THE MUDDLE FAMILIES

 

 

Introduction James & Ann Muddle’s Family Index of Family Members

 

Introduction

 

Only one branch of the Mayfield Muddles has as yet been written-up, this is the Biddenden Branch that was stated by James Muddle, who had been born at Mayfield in Sussex in 1734. He moved to Biddenden in Kent where he married in 1760 and had three sons, but by 1773 James, his wife and his two younger sons were all dead, leaving just his eldest son to carry on the line. This eldest son, another James, married at Biddenden in 1789; he had a son born at Benenden in 1791 and then moved to Staplehurst were he had five daughters and another son.

The daughters of this second James mostly ended up living in Tunbridge Wells and the fate of their younger brother is unknown, so the continuation of this Muddle line was again in the hands of the eldest son, yet another James. This third James married at Staplehurst in 1816 and had five sons. He must have had some education because he was clerk to Staplehurst solicitor James Ottaway until Mr Ottaway died in an accident in 1825. James then tried to setup a school in Staplehurst but this venture seems to have almost immediately failed and led to ruination and lost of status for James. By 1828 James was recorded as being a labourer and in 1840 his family were living in a small rented cottage in Staplehurst. James died in 1853 and his wife in 1867, and they were both buried in Staplehurst Churchyard.

Of the five son of James, the eldest, again called James, and the third, Henry, both enlisted in the 21st Regiment of Foot. Henry died at sea in 1839 on the way to Van Diemen's Land only 3 months after enlisting, and James died in the Crimea during 1855 after serving for 16 years. The second son, Thomas, died in infancy. The youngest son, John, moved to Strood near Rochester where he married in 1854, worked as a labourer, and had ten children, six of whom died in infancy. Of the four surviving children the only daughter stayed a spinster and looked after her father after her mother’s relatively early death. The youngest son joined the army and became a Sergeant Major but never married. The other two sons married, one was childless and the other had just one child, a son, this son married and again had just one child, this time a daughter called Betty Joan Muddle, who was born in 1920 and married in 1948.

The fourth son, called George, of the third James married Eliza Wright in 1844 and had a son the following year but then the next year he died of tuberculosis aged only 21. His son, also called George, joined the Royal Marines, serving from 1860 to 1874. After leaving the marines George settled in the Birkenhead area of Cheshire, married and had four children there. His only son, John George, became a Gunner in the Royal Marine Artillery and died a bachelor when HMS Indefatigable blew up and sunk at the Battle of Jutland in 1916.

After the early death of her husband Eliza Muddle, née Wright, never remarried, but went on the have four illegitimate children all born in workhouses, the first at Hollingbourne Workhouse in 1847, who died when only six months old, and the other three at Maidstone Workhouse in 1849, 1858 and 1861. Eliza and her children, including her legitimate son, seem to have lived in the workhouse, with the children being educated in the workhouse school, until some time during the 1860s when Eliza became the housekeeper to bachelor John Bright. Eliza, and those of her children who were still living with her, lived with John Bright at Maidstone and then Tovil near Maidstone until his death in 1884. Eliza continued to live at Tovil, as did her two daughters who had both married. Eliza died at Maidstone in 1897.

Eliza’s youngest son, John James Muddle, joined the army in 1878; he saw active service in Egypt in 1882, and his rapid promotion over 6½ years resulted in him becoming a Colour Sergeant in The Queen’s Own Royal West Kent Regiment in 1884. This was also the year that he married Eleanor Isabel Pobgee, a marriage that resulted in six children. Their two sons died aged nine months and eighteen years, one daughter died aged four, two died spinsters when about eighty, and only their eldest daughter married. John was made a Staff Sergeant at the Royal Military College at Sandhurst in Berkshire in early 1891, and he served there until his discharge from the army in 1899, after 21 years of service. After his discharge John continued to work for the College as a gatekeeper and mess waiter until at least 1923. After retiring John and Eleanor continued to live near the College, Eleanor died in 1946, aged 83, and John died in 1952, aged 90. It was with the deaths of their two spinster daughters, Agnes Maud Muddle and Eveline Grace Muddle, in 1968 and 1981 that the Muddle name finally died out in the Biddenden Branch of the Mayfield Muddles.

 

 

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