John Parsons and Mary Grills
Parents :
John Parsons' parents not
known
Sampson
Grills (b 1710) and Mary (b 1715) married South Hill
John Parsons (b 1739 South Hill Cornwall, m Mary Grills 1759 South
Hill, d 1810)
Mary Grills (b 1743 South Hill, d 1794)
Elizabeth Parsons (b 1760 Stoke Climsland, d bef
1762)
Mary Parsons (b 1761, d bef 1769)
Elizabeth Parsons (b 1762, d aft 1810)
Thomasin Parsons (b 1764, m John Hawton 1786
Stoke Climsland, d 1843)
John Parsons (b 1765 Stoke Climsland, m Susannah
Hoare 1792, d aft 1810)
James Parsons (b 1767 Stoke Climsland, d aft
1810)
Sarah Parsons (b 1768 Stoke Climsland, d bef
1811)
Mary Parsons
(b 1769 Stoke Climsland, m James
Hawton 1791 Stoke Climsland, d 1843)
Francis
(Frank) Hawton (b 1799 Stoke Climsland Cornwall, m Jane Dingle
1820 Stoke Climsland)
Margaret Hawton (b 1828 Stoke
Climsland, m William Burton
Mitchell 1846 Stoke Climsland Cornwall, d 1922 Essendon Vic)
William Mitchell
(b 1850 Tregorick Cornwall, m Ellen
Adelaide Cubit 1880 Sandridge Melb, d 1889 Bethanga, Vic )
Ernest
Harold Mitchell (b 1887 Whiteford, m Liela Muriel
Roach 1914 Kew, d 1960 Wodonga)
Richard John Parsons (b 1773 Stoke Climsland, d
bef 1811)
Cautionary Note
The dates for Mary Grill's birth, marriage and her parents may be
sus. The following is from an email from Richard Grylls, author of
the book GRYLLS & GRILLS, published in 1999.
Chapter 3 in
Vol 1 deals with the deluge of people named Grills who lived in
Southill or South Hill [either acceptable but not South Hills],
Cornwall in the 1600s and 1700s. They are also shown on
Trees 1A to 1G in Vol 2. Your John Parson and Mary Grills
are on Tree 1G. The document concerning their marriage
settlement has survived. I don't have a copy, but I'd be
surprised if it did not mention John Parson's father's name.
The family were from the nearby parish of Stoke Climsland.
Mary Grills's sister Grace, married George Parson of Stoke
Climsland. I have a suspicion that George and John were
brothers. Are you aware if either of them left a will?
That's not something I've looked for.
You mention the
burial date of Mary Parson nee Grills? Do you think she was
buried in South Hill? I reckon she was born in 1736,
daughter of Sampson and Mary Grills of Trefinnick, South
Hill. Sampson died in 1790 and left a will. His
daughter Grace had already died, but he mentioned her son Richard
Parson, son of George Parson of Lamerton (Devon), gent.
Sampson Grills also mentioned his married granddaughters,
Elizabeth the wife of Thomas Robyns of Plymouth, surgeon, and Mary
Knighton whose husband was of ?????? Knighton Esq. of Whitchurch,
Devon. Elizabeth and Mary were the daughters of John Parson,
butcher of Stoke Climsland.
On receipt of the above I trawled FamilySearch, and just got more
confused. I found more Mary Grills
Mary Grills (b 4 Sep 1743 South Hill) m John Parsons 7 May 1759
South Hill - (Mary's parents Sampson and Mary)
Mary Grills (b 1743 South Hill) m John Parsons 1763 -
(Mary's parents Sampson b 1710 and Mary b 1715 , married
<1742>)
Mary Grills (b 22 Jan 1729 South Hill) (Mary's parents John
and Grace)
Mary Grills (b 18 Oct 1834 South Hill) (Mary's parents Henry
and ?)
Mary Grills (chr 19 Feb 1735 South Hill) (Mary's parents Samp
and ?)
I sent this information to Richard, and an extract of his reply
follows
I did a lot of
my Grylls/Grills research in the late 1970s and early 1980s. IGI
was only just becoming available! I collected a huge amount
of Grills etc. information from the original registers, from
wills, and from any other documents I could find. [You'll be
pleased to hear that I still encounter the occasional original
document which I had not found earlier, but no shattering
revelations, sadly.]
IGI is only
very partial for the parish of Southill.
