Extract from The Storrs Family: Genealogical and other memoranda

by Charles Storrs

{61}

This manuscript volume was furnished to the Archæological Society by a great-granddaughter of William Storr, Mrs. Susannah Best of Goole, Yorkshire.  I have had some correspondence with her and with her daughter, Miss A. M. Best, now the wife of Rev. Percival Wilmot Bryan of Charlton Adam Vicarage, Somerset.  Mrs. Best’s grandfather, Samuel Storr, born at Wistow 1703, married out of the Society of Friends, to which he belonged, and so was alienated from his family [note Z].  She has sent me extracts from some papers left by {62} him and his descendants, which I herewith give.  The spelling seems to have been modernized in the copying [note A], and as the entries are by different hands there are some which are not quite clear, but for their intrinsic interest I give them as I received them:

“(Of Marriage.)  I, Sam’l Storr married Mary, my wife, a Churchwoman, but, being a Quaker, my brethren thrust me out.  We went to Hutton Bushel and lived in a little house.”

“(Of Births.)  We had three sons; William, my eldest, & Sam’l & Robert, all hopeful children.  I was not looked on by my brethren after my marriage.  My brother William still lives on the east side of Holderness and is getting a large family.  Robert went into Lincolnshire and his branch is quite extinct.  I am an alien to my mother’s children and a stranger in my Father’s house.  My brother William’s family is an uprising family in the Navy and Army.  Our family crest is a stork, but I must now put it away.”

“(Of Death.)  My Father died and left me 6000£.  My oldest son William was a farmer at Scalm Park.  My son Robert died aged 20 years, and two years after my son Sam’l died aged 21 years.”

“(Where my family lived.)  I have lived to see my grandchildren married & settled.  My grandson William bought Scalm Park & kept a very good house.  My grandson Robert, his father my son, built the old hall in Wistow, and made him a fishpond and a grand garden and a great Park, and put Whale jawbones at the entrance of the Park in front of the House.  My grandson Samuel went to live at a small farm at Wistow Lordship—as he was the youngest my son bought him only a little place he being but a younger son.  I know nothing of my Father’s family, me being driven out, but that they still live in Holderness and are yet Quakers.  I am now 84 years old, and when I die I should much like to be buried in my family burying ground in my Father’s farm.  I have got a {63} man to procure for me grafts from my Father’s mulberry tree in Holderness for my grandson’s gardens, and fine growing plants they are. 

“I Sam’l Storr came to reside at Wistow Lordship, my Father’s small patrimonial estate, at his death.  I was Capt’n of the Second York West Militia in the 24^th year of my age.  I was compelled by my Father’s extravagance to relinquish my Father’s relatives & my own comrades & to seek friends amongst my Mother’s relatives the Spofforths of Howden.”

“(Of Kin.)  My Uncle Robert resided at Scalm Park in great gaiety, but in 1780 he was reduced, and his children are now my laborers.  William, my Uncle, lived at the Hall in Wistow.  He kept a large establishment of servants.  His eldest daughter, Ann, married Mr. Swan, Alderman of York.  His 2^nd daughter, Elizabeth, married —— Nichols, and is the mother of the present Recorder of Doncaster [note B].  His son William Storr, was shot landing with the troops in Germany.  The other children died in their infancy.  They, my uncles, are both reduced to poverty.”

“(Deaths.)  My Father, Sam’l Storr died and was buried at Wistow Dec. 17^th 1762, leaving issue only me, Sam’l Storr.  My Mother, Elizabeth Spofforth, died at my birth and was interred at Wistow Dec. 29^th 1738 [note C].  My Uncle Robert died October 1788 [note D], & was interred at Wistow.  My Uncle William died Dec. 1781 & buried at Wistow.” [note E]

Mrs. Best is described to me as very tall (five feet eleven inches in height), and of fair complexion.  She is now (1884) in her eighty-eighth year, “with sight and memory unimpaired—can read the smallest print and do the finest needlework without spectacles, and is a quite regular attendant at church.” Her home is now with her daughter, Mrs. Bryan, where the vicarage and the church are separated by only a four-minutes walk.  She has sent some pretty specimens of her needlework to my family.  She has two other daughters—{62}Mrs. Helliwell, who at one time resided in Toronto, and Mrs. Hodgson of Rochdale, Lancashire.  Mrs. Best wrote me some time since in her own hand, and through her daughter, now Mrs. Bryan:

“About twenty years ago my family and the Holderness branch became acquainted and traced the connection quite clearly.  The name of Storr seems dying out.  The Holderness branch is quite extinct (in the male line).  My father, Samuel Storr of Wistow Lordship, left three sons: 1. Robert, died unmarried; 2. Samuel, whose sons are all dead, leaving no issue; 3. William, left two sons, both married, but without children.  On the death of my brother Robert [note F] the small farm at Wistow Lordship, spoken of by my great-grandfather, was purchased by my husband, and is the only property left in the family either in Holderness or Wistow.  My elder son, John Storr Best, who was six feet four inches in height, died at the age of twenty-one, while in St  John’s College, Cambridge [note G].  My only remaining son, Robert Storr Best, is a large farmer at Moorfields, Goole.  He has twelve children, all of whom have been named Storr Best at their christening.  We endeavor in this way to keep up the name.”

“My father had a large book which took our pedigree down to 1814; but he lent it and never recovered it, so I have only his memory to depend on.  He well knew our family came in with the Conqueror, but in what capacity he had not known.  They had large possessions of property in Holderness and the parts adjoining, and certainly were associated with the county families.  My great-grandfather being expelled from his family so completely [note Z], I have only the traditions of my father to go by.  There is a hall yet standing in Wistow that was built for one of his sons, and the farm in this lordship was purchased for the younger son, my grandfather, who was a cripple, but yet married into a very good Yorkshire family, the Spofforths of Howden.” “My father’s relatives kept up a verbal acquaintance with {65} him through some Quaker gentlemen of Selby named Proctor, whom they met at their meetings in Hull, but he and his kindred never saw each other again.”

Mrs. Bryan writes:

“The Storrs of our branch are very tall, with fair hair, blue eyes, and oval face.  When my mother came to Goole many years ago, she was quite startled by the strong resemblance a lady residing there bore to her father—far greater than any of his own children, and on inquiry this lady proved to have been a Miss Storr of Holderness.”