INTRODUCTION
The following is written verbatim from the first page of Brigadier F.R.Lindsay Goadby's work. It's a fascinating document from which we can learn a lot about the Goadby family. What is incredible is that he did all of this work without a computer or the Internet, truly a work of love. I have transcribed some of his work into the online tree. The content has been edited and amended after newer contributions and the advent of easier access to public records.
To view his original work click on "The Goadby Papers" button in the left panel.
I would like to thank Judith Mayoh, Jacqueline Nicholas, Gay Smallwood, Peter Smee and Ian Bower, for their valuable contributions to this Tree.
Bruce A. Smith
GOADBY FAMILY STORY
Our name is unusual and in the family we say that "All Goadbys are related". This collation of Goadby records suggests that the saying is correct, though a few links are still not discovered.
The object of compiling this Tree is to enable future generations to have some idea as to how they became related. It seems that the family name might be dying out, as there are only about 50 male Goadbys left to keep it alive. The Tree has been built up from searches through parts of over 300 parish registers (mostly in Leicestershire, Warwickshire and London), from old wills, from Guildhall records, from the post 1837 Somerset House indexes, from census returns and of course from family sources. Somerset House indexes alone produced some 1600 Goadby entries, equally divided before and after 1900 and the last 800 names are included in the present tables.
The name 'Goadby' appears to originate from the Danish name 'Gouti', to which was added 'by', meaning a farmstead or holding. Two 'Goutis' were among the Danish invaders of Leicestershire about 925 AD and their settlements are now 'Goadby Marwood', 17 miles NE from Leicester and a small hamlet some 10 miles East of the city. The Norman spelling was Goutebie and any villager who moved from one of these places would have called himself by his Christian name followed by 'de Goutebie', i.e. 'from Goutebie'. Mediaeval traces of the 'de Goutebies' are few, as they were not land owners, but Leicester Borough archives show that there was a prosperous family of 'de Goutebie' wool merchants in the City between 1280 and 1360. Unfortunately the subsequent Borough records were destroyed in the 'Sack of Leicester' in 1645 and the story can only be continued from Parish Registers. These did not start until 1538 and few remain earlier than 1660. By this time the basic name seems to have stabilised as 'Goadby' though no less than 58 variants have been found spelt phonetically according to the individual pronunciation, eg 'Gordby', 'Golby'.
Parish records from 1550 indicate a large settlement of Goadbys in Earl Shilton, 10 miles SW (pp.1&2) of Leicester. and a scattered population in the South Croxton/Ashby Folville/Twyford are 10 miles East (pp.19-21). The former were almost all connected with clothing (mercers, tailors, glovers, breeches makers etc.) while the latter were agricultural (yeomen, blacksmiths, laborers). There were scattered pockets of Goadbys in North Warwickshire, roughly between the Watling Street (A roman road on the Leics /Warks border now known as the A5, ed) and Coventry who's link with Leicestershire has not been found. These too were agricultural but with the 18th Century depressions they drifted into opencast coal mining; later moving into factories. These Warwickshire Goadbys died out as such by 1860 but a line continued with the spelling 'Goalby'. This had been adopted by the Clerk who wrote the Register at a village wedding in 1737 from which there is a large branch in the USA. These Warwickshire family trees are not included in this collation but will be deposited with the County Archivist later.
London parish registers show Goadbys from the early 17th Century and a link with Leicestershire is probable (pp.22-24). A common feature with Earl Shilton is the prevalence of Elias and Lydia as Christian names.. There were also settlers in Virginia, the first being Thomas in 1608,. Yet another link between London and Leicestershire is a background connection with Sachervals and Shipleys whose names occur in parishes where Goadbys too are recorded and this recurs later in Virginia.
