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Elizabeth EPTON was born on 1 August 1798 at Ulceby cum Fordingham, the daughter of Richard EPTON and Mary (née SIMS).
Her direct line can be traced back through many generations of farmers to Robert EPTON and Elizabeth née WALLIS who married in 1620 at Mumby. One of their children, John EPTON senior married Elizabeth in Swaby, St Nicholas circa 1660, at the beginning of the reign of Charles II. This John EPTON senior married three times due to his spouses’ deaths but grandson William EPTON senior, a farmer, went one better and because of the early demises of his brides, married four times – two Marys and two Anns. William EPTON senior, despite the number of his wives, could only manage to produce seven children. His son, William EPTON junior (also a farmer) had one wife, Elizabeth, and managed eight children, one of whom was our Joseph EPTON who married Ann HEWSON in 1770 at Bilsby. Joseph was a servant at the time of his marriage and later was described as a farmer.
Joseph and Ann (née HEWSON) EPTON were Elizabeth's paternal grandparents and my direct line.
They had seven children:
1. Richard EPTON (1770-1811) He married Mary SIMS, a nurse, at Hogsthorpe in 1793. When eighteen, and a year before her marriage to Richard, Mary had an illegitimate son, Thomas. The father was the forty-five-year old village blacksmith, Thomas GOODING. The child, named Thomas GOODING junior, was brought up as a pauper by the parish of Hogsthorpe and not by Richard and Mary.
Whilst Mary SIMS was dallying under the spreading chestnut tree with her veteran sweetheart, Richard was working as an agricultural labourer for William SIMPSON, a grazier of Mablethorpe. Richard EPTON moved back into Hogsthorpe for his marriage to this Mary SIMS. Richard and Mary had eight children, one of whom, called Elizabeth and born in 1798 at Ulceby cum Fordingham, would marry at the young age of fifteen (with her parents consent) and become Mrs Elizabeth CADE, wife of my John CADE.
2. Rebecca EPTON (1771-1839) married John FARROW.
3. John EPTON (1773-).
4. Elizabeth EPTON (1777-1866) married Robert HADWICK, a miller of Louth.
5. Ann EPTON (circa 1779-bef 1783) died as a child.
6. Joseph EPTON junior (1780-1859) a farmer and a cow keeper, married Frances THOMPSON. Their daughter, Sarah EPTON, married William DESFORGES, a cottager. William's family goes back to the Reverend Peter DESFORGES, a French Huguenot, who came to this country to escape the persecutions of the Protestants in France during the period of 1680-1681.
7. Ann EPTON (1783-1864) the baby of the family was baptised at Anderby Church with her father's name. By the time Ann was twenty-one, she wanted clothes and money. She achieved both of these dreams and by the time she was twenty-three, an antipodal sea-cruise.
Ann was convicted of larceny (clothes and money - worth less than £10 at today's value), sentenced to be deported to Australia for seven years and was held in the Louth House of Correction until such time. She sailed on the William Pitt bound for Sydney, New South Wales in 1806. Ann EPTON became a housekeeper, married George HAM and they had two sons and two daughters. Her second marriage was to Derbyshire born James EDWARDS in 1837 at Glendon, New South Wales. Ann (née EPTON) died in 1864 at Jerry Plains, New South Wales, Australia.
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