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OCR Rendition - approximate
The Ancestry of Francis Galton 39 Abigail Farmer, after the death of her husband in 1725, married Arthur Jephson of Bristol, and from this Abrahams' marriage was descended John Henry Shorthouse the author of 'John Inglesant. The commercial links between Bristol and Birmingham were very strong, and we are inclined to think that Joseph Farmer, the father of Joseph and Thomas, may have been a Bristol man. There are Joseph Farmer of Cary's Lane, Bristol, who died in 1755, and his wife Sarah, who died in 1722, and these may well have been the parents of our Joseph and Thomas. Anyhow, we find the son Thomas of Thomas Farmer is an ironmonger of Bristol, and marries there in 1743 Mary Jephson, almost certainly a relative of his mother's second husband, Arthur Jephson'. It is in Bristol, rather than Birmingham, that we must look for the link between the Galtons and Farmers. Robert Galton, son of John of Taunton, appears in Bristol as a " Haberdasher of small wares, and there in 1734 he marries Hannah Farmer 2 ; this is the first Galton-Farmer marriage. Hannah was daughter -of Thomas Farmer and Abigail Abrahams and sister-of Thomas the ironmonger in Bristol. It is quite probable that Thomas Farmer and Robert Galton both dealt in Birmingham hardware, and from this basis started the common mercantile interests of Galtons and Farmers in later years, Bristol being then largely the port of Birmingham. . Robert Galton lived in King's Square, Bristol, and there his last child, Sarah, was born in 1743, and she died and was buried in 1745. Shortly after this he appears to have gone to Boston in New England, probably on business matters, and there he died in 1746, or according to some accounts in 1749. It is hardly likely that he settled there as his wife and children remained in Bristol. It is possible that his mission had something to do with the large consignment of slaves valued at the Bay of Chesapeake, near to the Ironstone Mines, where they would erect their forges and furnaces. Thus Farmer seems to have been one of the pioneers in estab lishing the iron-industry of America and the Galtons' connection with the Farmers and their dealings in slaves seem to point to the reason for Robert Galton's visit to New England in 1743-1745. [The deed above referred to was in the possession of Messrs S. and E. Coleman of White Hart Lane, Tottenham, in July, 1913, and was most kindly purchased and presented to the Galton Laboratory by Mr Edmund Wheler Galton.] 1 Tertius Galton's physician at Leamington, Dr Jephson, was probably also a relative. 2 There were only four children of this marriage, three died in infancy, one only survived to twenty and died then.
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