Squire Sutton

Ron>Hylene>John Thomas>William Williamson>William>Squire

Squire Sutton was born July 1789 in Cheshire, England probably in the Stockport/Cheadle area.  He was enrolled in the Stockport Sunday School for Jul 1785, Jul 1798 [parent: John Sutton] and Sept 1801 [ guardian: William Sutton]. The Stockport Sunday school was founded in 1784, and became the largest Sunday school in the world. It was situated on London Square, Wellington Street Stockport behind the town hall. Before the days of universal education, children would be employed in the cotton and hatting industry from a very early age, Sunday Schools provided the one source of Education available before the passing of the 1870 Education Act.

In 1810, at the age of 21, Squire married Hannah Buswell.  They were married in Cheadle even though she came from Westcott Barton in Oxfordshire. Squire Sutton was a labourer in a factory when he married Hannah, who came from a reasonably well off family.  Her uncle Martin Buswell owned substantial lands in Claydon, Oxfordshire and Farnborough, Warwickshire. 

Hannah and her sister Sybilla Wheeldon, received a substantial inheritance upon the death of their first cousin 1x removed, Mary Longe (née Buswell), daughter of Martin Buswell, in 1825. 

Hannah and Squire had 8 children, all born in Stockport, Cheshire.  The second eldest William is my ggg-grandfather. 

On 6 June 1841, census night, Squire Sutton, his wife Anna[sic] and two sons Daniel (15) and John (20)worked a farm outside of Farnborough.  In a separate household, but still on the farm, was his son William (30), his wife Esther and their children Anna, John&William, and Thomas (6wks).  William Williamson, his wife Amelia and their 3 daughters Eliza(3), Elizabeth (5) and Sarah (15mths) were also on the farm.  I think that William was Esther Sutton's brother.  Both William S. and William W. were cotton dealers, while Squire Sutton is listed as a farmer.

Squire and their sons Thomas, William and Daniel continually hounded Hannah for money.  They lived a well-off lifestyle and seemed to alternate addresses between Cheshire, Banbury and Farnborough.  But in 1847 Squire was imprisoned for debt in Chester Gaol (see previous post Jan 2008). His son, William was also declared a bankrupt on 26 May 1848, by the Court of Bankruptcy, Manchester,

The lands however still belonged to Hannah as her son Thomas sold the Farnborough lands to the Great Western Railway in 1861, 12 months after her death.  The remaining land was passed onto Hannah's grand-daughter Emma Sutton (daughter of John) who sold the remaining lands and left the area to settle in South Dorset.

In 1848 Hannah sought a legal separation from Squire, agreeing to pay him £26 per annum, plus a further £4 per annum, to assist him in obtaining a dwelling or lodgings. Until their separation,once Hannah received her inheritance, he styled himself a Farmer and a Gentleman, later becoming a Publican, a Cotton Waste Dealer, a Shopkeeper, and a Cotton Spinner.

By 1851, Squire aged 61, was a lodger in The Warren Alms Houses in the Folley to the East of St. Mary's Parish Church. The Folley was a narrow pathway between Millgate and St. Mary's Gate in Stockport.

Squire died in 1856 in Neithrop near Banbury, Oxfordshire aged 66.  He had been visiting his son Daniel who was Publican at the Hare and Hounds in Neithrop.