ISBN 978-1-83975-157-8 in paperback
eBook ISBN 978-1-80381-155-0
last updated 15th February 2025 using old laptop with Windows 7 as practice before moving to new laptop andmore ambitio
A family containing six authors is special. When three of them independently become famous - Agnes Strickland, Susanna Moodie and Catharine Parr Traill - the family is extraordinary.
'The Strickland Family' interweaves family letters, writings and newspaper items, allowing this complex and exceptional family to tell their own life stories, set in 19th century England and Canada.
Originally published in 2020 with the title 'The Strickland Family of Suffolk (1758 to 1899)' the book was republished in 2022 as a print on demand book which can be ordered and bought at any bookshop or online. The 2022 version is also available in eBook form.
This website (currently in the early stages of development) aims to bring people up to date on events that have taken place and additional information that has been found following publication of the book. This includes information about some of the many descendants of the family.
Accounts of the following items are likely to be added to this site:
information in the re-published book that was not in the original (work has begun in this section - see below)
events in Southwold, Suffolk, England in July 2021 including tidying the graves of Agnes and Jane Strickland and holding graveside prayers attended by local dignitaries
visiting Tilford, Hampshire, England including seeing the graves of Elizabeth and Captain Tom Strickland and of Sarah Strickland Gwillym plus adding their life stories to the Tilford memorial project
items contributed to Lakefield, Ontario and Suffolk publications
contacts made via Lakefield Community Museum
visiting Ulverston, Cumbria, England where Sarah Strickland Gwillym lived with her second husband, Rev Canon Richard Gwillym.
visiting Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England and contributing an article to a Canadian publication about Robert Strickland (eldest son of Samuel Strickland) and his daughter (who was married to the vicar of Harmondsworth)
investigating reasons for misplaced plaque - subsequently obliterated - claiming to mark the final home of Agnes Strickland in Southwold
information received from Canada about descendants of the Strickland family
Items located in an American museum including a letter signed by a number of Strickland descendants
Section: information added to the text in the book when it was republished with a change of title in 2022
4th January 1838: Robert Childs' Will is accepted
Although Robert Childs had written a Last Will and Testament which had been duly witnessed and authorised when he was in good health, it was realised on 19th December 1837, two days after he had jumped from the window, that this Will had somehow been destroyed and needed to be rewritten as a matter of urgency.
The rewritten Will specified that Robert Childs' watch, seal and chain were bequeathed to Charles Childs; that all the furniture of Robert Childs' house, together with his other personal effects were bequeathed to Sarah; and that Robert Childs' share in the family business would pass to John Childs.
This share of the family business had been valued at £1,000, and John Childs was entrusted to provide for Sarah's future with this amount of money. He was to pay £200 to Sarah within three months of Robert's death, and was either to pay Sarah interest on the remaining £800 at the rate of 5% every year for the rest of her life, or to buy an annuity to the value of £800, the income to be for Sarah's benefit.
This rewritten Will had been read to Robert Childs item by item on 19th December 1837, and he had agreed that each item was correct. This had been done in the presence of witnesses including Sarah, and witness signatures were attached accordingly. By this time Robert was just about able to make his mark, but was no longer able to sign his name.
Robert Childs' rewritten Will was accepted and authorised for implementation on 4th January 1838. His executors were his brother John Childs and his nephew Charles Childs.
11th January 1839: Susanna passes on family news to John
On 11th January 1839 Susanna wrote to John passing on family news from England. She said: "Kate had a letter from Agnes this week, dated Oct. They are all well at home. Agnes has backed out from the old man, she says so discreetly that she hopes he will leave her a legacy after all, and she is going to marry a Mr Kirby, sometime during the winter, who is much attached to her and is only 55, is very rich, and promises to make very handsome settlements upon her." Whether this is an accurate account, or one coloured by Susanna's imagination is impossible to say but it does show that there were some romantic entanglements in Agnes's life. At this time Agnes was 42 years old.
Susanna continued: "Sarah has left Reydon, and is living opposite to where the Wales's lived in Southwold, is visited by all the genteel families near, and is slowly but surely recovering her health and spirits." Suffolk Archives have a paper which shows a Sarah Child being the tenant renting 'Honeysuckle House' at 17 Park Lane in Southwold in 1841.
Other comments show that Agnes was keeping a watchful eye on things in England on Susanna's behalf, for Susanna told John: "Some Mr Turner, has set a song of mine to music, and A wanted him to make some remuneration, but this he declined ... She wishes me to try him with Canadian songs, as it might 'perhaps bring my poetry a little into notice.' I don't think it worth the trial and would rather now, be popular in the country of my adoption than at home."
21st May 1864: Eliza has been asked for her autograph
Eliza replied to a letter from a friend on 21st May 1864 in which she explained her attitude to receiving letters. It also appears from her letter that her contribution to the work published under Agnes's name was more widely known than she wished.