I haven't looked at recent updates
on this site, so do not know how far back Lynda has transcribed
the Southill register. But worth a try anyway. The
Grills Clan in Southill bred like rabbits, so there were plenty of
young ladies called Mary Grills to choose from!
I'm inclined to
trust wills and what's written in them. So, I think that the
Mary Grills who married John Parson was indeed the one born in
1736 and the one mentioned as 'Mary Parson' in her father's
(Sampson) will. I'm also inclined to think that Sampson knew
accurately who his granddaughter Mary Parson had married.
THUS, I'm inclined to think that the Mary Parson who married Mr
Hawton was NOT the daughter of John Parson and Mary nee Grills.
Your real
problem is that the Stoke Climsland register is not too well
covered by IGI either. BUT a huge project was done on Stoke
Climsland history, and there is now a parish archive in the
village. Whether it's online or not I do not know.
However, I think it would be worth your while asking Google or
some other search engine what it has on "Stoke Climsland". I think
you may well find there is another Mary Parson, possible one born
about 1760-70, and thus more suitable to be getting married in
1791. .......
Yes, I have a
copy of Sampson Grills's 1790 will, which I could copy and send
you, but, since I'm querying (sadly) whether your Mary Parsons is
a descendant of his, perhaps it would be wise to postpone sending
it for the present.
Email from Matthew Connolly (May 2007)
I descend from
the 'other' Mary Parson/s, who is mentioned in the will as Mary
Knighton; she married John Moore Knighton of Whitchurch at
Linkinhorne in 1785, and was described as being of Stoke
Climsland. I'd got her as probably the Mary baptised at Stoke C in
1761 to John and Elizabeth, but it looks like the mother was
actually Mary Grills as you have, in order to fit in with the will
information. [If so, that would be the third time I have seen a
mother incorrectly called Elizabeth in a baptism entry- perhaps it
was standard practice to use that name if the vicar couldn't
remember the right one!] I can confirm that Mary lived a long life
and never married anyone else, and I've also traced descendants at
least to 1901 for her sister Elizabeth Robins.
Your information
prompted me to take another look at the records myself- I think
there are two big problems with the Family Search data, firstly
that we are not seeing the whole picture (Stoke C only has some
baptisms and no marriages, some neighbouring parishes not in at
all, no burial records, periods that are supposedly covered are
incomplete), and secondly that the genuine extracted records are
mixed in with submitted ones, where somebody has sent in a record
that might not even exist but they believe should. I think that
has really muddied the waters here, with several locally common
names (John Parsons, Sampson Grills, Mary, Elizabeth) being
mistakenly equated.
It gets even
more confused as I have now found another John Parson marriage,
not in the IGI, at Stoke Climsland in 1766 to Mary Bond. So there
are now four marriages in the area in 12 years for John Parson/s-
Elizabeth (Elizabeth Caunter, 1754, also not in IGI), Mary Grills
1759, Mary Austin 1761, and Mary Bond 1766.
I've now seen the
abstract of the will of the John Parsons who is your ancestor (let
me know if you would like a copy) and it mentions his sons James
and John, and daughters Elizabeth Mason, Thomazine Hawton and Mary
Hawton. No mention of the other Elizabeth and Mary, and no mention
of Richard John Parson who the IGI submission gives as son of John
and Mary Grills. Richard John died 25 April 1848 aged 75, at Stoke
Climsland, I have his will too but it only mentions his wife. The
IGI submission says he was baptised at Stoke C in 1773 but I
haven't found a record to support that.
From the Lynher
Parishes web pages- which are outstandingly useful- I think the
Grills bit goes: Sampson Grills m Mary Saltren 1734 Linkinhorne-
their daughter Mary bap 1735 or 6 at South Hill- Mary married John
Parson 1759 South Hill. To corroborate both this and the Sampson
Grills will, I have the will of Mary Saltren's sister in which she
mentions her great nieces Elizabeth Robins and Mary Knighton; her
main beneficiary was Richard Parson (son of George by Grace
Grills), who in turn died childless and left the property to the
son of Elizabeth Robins. The Mary Grills who was baptised in 1743
I believe would have been daughter of a different (probably
younger) Sampson Grills who married Mary Oake the previous year.
She would then be the Mary Grills who married John Body in 1761
while still a minor, with her mother's permission. There is
another confused IGI submission which has the Grace who married
George Parsons as daughter of Sampson Grills and Mary Oake!
