Examples of my work

On 14th May 1875 Thomas married Naomi Kemp at Mayfield Church. Naomi had been born in Mayfield in 1857 to shoemaker Richard Kemp and his wife Caroline, and was christened there on 17th September 1857. Thomas and Naomi appear to have lived in Burwash during the late 1870s, as their first two children were born there. By 1881 they had moved to Battle, and by April of that year were living in Mount Street with three children. Thomas was working as a hoopmaker.

Unfortunately, Naomi Sherlock died in 1885, aged just 27, leaving Thomas widowed with three children to support. However, 36-year-old Thomas remarried the following year. He wed Margaret Stonestreet. Margaret had been born in Brightling in 1851 to agricultural labourer Jeremiah Stonestreet and his wife Ellen. In the 1870s Margaret had been a servant in Marylebone, London, but by 1881 was living with her widowed mother in Salehurst, Sussex. In 1880 Margaret had given birth to an illegitimate child; Edith Mary Stonestreet. In April 1891 Thomas and Margaret were living in Black Horse Road, Battle. With them were four children from Thomas and Naomi’s marriage, three children from Thomas and Margaret’s marriage, and Margaret’s illegitimate daughter Edith. By April 1901 the family had moved to Ashburnham (just east of Battle) where Thomas, now 51, was working as a self-employed farmer. With only three children left in the household they had taken in a lodger; a 96-year-old widow from Guildford.

Thomas Sherlock died in the summer of 1907, aged just 57. Margaret Sherlock lived on until 1933, when she died in Salehurst.