The first 18 pages of this record stem from Earl Shilton (PP.1& 2) whence Thomas went off to fight for his King at the Battle of Worcester in 1651. Earl Shilton appears to have been a Parliamentary stronghold., so after the defeat, Thomas settled down in the Market town of Hinckley, 3 miles away and the Earl Shilton Goadbys slowly died out. In 1703 one of his grandsons Joseph I (P.3) married and moved to Market Bosworth, 10 miles to the North and by 1785 John, a grandson of the latter, was established at Rugby (p.7), most of his descendants now being in the Birmingham area. In 1793, Joseph IV, joined the Baptists, later becoming a Minister and his line scattered where the ministry took them (pp.4-6). The remainder (p.8) stayed at Bosworth until about 1860, many going to the local hosiery trade. One young orphan, William was apprenticed in Arnold, Nottinghamshire, where he founded a large family (pp.9&10), whose descendants are still in the vicinity and neighbouring places in Derbyshire. Later Amelia married and went to Australia (p.11).
Joseph I's youngest brother, Elias (p.12) remained at Hinckley, where his family became stocking knitters or frame makers. One of the latter, William, (pp.17-18) emigrated to the USA in 1814, while the branch at home seem to have divided into non-conformists and churchmen. (pp.13-16). The former appear to have kept to hosiery, textiles and allied trades, some in Leicester and have become executives, while their poorer Church cousins remained operatives. Many of the latter left hosiery for the boot and shoe trade developing in Leicester (pp.14A&15).
The East of Leicester line starts with the South Croxton records of 1622 (pp.19&20) though there was record of a Goadby tenant there in 1568. This family were first weavers, then shepherds and yeomen - later passing via farriery to blacksmiths. About 1800, a marriage took them to Newtown Linford, 7 miles NW from Leicester. and some are now in the Coalville area. The Ashby Folville line died out by 1720, the last, William, being a brewer and Mayor of Leicester. Twyford parish registers (p.21) do not start until 1689 but this line is presumably the same as the South Croxton one. The villages being only 2½ miles apart. Here the first recorded Goadby, John, had been the parish Clerk for over 24 years, while the family were yeomen or shepherds until about 1860, when a carpenter descendant moved to London and the family died out locally.
The main London Tree (p.22) is complicated by the destruction of records in the Great Fire of 1666, particularly those of the Livery Companies. A family of Smiths lived in Newington from 1623 to 1650 but there is no subsequent trace. From 1655 to 1800 there is a continuous record of well-to-do Citizens of London, resident in the City and Shoreditch, most of whom belonged to the Clothworkers Guild, though two were apprenticed as a printer and a bookseller. One of these clothworkers, (Samuel) married his housekeeper secondly (Priscilla Shutton) and soon afterwards died intestate, whereupon she dissipated his estate among her laborer and collier relatives in West Leicestershire.
The above London family may well be linked to a later tree, which starts about 1780 but three vital dates are missing for proof. A presumptive tree of the latter is on p.23. The head of this was Samuel , dancing master and fencing master, who taught in London and in York and who had royal clientele when established in The Quadrant, Regent Street., about 1830 to 1840. He was said to have lost all his money about 1841 and retired to the Isle of White to die. One of his sons, Henry received a silver medal, then a gold medal from the predecessors of The Royal society, for microscopic research and emigrated to USA in 1850 A descendant of Horace Gregory, the well known poet and writer. A younger son, Samuel Hill, (p.24) joined the army as a schoolmaster, and served in India - his descendants are mostly in Australia, Peter Goadby, being a world renowned shark killer (sic). Search continues but the London parish registers are vast and voluminous, mostly unindexed and there are no real family clues to the London origins.
Records in Virginia and the Carolinas show that Thomas Goadby had settled on the James River by 1608 and that two further Goadbys arrived from England, John in 1635 and Thomas in 1637, all having estates in the same area. The family moved on South through the Carolinas but trace on the male line is lost from 1755 and the name does not appear in records of the War of Independence. I am indebted for this information to Mrs. Beth Engel of Brunswick, Georgia, who is a descendant.
Few Goadbys seem to have been in the public services except John (p.8), Samuel Hill, (p.24) and the compiler (p.4A) (Army in India), and a solitary Knighthood obtained was the award of K.B.E. to Kenneth (p.4A) for his services as a physician in the First World War. Michael (p.12) fought at Waterloo, John (p.8) was in the Sikh War 1846, two were in India during the Mutiny - John Orissa (p.6A) and Samuel Hill (p.24) Many served in the two World wars and Lawrence (p.6A) was awarded the Military Cross.
