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Brentford Councillors - Thomas Piper

Introduction

Thomas Piper

There appears to have been four generations of Thomas Pipers in the town through the 19th century. The man serving on the Local Board was the second one born 1810/11.

A Thomas Piper (67) was a publican on the south side of the High Street in the 1841 census and was paid £10 for damage to his property (The Six Bells) after the Flood in 1841. (See the book Flood! by Val Bott).

His son Charles was also resident at the Six Bells in the census of that year.

There was also a Thomas Piper (30) a carpenter with a wife Elizabeth living at Brentford End with James (25) baker at the same property.

I think Thomas (b 1811), James (b 1813) and Charles (b 1815) were brothers and their mother was called Mary.

On the ancestry website there are the baptism records of St Lawrence Church, New Brentford with two entries for John son of Thomas victualler and Mary late Osborn having been born October 25th 1811 and baptised on November 20th.

St Mary’s Ealing shows a Thomas, son of Thomas and Mary baptised on March 31st 1810.

On later census Thomas shows that he was born in New Brentford so it’s possible that the St Mary’s, Ealing (covering Old Brentford) child died and that he is the child baptised John but later known as Thomas.
Or that he’s the 1810 child with the wrong place of birth shown on the census.
Or that the vicar entered the wrong name in the register.

It seems that the second Thomas married Elizabeth Boanas at St Pancras Parish Church on March 30th 1835.

The elder Thomas’s death was recorded in the June quarter 1850: Brentford 3 4. He left a PCC will.

In the 1851 census Thomas is a Victualler aged 41 in the High Street with his wife Elizabeth (43) born in Whitby and their children Benjamin (16), Catherine (14), Thomas (7) and Charles (5). There is a Pot man and at least 4 lodgers. From information on this website this would seem to be The Feathers on the north side of the High Street to the east of the Half Acre.

Charles (35) appears to have taken over the Six Bells and is a Victualler there with his wife Mary (45), a 7 year old niece, a Pot boy and a house servant.

Charles died during the September quarter 1856 leaving a will and by the 1861 census Thomas was running the Six Bells with his wife’s niece Rachel Boanas (18) from Whitby and a Pot man from Wiltshire.
Elizabeth was still at The Feathers with daughter Catherine (24) and sons Thomas (17) Clerk at the Gas works and Charles (15). A niece from Middlesbrough was a house servant, there was a pot man and two lodgers.

I can’t find Thomas in the 1871 census but it seems that Elizabeth had died by then. There’s a death on freebmd of Elizabeth Piper in the June quarter 1865 Brentford 3a 47 and a marriage of Thomas Piper in the December quarter 1866 Brentford 3a 79.

His son Thomas* though was in the High Street in 1871 with his wife Rebecca who had been born in Whitby and would seem to be his cousin. They had a 4th generation Thomas Piper aged 3, a son John 2 and a daughter Mary who was 6 months.
Thomas and Mary’s son, Charles, a 28 year old clerk was also married to another Mary (25) and living with their daughter Frances (5) in King Street, St Anne’s, Westminster.

* By 1891 this son was living at 102, Windmill Road with Rebecca and 6 children. He was a Collector for Brentford Gas Coy and their son, Hugh aged 17 was a clerk for the company.

In a directory of 1872 T Piper is shown at High Street Old Brentford and at the Six Bells and by 1877 in Boston Park Road.

Thomas died on October 29th 1880 and his will was proved by his widow Emma (his second wife) and Joseph Bridger Lewis both of New Brentford. Effects were under £4,000.
Mr Lewis was also an early member of Brentford Local Board and in business in the High Street, New Brentford.

Pub records from directories show Thomas Piper as follows
At The Feathers

• 1853 Masons’s Directory
• 1855 P O Directory
• By 1870 this was George Kates

At the Six Bells

• 1826 and 1839 Pigot’s directory
• 1841 Mr Piper on the compensation list for victims of the flood.
• 1855 Charles Piper PO Directory.
• 1858 Thomas Piper landlord in Clitherow records family records at London Metropolitan Archives (ACC 1360).
• 1866 and 1870 T Piper PO Directory
• 1871 Census
• 1874 and 1878 PO Directory
• 1881 James Dykes there

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Page published August 2011