Framing History-John McArthur, Officer in the British Marines

In 1745 an attempt was made by Charles Edward Stuart, also known as ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’ to regain the British throne for the exiled house of Stuart of Scotland.

At this time most of the British Army was on the European Continent involved in what was termed the ‘Austrian Succession’.

Making the most of this opportunity, Bonnie Prince Charlie sailed from France for Scotland where he was supported by several highland clans. They were known as the ‘Jacobites’. Under the Stuart banner, they marched south claiming victory at Preston near Edinburgh. Now bold with success, they continued marching southwards over the border into England. They were stopped at Derby when some of the British Army was hurriedly recalled from Europe to defend the realm.

The Jacobites retreated north to Inverness where the British Army caught up with them on the moors of Culloden. Here the Jacobites were defeated with Bonnie Prince Charlie fleeing back to France.

It has been claimed that members of the McArthur family were part of the Jacobite army. Several family members were killed including five out of a family of six brothers. The sixth brother, reportedly one Alexander McArthur returned home to the highlands. Fearing retribution he and his young wife, Catherine, along with several other family members sailed for the Americas.

After a few years, Alexander and Catherine McArthur returned to England. We believe they were involved in the cloth trade in Kent, and there a son was born on 12 January 1752. He was named James, possibly for his Paternal Grandfather, and was baptized 20 January in the Independent Chapel in Canterbury.

We lose sight of the McArthur family for some years but believe they had a large family of both sons and daughters. They possibly remained in the cloth trade and moved around England as the industrial revolution brought big changes in this trade in particular. Their children are believed to have been baptized in some of the many dissenting Presbyterian Churches scattered throughout England.

In the mid-1760’s we know the McArthur family settled in Stoke Dameral a parish of the Plymouth area in Devon. Here they opened a drapery business.  Another son was born in August 1767. There were no Presbyterian Chapels in Stoke Dameral and this son was baptized on 3 September in the parish church of St Andrews. He was named John.

St Andrews, Stoke Dameral, Plymouth, Devon

Two years later another son was born and was baptized in the same church on 27 August 1770. He was given the name William. Sadly he died as an infant and was buried on 24 November 1772.

John was now the youngest surviving son in the family.

John was only ten years of age when his mother Catherine died and was buried in the churchyard on 31 August 1777.

John had a good education, and keeping in mind subsequent events, it would appear he may have attended Plympton Grammar School. This now very famous school was founded from the bequest of Elize Hele, a local landowner and attorney who had been Treasurer to King James I. In his Will, he left all his estate and money for pious uses. His executors built three schools. One at Plympton and two in Exeter. Although it began as a ‘charity’ school the Plympton school had an excellent reputation for scholarship, and many wealthy Devon and Cornwall landed families sent their sons there.

Plympton is not far from Stoke Dameral, and it is highly likely that John spent his early years of education here as he later ‘toyed with the idea of studying law’, which would have necessitated a good grounding in Latin and the Classics. John’s older brother James, and Evan and Nicholas Nepean sons of Nicholas Nepean of Saltash, Cornwall, are also believed to have attended this reputable school.

John would have left school at about aged 14 years. He could have joined his father as an apprentice in the cloth trade, but it is believed John would have none of that. Then his father suggested he should join the Navy or the Marines as a career serviceman. It is believed some of his brothers had already joined the Navy and Marines.

In the Navy, you needed to begin at the bottom and spend many years at sea to earn your way up the promotion ladder and to sit for an extensive examination before you could become a commissioned officer.

However, in the Marines, you could purchase officer positions for a sum of money. John’s father was able to purchase him an Ensign’s commission in the Marines in 1782. He was mustered into Fish’s Corps destined for the American Colonies. They were housed at the newly built Stonehouse Barracks. However, the War of Independence came to an end soon afterward and the newly founded Corps were not needed and disbanded. The officers were put on half-pay and the lower ranks turned out to find their own employment. Several senior officers of this Corps were also from Devon and Cornwall landed gentry and returned to their estates when the corps was disbanded.

John was at a loose end. A few weeks later an incident happened in the streets of Plymouth that set the town’s people against the Marines. A riot erupted between the Town’s Guard (Town Constable and his men), and a party of the 36th Regiment who were stationed at the Stonehouse barracks. It was quelled with the assistance of other marines, but the town’s folk were concerned.

Although not mentioned by name, oral family history suggests that one of John’s senior officers was a landowner at Holsworthy and when the Corps was disbanded he returned to his estates at Holsworthy and took young John with him. John was there several years and learned about running an estate. He is said to have been an excellent horseman and rode with the hounds frequently.

There is little doubt the family hoped John would make a good match with the daughter of landed-gentry to improve his social position and financial prospects, as his older brother, James had done. One of the landed families in Holsworthy was the Kingdon family who was to play a part in John’s life. There were also a number of Linen Drapers who would have been known to John’s family, and two landed attorney’s in the parish who may also have been interested in John clerking for them.

In 1787 John McArthur was employed as a tutor in the Grammar School where Thomas Hockin, the son of the Rev John Kingdon, Vicar of Bridgerule, was being educated. John was invited to visit the Kingdon family at Bridgerule. It was there he met Elizabeth Veale.