It's
interesting that the only 18th century Parsons records in the
South Hill registers are John marrying Mary Grills in 1759, George
marrying Grace Grills in 1767, and two burials: Mary of Stoke
Climsland in 1761 or 2, and Grace in 1777 or 8. There is an MI
there for Grace, wife of George Parson, died 1st Feb 1778 age 35,
so the latter date is correct; presumably then Mary had died in
1762. I would have to then conclude that this was Mary Grills,
wife of John Parson, and that would be why she had only Elizabeth
in 1760 and Mary (probably) in 1761.
The upshot of
all this is that we both descend from Mary daughter of John and
Mary, but I believe it's a different Mary and a different John and
Mary! There was a will for a John Parsons of Stoke Climsland
proved at Exeter in 1778, but it would have been destroyed in the
bombing of 1942 so can't help us now, beyond proving there was
more than one man of the name there at the time. Conjecturally, my
one married Mary Bond after the death of Mary Grills, and they
were parents of Richard John Parson, but there's always the
possibility of further Johns we don't yet know about! As such,
it's impossible to safely speculate on how they may have been
related, and any parentage, until we can find their baptisms (I'm
working on it, but nothing so far). In the current absence of
other candidates, I'd have to agree with the correspondent who
felt Mary Austin was most likely your ancestor; I hope this isn't
a disappointment, although I'm sure you'd rather have information
as correct as possible.
Thanks to Matthew, I also have a transcript of John Parson's Will\
Date
of
Probate 16 May 1811, less than £450
Testator John Parsons of Stoke
Climsland, Yeoman
James Parsons Residuary Legatee,
son, all the rest residue and remainder of any goods and
chattels
John Parsons, son, seventy eight
pounds, cancel(?) a note for twenty two pounds
Elizabeth Mason, daughter ten
pounds, cancel(?) a book debt for ninety pounds
Thomazine Hawton, daughter
ninety pounds, cancel(?) a book debt for ten pounds
Mary Hawton, daughter, one
hundred pounds
This gives us Elizabeth's married name, and the probability that the
legatees were alive in 1810.
So that is where it stands for the moment. The ball is back
in my court to do some more work
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Richard Grylls, Nicola Chapman and Matthew Connolly for their
help
Research Notes
Nicola Chapman supplied the
following information
Mary Grills ,,,,. I have gtten my
info from
http://www.lynherparishes.co.uk/Southill/Registers/Marriages.1566-1799.htm
M412, 1759, May, 7, PARSON John (Bn - Parsons) (S), Yeoman, Stoke
Climsland, GRILLS Mary. (S), Sp, South Hill, Bn. Sampson Grills,
John Nicholson.
According to
parish records Mary & John's first daughter Elizabeth was born
in 1760 so this marriage fits. Also occupation fits because his
son James was a farmer in Venn, Southill - a husbandman and in
1812 on the Land Tax Assesment he was registered as occupier on
land owner by proprieter William Horndon Esq, the tenement was
Trevan. So it does fit that his father John was a farmer too. I
found the definition of a ¡yeoman¢ was also a farmer of middling
social status.
This is only a
fairly new line to me so I have not yet got any further.
I have met
someone online though who said the following:
"I'm
interested
that you have Mary GRILL(S) as Thomasin''s mother. I''ve had
trouble pursuing her line, which I originally found to include
SALTREN, PAULING and FRENCH, because the Will of Thomasin''s
grandfather, Sampson GRILLS, does not mention her.
Have you more info on this part
of the family, please?
I was forced to conclude that
John PARSONS, Thomasin''s father, may well be the one who
married Mary AUSTEN."
Will Mary Grills Spinster of Southill Extract of
will at CRO 9th January 1730 Land at Landsugle John &
Elizabeth Beale and their son Sampson Thomas Williams, Mary
William, Joan Williams Witnesses Jenny Grills, Sampson Lucas, Thos Kerswill
Note for Sampson Lucas Grills (b
1710) in Susan Parson's tree on Genes Reunited
Sampson died in 1790 and left a will. His
daughter Grace had already died, but he mentioned her son Richard
Parson, son of George Parson of Lamerton (Devon), gent. Sampson
Grills also mentioned his married granddaughters, Elizabeth the
wife of Thomas Robyns of Plymouth, surgeon, and Mary Knighton
whose husband was of ?????? Knighton Esq. of Whitchurch, Devon.
Elizabeth and Mary were the daughters of John Parson, butcher of
Stoke Climsland.
If you have additions or
corrections to this page, please contact
us Bones in the Belfry home page
Page last updated - 2025