There was an early trend towards Non-Conformity, which limits the available material for a full tree, as very few genealogical records, other than those of the Church of England, exist before 1820. For instance, Elias Goadby, mercer of Ibstock, Leics, was a leading Non-Conformist prosecuted in 1668 for not attending church but in 1672 he was licensed to hold meetings in his own house. In 1735, the 7 year apprenticeship of Robert Goadby as a vintner, was sealed in London when he was described as 'Son of Elias, late of Ashby in Leics; peruke maker'. None of these men appear in parish records in Leicestershire, although these are complete for the period.
The swing towards non-conformity intensified in 1793 when Joseph IV (p.3) joined the Baptist Brotherhood at Barton-in-the Beans, a few miles from his home, and two generations of scholarly Baptist ministers followed. Two of these were missionaries in Orissa (India), John (p.3) who later served in Virginia sic. (Actually he served in Poultney, Vermont not Virginia) and in Montreal and John Orissa (pp3A & 6A) who died there of dysentery. Another Thomas (pp.3,5) was head of the Chilwell Baptist College. The story of these Ministers was published about 1910 in a book called 'Not Saints but Men' compiled by Bertha (p.6E) and Lilian (p.4A) but all of the original "Goadby Papers' have disappeared.
Despite their general lack of pretensions, the Goadbys appropriated no less than three coats of arms during the 19th Century, to none of which the College of Heralds can record any entitlement. The first was a masterpiece of the 'heraldic stationers art' - "Gules a chevron ermine between three hazel leaves or; Crest on a wreath argent and gules a stag trippant proper" with words "Vertus Veritasque Vincent". This was obtained by CC Goadby (p.7) but properly belonged to one Thomas Goadby of Norfolk whose line had ended a century earlier. The second was described by Lawrence (p6A) as a tradition handed down by his mother. - "a bent mailed arm with the fist clenched holding a spear" and the words "Esse Quot Esse". These belonged separately to some 30 families, none being Goadbys. Finally, there was a "Bushy green tree" above a scroll with the words "Per Ardua ad Astra". used by Allan Goadby (p.4) and probably his brothers until dropped in 1910 owing to the imposition of a tax on arms!
Physically many Goadbys have two marked characteristics - two unusually large upper front teeth (The Goadby Gravestones) and also rather long earlobes.
Few Goadbys were monied, though some of the London branch, were well breeched (p.22), Samuel and his son John, were Deputy City Measurers (cloth), described in the Gentlemen's magazine as an "important and lucrative appointment under the City of London". Robert, owner of the Sherborne Advertiser, left £200 in Consols to provide £3 annually for the poor and £2 for the Vicar to preach a sermon on the wonderful ways of God as exemplified by nature, at evensong on the first Sunday in May. Thomas, (p.8, 1817- 71) could walk for two miles on his own land from Hinckley to Barwell, owing to the success of his hosiery business. Some of the American tree (pp.17,18) were dollar millionaires until the Wall Street crash in 1929, one being dubbed "the best dressed man in New York"
As a contrast, a Mrs. Jane Goadby was notorious in London for having opened the first properly conducted brothel in England, in Berwick Street, Soho, at least from 1753 to 1775. Her name appears in contemporary literature as well as in the Rate books, but her link with the tree is as yet undiscovered.
No doubt in time further information will emerge to clarify the early days of the family and especially the London Goadbys. There may too be 'lost tribes' in the backwoods of America who will want places - but not in Australia, where the whole electoral register has been checked.
Copies of this collation are being presented to the Society of Genealogists, and to the Leicestershire and Warwickshire County Record Offices. They are also being placed in the Public Libraries at Leicester and Hinckley. Any further developments will be deposited with the Society and the Record Offices, as well as being communicated to the head of the branch concerned.
Gaunt Mill, Standlake.; Brigadier F.R.L. Goadby
Oxon - Spring 1975
© Bruce A. Smith 2001-2015
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