in the household of Samuel and Agnes Hutchins in St Clement Danes Parish, Westminster. Note that Harriet's age in the census record is consistent with the baptism date of 13/1/1828, and that Samuel Hutchins is the right age to be a Samuel Hutchings brother of Harriet Hutchings born in 1808, 1809 or or 1810. Note also that the census record indicates that Samuel Hutchins and Harriet Langbridge were not born in St Clement Danes Parish, so that it is quite conceivable that they were born in Moretonhampstead and are the people we think they are.

In 1851 Harriet and her sister Mary are located in St Luke Parish, Chelsea. This is what the census record of the household in question says:

Name	Rel	Status	Age	Occupation	Birthplace
5 Walton Street:
Hannah Wyat	Head	W	61	Householder	Devon, Colyton
William Wyat	Son	U	26	Baker journeyman	Dorset, Dalwood
John Wyat	Visitor	U	21	Painter journeyman	Middlesex, Chelsea
Harriet Langbridge	Sister	U	22	Dressmaker	Devon Exeter
Mary Langbridge	Sister	U	21	Dressmaker	Devonshire(?), Moretonhampstead

It is obvious that Harriet and Mary could not really have been sisters of Hannah; so it looks as though the enumerator has mistranscribed the data supplied by the householder. My guess is that the original said this:

Name	Rel	Status	Age	Occupation	Birthplace
5 Walton Street:
Hannah Wyat	Head	W	61	Householder	Devon, Colyton
William Wyat	Son	U	26	Baker journeyman	Dorset, Dalwood
John Wyat	Son	U	21	Painter journeyman	Middlesex, Chelsea
Harriet Langbridge	Visitor	U	22	Dressmaker	Devon Exeter
Mary Langbridge	Sister	U	21	Dressmaker	Devon, Moretonhampstead

This would at least be understandable, with Mary giving her relationship to the previous person on the list rather than the Head.

Since Harriet and Mary appear to have deliberately given different birth locations I see no reason to disbelieve them. It is quite possible that Harriet was born in Exeter and subsequently baptized in Moretonhampstead.

Harriet was married in the parish church of St Luke Parish on 9/3/1852, to Alfred Smith. The marriage certificate is shown on the Alfred and Harriet Smith page. I am grateful to Graham Clarkson for sending me copies of this certificate and the census information appearing above, as well as pointing me in the direction of other useful information relating to these people.

If you have any corrections, complaints, criticisms, suggestions or additional information, please email bobhow@tpg.com.au.