Eliza wrote: "It gave me great pleasure to read your letter giving me the pleasant news of your married happiness and that you had a lovely baby." However, Eliza admitted: "There was one drawback always is in a friends' letter must be answered and I do not find that writing letters is any relaxation after the mind is worn with proofs and MSs. Nay the eyes do not like it and tell me they expect rest or they will not go on."
An autograph had been requested, and Eliza's reply showed that this was not the first such request she had received. She wrote: "And autographs are more that usually tormenting especially when I have made what the world would think some sacrifice in the hope that everybody would let my writing pass without caring a fly about it and that no one would want either my autograph or what is some degrees worse my photograph. How can I have an autograph when I have never committed my name to the public? And then instead of scribbling faster than speech one must ... write ones' copy well!!"
In response to the request for a letter with Agnes's autograph, Eliza's reply managed to protect Agnes from another chore, at the same time as giving what was wanted, by her own efforts rather than Agnes's. Eliza wrote: "My sister is at present much teased with negotiations respecting a new stereotype edition of the Queens of England ... We must not ask her for the letter you want ... I have done what I can clipped some beginnings and endings from her almost daily letters to me which are by mutual agreement all destroyed when the memorandums they contain are acted upon. But the correspondence though often delightful is not for the world's pen - As for the little dull notes she never writes them to me at least I would think her gone delirit(?) if she did." Presumably the mystery word is "delirious" or something similar.
The remoteness of Eliza's home was another reason for her reluctance to exchange letters. She wrote: "Among my difficulties of correspondence I am here" - at 'Abbott's Lodge' in Tilford - "nearly two miles from the Post Office and have no letters three days in the week. I never stay in London only passing through to visit my mother in Reydon Hall if she is ill. I am just returned."
20th November 1864: John follows Susanna's example
John Moodie in his correspondence and memoirs was inclined to express the same unkind and seemingly unmerited opinions of the Strickland family as Susanna. The most notable example was in a letter he wrote to his daughter Katie Vickers on 20th November 1864, two months after his mother-in-law had died.
Referring to Sam he wrote: "I hear Strickland has gone home to get some plunder I suppose at Reydon. Mrs Gwillym is to give her share of Reydon proceeds to Strickland. I think it would have shown more benevolence to have given it to either of her Sisters in Canada who want it so much more."
There is no evidence that Sam went to England at this point, although his presence would have been very welcome. Susanna, and therefore John, must have known that Mrs Strickland's Will required everything to be sold and the money divided equally. He should also have been aware that Mrs Strickland had been living in near poverty for decades, and that there was very little in the way of "spoils" to be had. There is no mention or suggestion elsewhere that Sarah gave her share to Sam.
17th December 1867 (Changed from original account of Richard Gwillym's funeral)
If Sarah wanted Richard's funeral to be a quiet and private affair, she did not get her wish. A newspaper cutting preserved in Barrow Archives carries the following account: "The funeral, which was plain and unpretentious, took place yesterday. There was neither mourning coach nor carriages. The 37A (Ulverston) Company of the Rifle Volunteers, of which Mr Gwillym was the chaplain, formed ... in front of Stockbridge House, the members being in uniform ... the mournful procession moved slowly along, and after it came the chief mourners, then many of the principal inhabitants and tradesmen ... as the cortege slowly wound its way many others joined. The shops were all closed."
When the cortege arrived at St Mary's Church, the children "of the National and Town Bank Sunday School, formed a line on each side of the road. The volunteers divided along the path leading from the gates to the church, and the coffin was borne into the sacred edifice, which was in mourning.
"On the body being removed to its last resting place, the churchwardens ... each carried his white wand, to which was tied a piece of crepe. The grave is at the east end of the church yard, on the high side of, and not far from, the steps leading to the "Ladies Walk" ... During the service, the church was full, and, on leaving it, there must have been in the churchyard nearly the whole population of the town able to attend ... his loss will be deeply and sincerely mourned for many, many years to come."
March 1891: Sarah's estate is valued (additional information)
Census data implies that the Strickland sisters provided for the long-term welfare of the Vickery family. In 1871, when Agnes was still alive and in good health, Mary Ann Vickery, aged 29, was the only person recorded as living in 'Park Lane Cottage,' Southwold, and she was described as a general servant. In 1881, after Elizabeth had died, Jessie Vickery aged 39 was living in 'Eden Lodge' on the Tilford Road, with her mother aged 71, and both had an annuity to provide them with an income. At this time, Mary Ann Vickery, aged 40, was living with Sarah at 'Abbot's Lodge' as her ladies maid. Ten years later, at the time of the 1891 census, and about nine months after Sarah's death, Mary Ann Vickery had joined her mother and sister living at 'Eden Lodge', and each of the three members of the family was able to describe herself as "now living on own means.