Some ancestors

What they looked like,
in those days

I happened upon a website that traced my ancestry back something like 11 generations, to the late 16th century.

My father Walter Robert Tullett (b. 1915) was the son of Walter Tullett (b. 1864). Walter, the second of eight children, was the son of another Walter Tullett (also spelled Tulet), b. 1836. His father was William Tullett (or Tewlet), b. 1799. William was the son of John Tullett, b. 1775. John was the son of Edward Tullett, b. 1736. Edward was the son of Peter Tullett, b 1700. Beyond that, the records fizzle out.

From the mid-19th century back, all the Tullett men worked on farms on the slopes of the South Downs in Sussex, not far from Shoreham-by-Sea, and lived to a good age.

The Tullett name has variations: Tulet, Tulett, Tewlet, Toolet, Tollet, Tyllet, Tillet, and so on, so you can never be completely sure!

My grandparents Walter and Louisa,
with my aunt as a little girl, before my father's birth

And their wives were mentioned too, with frustratingly little detail about them. My grandmother's name was Louisa Hill; she married my grandfather in 1907, in Newington, London, just south of the Thames. No information about her parents, which is what I'd really like to have found out, because she died when I was seven or so and I remember her; she looked rather like I do now. Her pedigree has always been vague.

My great-grandmother, married in West Grinstead in 1863, was called Emily Goacher. I have a vague idea that in the 1980s I visited her grave and discovered that she had died within a few days of her husband Walter, my great-grandfather. She was born in 1839 in Bines Green, the daughter of Henry Goacher (1797-1870) and Martha Mears (1806-1861). According to the census of 1901, Emily, Walter and their family lived at a place — a farm perhaps — called Crouches.

William Tullett, my great-great grandfather *, married Charlotte Woodman, born in 1802, the daughter of John Woodman and another Charlotte (surname unknown). She lived to the grand age of 84, dying in 1887.

My great-great-great-grandfather John Tullett married a Rachel Sayers, who lived from 1779 to 1806.

John Tullett's father Edward got married in 1760 to Elizabeth Whiting or Whitten (1740-1793) who must have been illiterate, because she signed her wedding certificate with an X ("her mark'). They had 13 "known" children so she must have died of exhaustion. They must have been contemporaries of JS Bach, though I very much doubt they'd ever heard of him! She was the daughter of Richard Whitten (or White) and Mary Arnold (b. 1675), the daughter of Thomas Arnold and Elizabeth Grant (dates unknown).  If I have worked this out correctly, Mary Arnold must have been my great-great-great-great-great-grandmother ...

Edward was the son of Peter Tullett (1700-1749?) who married Elizabeth Gratwick, born in 1700; she was buried on 12th January 1786 in Slaugham as "Elizabeth Toolet an aged widow". Peter Tullett's origins are confusingly doubtful. Elizabeth's parents were married in 1697. They were Joseph Gratwick and Mary Arnold (1675-1735). Joseph was born in 1668 and died in 1748, 80 years old.

So Joseph's father Andrew Gratwick (1631-1704) and his wife Winifred must have been my 8x great-grandparents. Andrew Gratwick was baptised on 26 December 1631 in West Grinstead, the son of John Gratwick (1593-1656) and either Mary (surname unknown), who died in 1659, or more probably Ann Michell (1604/5-1658).


* I mentioned a different great-great-grandfather (as well as some other ancestors on my mother's side) in a blogpost I published in 2013.