Benjamin Siddall, born 1751
Benjamin Siddall moved from Wensley to Masham with his brothers Ralph and Stephen in the 1760s. When Ben is 21 in 1772, he marries Mary Astwood. They are, shall we say, prolific and raise a football team plus one referee.
| Date | Name |
|---|---|
| 23rd May 1773 | Ralph |
| 9th October 1774 | Benjamin |
| 9th September 1776 | David |
| 17th September 1778 | Joseph |
| 21st May 1780 | John |
| 7th July 1782 | Hannah |
| 11th April 1784 | William |
| 16th April 1786 | Francis |
| 21st September 1788 | Mary |
| 14th November 1790 | Ann |
| 25th November 1792 | Thomas |
| 22nd March 1795 | Jane |
All the dates given are baptism dates, not birth dates but they will be fairly close. People didn't leave it too long to get a baby baptised in case it died and had to wait in Limbo for Judgement Day.
Benjamin was a carpenter and must have made a good living to feed all those hungry mouths. All these babies seem to survive as there are no records of a burial for any of them but tragically, when Jane is born, four days after she is baptised, they bury her mother, Mary aged 42, who must have died in childbirth or very soon afterwards.
On 6th June 1809, Benjamin, aged 57 marries Elizabeth Metcalf, a spinster aged 44. He is buried on the 1st August 1826 at the ripe old age of 75.
During his lifetime these events happened: The Black Hole of Calcutta, 1756, Wars in India, Holland, American war of Independence, the Falkland Islands (Does nothing change?); the abolition of slavery, the discovery of Oxygen, Ammonia, Nitrous Oxide, the invention of the spinning mule 1779, James Watt's steam engine 1782, the first balloon ascent, the first puddling furnace, the invention of the threshing machine, all 1784; the mutiny on the Bounty 1790, the invention of the gas lamp, the French Revolutionary wars, Income tax 1799, the union of Britain and Ireland; the assassination of a British Prime Minister, Spencer Percival 1812, the battle of Waterloo and the Corn Laws in 1815. Two kings, George III and IV and eleven prime ministers.