21.1 5xgreat grandfather Nicholas Hill of Elsted (1752?-1811) Another brick wall

 My great-grandmother was Susan Caroline Hill, born in London in 1875. Her father, grandfather and great-grandfather (my 2x, 3x and 4x great-grandfathers) were all called John Hill and were all born in the small rural village of Elsted, Sussex. My 4xgreat grandfather John Hill was baptised at Elsted’s Saxon church on 4 May 1780. The digitised copy of the parish register at FamilySearch is faint and not very legible, but shows that John Hill was the son of Nicholas Hill and his wife Mary.

I was lucky enough to visit Elsted in 2021 on the way home from a post-lockdown trip to Winchester and Chichester. 

Elsted – St Paul – Sussex Parish Churches website records that the nave is 11^th century, other parts from the 12^th and 13^th centuries.

In the doorway hang two lists of all the incumbents of the church, going back to ‘Ralph the Priest’ in 1086 and ending with the most recent – Mark Morton, appointed in 2011. 

The Sussex Parish Churches website also notes that “The parish was long united with Treyford and Didling and after a new church at Treyford was built in 1849, Elsted church fell into partial ruin.  It was only taken back into full use after the C19 church had been demolished in 1951”. At the time that my 4xgreat grandfather John Hill was baptised at Elsted in 1780, the vicar was Walter Islip.

Islip also married his parents, Nicholas Hill and Mary Fossey, at Treyford & Didling – Elsted’s sister church – on 28 October 1777.

FamilySearch has a copy of the page from the Parish Register which reads:

No 22 1777

Banns of marriage between Nicholas Hill & Mary Fossey of the Parish of Treyford cum Didling were published three several Sundays without impediment in the Churchs of Treyford & Didling and they were married this 28^th day of Oct. 1777 in the Parish Church of Treyford by me W.Islip, Curate.

This marriage was solemnized between us this 28^th day of October 1777

Nicholas Hill X his mark

Mary Fossey X her mark

In the presence of

Thos Snelling

Richard ?eall?

A search of the registers for more baptisms of the children of this couple indicate that they had at least six children between 1778 and 1796. John Hill, my 4xgreat grandfather, was their second child (and second son).

Assuming Nicholas Hill was about 21-25 when he married, he would have been born around 1752-1756. Unfortunately, I have not found a likely baptism for him. There is, however, a burial record for Nicholas Hill at Elsted on 25 April 1811; he is aged 57 (born around 1754). The image from FamilySearch shows the Bishop’s Transcript of this, the only burial in the parish by August 1811:

Unfortunately, no information is given on the children’s baptisms that would tell us what Nicholas Hill did for a living … although it is likely that he was an Agricultural Labourer like the majority of his descendents who were recorded in the 1841-1861 censuses in Elsted. While his baptism (and therefore parents) isn’t known, the Hill line for now ends with Nicholas Hill.

For the sources mentioned in bold, see blogpost: MyRoots: Lesly's family history: Sources and resources: A quick view