Greenwood family history
Over the last few years, various people have been in touch about the Greenwood and Lickiss families who once lived in the village and were related by marriage. Rosalyn Greenwood has visited Husthwaite and regularly corresponded about her research into the Greenwood family. This in turn has resulted in further correspondence with two other people about their relations to the Lickiss family. Here is Rosalyn’s account of the GREENWOOD FAMILY.
If the reader takes a walk down the path of St. Nicholas’ church and turns left, directly under the window is a well preserved headstone relating to the Greenwood family*. George Greenwood came from Osmotherley, married Elizabeth Thorpe from Stonegrave in 1758 and produced ten children, most of whom were baptised in nearby Coxwold. George must have moved his family to Husthwaite around 1769 when a man by the name of John Freer sold a cottage, orchard, garth and croft to George who rebuilt the property to include a shop and a joiners work room. George was a joiner and timber merchant for the nearby Newburgh estate. We think the house was situated close to or behind Prospect House where the Moncaster family lived (opposite Beal Cottage in High Street and demolished after 1958), and was probably very similar in design [help from Prof. Stuart Marriott about the history of George’s house, is gratefully acknowledged]. They were certainly good friends as Robert and Thomas Mouncaster (an early spelling of Moncaster) were witnesses to George’s will, along with Arthur Harper drawn up on the ninth day of January one thousand eight hundred and six.
Of his children Elizabeth was the first born in 1759, followed by Ruth in 1760, George 1762 William 1764, Matthias 1766, Jenny 1768, Thomas 1770, Mary 1772, John 1774 and Mary Ann in 1778. Church records show only two of them married in the village church - Mary Ann in 1798 to Henry Spink and John to Mary Weighill in November 1805. Matthias was married in Thirsk to Hannah Hudson.
After George’s death, his will stated that his two sons John and William, both joiners, were to inherit half the house equally, from the middle of the South door, down the path to the horse trough and the great poplar tree, no argueing. In the will, Matthias is left a small legacy as are George’s married daughters Mary Skellon and Mary Ann Spink, her daughter and his other grandchildren.
John had three daughters. One of them, Elizabeth Greenwood, born around 1810, married George Lickiss, a cordwainer from Coxwold from whom the Lickiss family descend in Husthwaite. After John died in 1837, this family were known to be living in his part of the house by 1839. The 1841 census lists the inhabitants as George and Elizabeth Lickiss, aged 30 and 25, their children Mary aged 1 and George aged 3 months, together with Mary Greenwood aged 65, (Elizabeth’s mother, widow of John), John’s eldest daughter Jane Greenwood aged 30 and her illegitimate son John Greenwood aged 7. By 1851, three more daughters had been born. George and Elizabeth Lickiss probably stayed in the village the longest, since they are mentioned in several censuses. George died in 1859 but Elizabeth outlived him and was still living in the village, occupied as a dressmaker, in 1861 and 1871, was receiving an annuity in 1881 and died aged 77 in 1887.
George Greenwood (father of John and William) died in 1816 and is buried in the grave in St Nicholas’s churchyard with his wife Elizabeth and his two favourite sons William and John. So William and John lived side by side. From the chambers and furniture mentioned in their wills it seems that George must have originally built a substantial house. They also both left a shop, in John’s case to his daughter Jane. William married Mary Knowlson from the nearby village of Thormanby in 1803 and they lived in the village all their married lives. They had three sons, his eldest William born 1805 moved to York in 1827 and set up a successful cabinet makers business. George became a Wesleyan minister in Penrith and John became a tailor in Haworth. Documents show that William’s son William, the cabinet maker, wrote beautiful script and his father made an effort to write but his brother John didn’t even try and signed both his marriage document and his will with a cross! As for the grandchildren I have managed to follow the lives of several of them, particularly Jane the daughter of John, but that is another story….
Rosalyn Greenwood August 2010
*Note, the inscriptions on the gravestone are mainly still legible and as recorded in 1912:
Sacred to the memory of George Greenwood, Who departed this life March 14th 1816. Aged 94 years.
Also William Greenwood, Son of the above Who died Nov 30th 1826. Aged 61 years.
Sacred to the memory of Elizabeth, wife of Geo. Greenwood, Who departed this life July 25th 1803. Aged 69 years.
Also John Greenwood, Son of the above. Who died Aug 15th 1837 aged 62 years.