Mary (Ginn) Hammond (abt. 1737 - 1785)

Born about 1737 in Cowlinge, Suffolk, England [uncertain]

Wife of Philip Hammond — married 17 Dec 1758 (to Feb 1777) in Cowlinge, Suffolk, England

Descendants

Died Jun 1785 at about age 48 in Lidgate, Suffolk, England

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Mark Carroll [send private message]

Biography

1844 Map of south-west Suffolk (part)

Mary (Ginn) Hammond lived all her adult life in and around Cowlinge and Lidgate in south-west Suffolk, England. The villages lie close to the border with Cambridgeshire to the west, about 7 miles (11km) south-east of the market town of Newmarket and 10 miles (16km) south-west of the cathedral town of Bury St Edmunds. On the map (above) Lidgate is near the centre of the image, with Cowlinge (marked as 'Cowling') just below it; Newmarket lies towards the 11 o'clock position and Bury St Edmunds towards the 1 o'clock position. However, Mary's origins are obscure; she was said to be 48 years old when she died in 1785, and thus was born about 1737, but we currently (2024) have no reliable historical record of her baptism. The fact that she married in Cowlinge suggests that her family was from that parish. (See Research notes.)

St Mary's Church, Lidgate

Mary married the widower Philip Hammond of Lidgate on 14 December 1758 at the parish church of Cowlinge when she was about 21 years old. ^[1] He was a collar maker who had previously married Martha Hockley in 1754; she had died in February 1758 when giving birth to their daughter, also called Martha. ^[2] Mary and Philip went on to have three children, all baptised at Lidgate St Mary: Mary (1762), Philip (1765) and John (1771, and buried a month later).
The parish church of Lidgate St Mary (above) lies close to the ruins of a 12th century castle and on top of a hill that overlooks the village and the surrounding rather flat, largely agricultural countryside. The church was constructed mainly in the 13th and 14th centuries, with the walls of the nave perhaps having been part of the castle's chapel. ^[3] A document submitted on 10 April 1676 to the local bishop by the churchwardens there stated that there were 223 communicants in the parish, no "Popish recusants [Roman Catholics] and no dissenters [Anglican non-conformists]". ^[4] In 1855 the parish had 494 inhabitants and 1737 acres of land; there was a transport service ('carrier') to Newmarket every Tuesday. ^[5]
Philip died in 1777 in Lidgate, when his two surviving children were only 15 and 12 years old; he was buried on 27 February that year in the parish churchyard. ^[6] His widow Mary did not re-marry; she outlived him by another eight years before dying in 1785 in Lidgate. She was buried on 29 June that year after a ceremony at the parish church. ^[7]

Research notes

• Mary (Ginn) Hammond is the maternal 5xgreat-grandmother of the first author and manager of her Wikitree profile, Mark Carroll.
• Ginn and its variants were a fairly common surname in Cowlinge at that time. According to memorial inscriptions on some of the gravestones in the parish church, ^[8] the following are buried there: Giles Ginn (died 1759 aged 84, hence born 1675); Charles Ginn (died 1768 aged 63, hence born 1705); and John Ginn (died 1779 aged 68, hence born 1711).

Sources

1. ↑ Whitehead, L.H. Haydon (transcriber). Suffolk Registers, volume 8, 1990. Entry for marriage of Hammond, Philip, widower of Lidgate, and Mary Ginn, 14 Dec 1758, Cowlinge. (Available: Society of Genealogists, Wharf Road, London N1 7GS, U.K. [accessed 20 Dec 2023].)
2. ↑ FreeREG. Transcripts of parish registers of Lidgate St Mary: entry for burial of Hammond, Martha, 25 Apr 1758. (Available: www.freereg.org.uk/ [accessed 27 Jan 2024].)
3. ↑ Knott, Simon, 2008. Suffolk Churches website. (Available: http://www.suffolkchurches.co.uk/lidgate.html [accessed 29 Jan 2024].)
4. ↑ Return by Churchwardens of Parishes in the Deanery of Clare, for Lidgate, 10 Apr 1676. Reference: FF 500/16. (Available: Suffolk Record Office, 77 Raingate Street, Bury St Edmunds, IP33 2AR, U.K.)
5. ↑ White, William. History, Gazeteer and Directory of Suffolk 1855, page 805. Sheffield: William White, 1855. (Available: https://specialcollections.le.ac.uk/digital/collection/ [accessed 19 Dec 2023].)
6. ↑ FreeREG. Transcripts of parish registers of Lidgate St Mary: entry for burial of Hammond, Philip, 27 Feb 1777. (Available: www.freereg.org.uk/ [accessed 20 Dec 2023].)
7. ↑ FreeREG. Transcripts of parish registers of Lidgate St Mary: entry for burial of Hammond, Mary, widow aged 48, 29 Jun 1785. (Available: www.freereg.org.uk/ [accessed 27 Jan 2024].)
8. ↑ Whitehead, L.H. Haydon, 1986. Suffolk Churchyard Inscriptions, volume 1. (Available: Society of Genealogists, Wharf Road, London N1 7GS, U.K. [accessed 20 Dec 2023].)