STOKE ST  MARY,  SOMERSET,   ENGLAND

STOKE ST MARY HISTORICAL RECORDS


CAPTAIN WILLIAM BROOM FARRANT


Captain William Broom Farrant was living in the village in 1846, as he is described in a newspaper article as Captain Farrant of Stoke St Mary.  [However we have no record of where he was actually living, he does not appear on the 1841 census.  The Parish register just lists his abode as Stoke. ]


Captain Farrant was born in 1791 and joined the 35th Regiment of Foot in 1812 and is listed in the regiments records as having fought at Waterloo.  


Name: Wm Farrent

Rank: Lieutenant

Regiment: 2nd Battalion 35th Regiment of Foot

Sub Unit: Captain Weare's Company


He then retired on half pay until 1831 when he became a Lieutenant in the 35th Regment.  He moved to the 9th Regiment in 1835, and it was probably then that his daughter, Mary met Lt Field.


Captain Farrant’s first wife HB died in 1837 in India, aged 53.  There is only a record of one daughter Mary.


Captain Farrant came back to England and in 1845 he married Elizabeth White, daughter of the late Rev. John White of Exminster, Devon.


Back to daughter Mary.  She married John Frederick Field of the 9th Regiment of Foot on 8 Mar 1838 at Chumsurah, Bengal.  And hadthree children.  We have records of the three children, William Frederick, born 10 Mar 1839, Mary born 3 Oct 1841 and died 9 April 1846 and Harriet Ellard, born 14 May 1843 and died 15 April 1846.


“On 21 December 1845, Captain Field was killed in action at Ferozeshah [in the First Anglo-Sikh War].  His widow with three children were preparing to return to Enland, when cholera carried off two of the children.  The mother died on the way home off St Helena.


Captain William Broom Farrant died 20 May 1846, and was buried at Stoke St Mary 26 May 1846



The following is the report of the Captain of the ship carrying Mrs Field to England


The undersigned John Baker hereby certify that a Mrs Mary Field, widow of Captain John Frederick Field, late of Her Majesty’s 9th Regt of Foot was a passenger with her son William Frederick Field, aged seven years on board the Castle Eden, East Indiamen which sailed from Calcutta for England on the 16th day of May 1846 and that the said Mary Field died on board the said ship on the eight day of August last off the Island of St Helena and was buried in the High Seas – and I further certify that upon the arrival of the ship at London on the twenty seventh day of September last I delivered the said William Frederick Field into the care of his Step grandmother Mrs Elizabeth Farrant of Stoke St Mary, Somerset, the widow of his Grandfather Captn William Froom Farrant deceased.


Dated at Deptford the 5th day of October 1846 – John Baker Commander of the Castle Eden

NB No Chaplain or Surgeon on board to countersign this certificate.


The poor orphan has arrived in England totally unprovided for, with the exception of the usual trifling military allowance of about £10 a year from the Compassionate Fund and he has no relatives on whom he can fall back.  His only connexion is his Step Grandmother [the widow of the late Captain Farrant, an old Waterloo Officer, who died last year] who is in the most infirm state of health.  The grandmother has not the means of assisting him, having an income of £40 a year only.

Gloucestershire Chronicle – 5 Dec 1846

There is no record of what happened to William Frederick Field on his arrival in UK but in 1855 at the age of 17 he joined his father’s old regiment the 9th Foot as an Ensign “without purchase”, in 1858 he joined the Royal Canadian Rifles and was promoted to Lieutenant.  In April 1859 he transferred to the 76th Foot but in December of that year he retired from the Army selling his commission.  There is no further record of him.


Elizabeth Farrant found a place at Partis College in Bath [a foundation for widowed/single women of reduced circumstances] and died aged 83 there in July 1878.

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