To improve his career prospects  John applied to be reinstated as an Ensign in the Marines in a regiment on deployment. The problem was that this was difficult as Britain was at peace and officer positions in the Marines were more difficult to find a placement. He was finally granted an Ensign’s position in the 68th Regiment in April 1788 and returned to Full Pay. At the time this regiment was stationed at Gibraltar and John McArthur was expected to join his regiment immediately. However, he took personal leave and remained in Devon to pay court to Elizabeth Veale.

 

 

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Framing History- Elizabeth McArthur, Descendant of Devonshire Landed Gentry-3.

Here we continue the story of Elizabeth Veale, born 1766, and a descendant of Devonshire Gentry. She later married John McArthur and emigrated to Australia on the Second Fleet in 1790.

Elizabeth Veale was about 12 years of age when her mother remarried and moved away from Bridgerule.

It is believed that it was at this time, she moved into the household of the Rev John Kingdon. Although John and Jane Kingdon had several sons, they only had one daughter at this time.

The Rev John Kingdon was also from a landed family of Holsworthy. He was born in 1735, the eldest son of  Roger and Judith Kingdon. He began his education at Holsworthy and later is believed to have attended a Grammar School in Exeter, before going to Exeter College, at Oxford University. In later years, he was well known for his great scholarship.

John Kingdon was appointed Vicar of Bridgerule in 1765 but lived at nearby Holsworthy.

On 25 June 1766, the Rev John Kingdon married, Jane Hockin, of Okehampton, Devonshire.

Bridget Kingdon, their eldest child was born at Holsworthy in 1767 and was baptized there on 21 July.  The family moved into the Bridgerule vicarage, known as East Park, soon afterward. All their subsequent children were born there and baptized at St Bridget’s.

Elizabeth Veale had grown up in the village with Bridget Kingdon, and she was welcomed into the household as a suitable companion.

St Bridget’s Bridgerule, Devon

John Kingdon also believed that girls should be well educated to run the family estates, while their husbands were absent, and so privately tutored his daughter, Bridget, and Elizabeth Veale. Not only to read and write well but also to study literature and sciences. She lived there several years before returning to the Hatherly home.

John Hatherly, Elizabeth Veale’s grandfather is known to have doted on his granddaughter and was preparing her for a ‘good’ marriage. Although Lodgeworthy in Bridgerule, was now in the hands of Edmund Leach, it had prospered and was intended for Elizabeth Veale’s dowry. Life was good on those Devonshire farms as Elizabeth Veale grew into womanhood.

Meanwhile down in Stoke Climsland, Edmund and Grace Leach had also prospered and they had had a daughter, Mary Isabella. She had been born in late 1780 and was baptized at All Saints Parish Church, Stoke Climsland on 14 January 1781.

However, when the American War of Independence ended in 1782, it changed life everywhere including those farming communities in Devon. Depression hit Britain quickly and severely with few markets, failing crops and increasing population by migration and immigration. Over the next five years disaster was to slowly engulf many families in that part of the country.

The result was that Edmund Leach gradually sank into bankruptcy, and had to sell all his property, including Lodgeworthy at Bridgerule, leaving Elizabeth Veale without any means for a dowry.

Elizabeth’s mother, Grace Leach, along with her youngest daughter Mary Isabella, returned to her father, John Hatherly’s home at Bridgerule, on the death of her mother, Grace Hatherly, in 1785. Her husband Edmund Leach remained at Stoke Climsland, where he died a pauper and was buried in All Saints Churchyard on 1 April 1791. His grave is unmarked.

In 1787, Elizabeth Veale was just 21 years of age when she met the dashing John McArthur. He was a tutor at the school where the young Thomas Hockin, a son of the Rev John and Jane Kingdon, was a pupil. He was invited by Thomas’s parents, to visit them at the Bridgerule vicarage. Thomas’s sister, Bridget was a close friend of Elizabeth Veale, and she too was invited to the vicarage to meet the charming young man.

Elizabeth Veale married John McArthur the following year at St Bridget’s, Bridgerule. The McArthurs left the parish soon afterward, and within a short time emigrated to the other side of the world.

Bridgerule, Devon. St Bridget’s on the hill with Vicarage.

In 1792,  shortly before her father’s death, Grace Leach married on 27 March, John Bond, a friend of her father, who had known Grace all her life.  Her father was ill and wanted someone, who could take care of her after he died. He died at Bridgerule and was buried in St Bridget’s Churchyard on 16 August 1792.

Elizabeth McArthur, when she heard her mother had married him, made a comment that leads us to believe that she thought him not socially acceptable, and her mother had married beneath her. Something Elizabeth’s mother thought Elizabeth had done when she married John McArthur.

Elizabeth, by this time, was in New South Wales far away, and no comfort or help to her mother.

Grace Bond’s youngest daughter Mary Isabella Leach, was only eleven years of age when her mother remarried. John Bond died on 16 July 1824 and Grace Bond died 22 June 1836 aged 89 years.

Mary Isabella Leach married Thomas Hacker on 22 January 1801 at Poundstock (Cornwall) and had a family of seven daughters. She later emigrated with some of her children and their families in 1852, to Prince Edward Island, Canada, where she died in 1858.