Philip Chauncy’s memoir: 1839 part 1
Early in 1839 Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816 – 1880), my third great grandfather, completed his articles with a surveyor, Joseph Jackson, of March, Cambridgeshire.
In this year Philip’s sister Anna died, only thirteen, of a cold. Her death certificate notes her cause of death as consumption.
Philip started to make preparations to emigrate to South Australia.
He paid a visit to his brother William in Berkshire, taking a railway journey for the first time. William was supervising the construction of a large public grandstand at Ascot, not far from Windsor Castle, where they walked together admiring its avenues and statues.
1839
During the month of January I was very ill with the bowel complaint, constipation, pain in the kidneys &c. I thus recur to my ailment in order that my dear children may know not only how long I have suffered but how necessary it is that they shd use every precaution to obviate such life long calamity. Among the jovial people with whom my lot was cast it was not very easy with my pliant disposition to abstain from sometimes taking stimulants – always in moderation, but never without being followed by greater or less punishment.
On the 24th Feb. my dear sister Anna aged 15 [13] years died. She had been out visiting and caught cold which settled on the lungs – she of all the younger branch of the family understood my Father best and was his favorite. He never recovered the blow which her loss occasioned him. She was a mild and intelligent child with the prettiest face and figure of any of them. I did not know of her death for two days and in the meantime had written her a kind long letter which was all too late.
Until the 7th March I was engaged on surveys in the Washes and of the parish of Fen Drayton. On that day my five years with Mr. Jackson Expired and the snow being too deep for me to continue the survey I returned to London. I was very Eager to make preparations for going out to South Australia where my sisters Theresa and Mrs Berkeley had preceded me in 1836. There was a pelting snow as I mounted the coach which had continued for two days until it was so deep that the coach was stopped for an hour & a half until a clearance was made along the road.
My chief business in London was to arrange with my Father’s solicitors, Messrs James Western and son of 7 Great James Street Bedford Row, how to raise more money on my reversionary interest my share (one eighth) of the £16000 stock vested in the 3% Consols and the 3½ % reduced from which my Father derived his income, and of which £450 had been sold out to article me to Mr. Jackson & pay for outfit & including £50 Western’s Expences!
On the 13th of March I travelled for the first time on a railway, with William some seven miles to Slough [the Great Western Railway opened in Slough in June 1838], to which place the great north western railway had been completed. We thence took a pleasant walk to Windsor, went over part of the Castle and had a beautiful view of the “Long walk” 3 miles with its magnificent Avenues of trees and great Statue of George the third at the End. From Windsor we walked on seven miles to Sunningwells [ Sunninghill Wells] and the next day to his lodgings at the Queen’s Head Ascot Heath. For William who was at this time articled to Mr. Higgins the Architect &c. of Watling St London had him stationed by him here to superintend the Erection of a new Grandstand [The first public grandstand at the Ascot Racecourse was erected in 1838, seating about 3,000 spectators.]
Mr. and Mrs Cox and their two pretty daughters, the one black eyed and the other with soft blue eyes, were the occupants of the Queen’s stand. He had been a Whipper-in of the hounds to Geo. IV and was now pensioned off and lived here very comfortably. A state bedroom was still kept prepared but I believe no one had occupied it since Geo. IV had slept there, that is if ever he did so.
Either William was very reticent on his own affairs or else I was very blind for altho’ I spent the night there the love affair that was going on escaped my observation. Be this as it may my brother William and Miss (Anna) Cox were soon after married [7 July 1840], and are now living at Goulburn in N.S.W. where he is Superintendent of Roads under the Government. They have eight children living.
The next day we looked over the Queen’s kennels of staghounds and then walked to Winkfield my late grandfather’s Estate. After his decease in 1829 it was sold and was at the time of our visit the property of a Mr. May and occupied by Lord Harley.
We returned to the Queen’s stand and the next morning after bidding William and my kind Entertainers good bye and taking a last look of the pretty blue eyes of Lucy Cox I took a solitary walk back to Windsor and returned by rail to London.
I will resume the account of Philip’s final months in England and preparations for emigration in a future post.
Related posts
1877 Memoir by Philip Chauncy
This post first published at https://anneyoungau.wordpress.com/2025/02/03/philip-chauncys-memoir-1839-part-1/