Curate at Cocking from 1855 to 1857
Thomas Clement was curate at Cocking for about a year and a half at the start of his clerical career, from late 1855 to the spring of 1857, towards the end of the “reign” of Thomas Valentine as vicar.
Thomas Clement was born on 13 August 1829 at Alton, Hampshire; he was the eldest son and fourth child of James White Clement (1796–1892) and his wife Sarah née Hollis (1798–1872). Thomas was baptised at St. Lawrence’s Church, Alton on 2 September 1829.
Family background
James White Clement was born in Alton into a family of solicitors with offices on Alton High Street. He married Sarah Hollis (originally from Romsey, Hampshire) on 3 April 1821, at St John the Evangelist Church, Westminster.
The couple’s first child, Jane was born on 8 June 1821 at Alton, followed by three further daughters, Mary Anne born in May 1823, Elizabeth Emily born in April 1825, and Catherine Frances born in August 1827.
After the birth of Thomas in August 1829, there was a gap of seven years before the couple’s sixth and final child, James White was born in October 1836.
At the first UK National Census in June 1841, the family (excluding Thomas) were living in Alton High Street. 11-year old Thomas was living in the home of Charles Mayo, a surgeon, in St Peter Street, Winchester. No occupation is shown on the census; it is probable that Thomas was staying in Winchester to attend school, possibly at Winchester College.
Education
After completing his schooling, Thomas was admitted as a pensioner to Clare Hall, Cambridge in September 1848, aged 19. He matriculated in the following Lent term, and graduated as Bachelor of Arts in 1853. At the 1851 census, Thomas was recorded as a student living at Clare Hall.
Clerical career
On 23 December 1855, Thomas was ordained as a deacon at Chichester Cathedral by the Bishop of Chichester, Ashurst Gilbert. A year later, on St Thomas’s Day (21 December), Thomas was ordained as priest.
Thomas was appointed as a curate at Cocking church immediately after his ordination as deacon; he first appears in the parish register when he officiated at the funeral of 39-year old Mary Clarke on 3 February 1856. At this time, the vicar of Cocking was Thomas Valentine, who had been installed in 1823. Now suffering from ill-health, Valentine took little part in the life of the church and had appointed Frank Hudson as curate, with Thomas Clement assisting him, and standing in for him when needed.
By Christmas 1856, Thomas Clement was considered as the parish priest. On 3 January 1857, this article appeared in the Sussex Agricultural Express:
COCKING — The Season.
We are happy to announce to our readers that the tenant-farmers in this district have not forgotten the happy season of the year, having given Christmas presents to all their labourers and likewise to the poor widows of this parish. We may add that Miss Clement felt much pleasure in visiting nearly all the poor people, and giving them a shilling each on Christmas Day, in the morning. Had not the Rev. A. Clement been engaged he would have discharged this gratifying task himself.
Thomas Clement’s final appearance in the Cocking parish register was on 22 April 1857, when he officiated at the funeral of 70-year old Charlotte Carpenter.
In May 1857, Thomas Clement was appointed curate at The Church of the Assumption, East Wittering, after his predecessor, James Webber Miller had been appointed Rector at St Andrew’s, Chichester. He first appears in the parish register on 3 July 1857, when he officiated at the funeral of 7-month old Ann Smith.
In November 1859, Thomas appeared at Chichester Magistrates Court as a witness when George Whittington was charged with cruelty towards a horse. Whittington was a wagon driver employed by Mrs Ann Rusbridger from East Wittering; he was driving a wagonload of hay when, about a mile south of Chichester, one of the horses was “pulling along too fast”. In an attempt to restrain it, he accidentally pulled out the horse’s tongue, before driving on to East Wittering. Later that day, Thomas Clement saw a lad poking an object on the ground on the Chichester turnpike; Thomas asked him what he was doing, and after examining the tongue, he took it away, and passed it on to Charles Sparkes, a farmer at Stubcroft Farm, near to East Wittering church, who in turn passed it to the police. Whittington was remanded for trial at the next Assizes, where he was sentenced to six months hard labour.
Thomas’s final appearance in the East Wittering parish register was on 21 April 1861, when he baptised Charles Coombes, an adult.
The following week, Thomas left the parish of East Wittering, when he was moved to St Paul’s Church, Southsea. Following his departure, his former parishioners presented a testimonial to Thomas, including “a beautiful prayer and communion service, elegantly bound with silver mountings”. This bore the inscription:
Presented to the Rev. Thomas Clement, on leaving the curacy of East Wittering, as a token of regard, by the members of his congregation.
April 28th, 1861.
St Paul’s Southsea was destroyed by enemy bombing during the Second World War; consequently, the parish registers have been destroyed.
In July 1862, Thomas Clement again appeared in court as a witness, when 58-year old Sarah Dow, was charged with forgery and obtaining money by false pretences, when she altered the date on her marriage certificate in order to obtain a widow’s pension from the Admiralty. Thomas Clement testified that the entries on the certificate presented to support her claim differed from the marriage register. At the subsequent assizes, she was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment with hard labour.
On 24 June 1863, at St Lawrence’s Church, Alton, Thomas assisted Rev. H.M. Wagner, vicar of Brighton, at the marriage of Rev. James Webber Miller (his predecessor as curate at East Wittering, now rector at nearby Birdham) to his eldest sister, Jane.
In July 1864, Thomas was installed as vicar at Holy Rood Church, Empshott in East Hampshire, following the tragic death of Robert Tindall in February. His first appearance in the parish register was on 21 August 1864, when he conducted the funeral of 61-year old Harriet Marshall.
Thomas’s final entry in the Empshott parish register came on 21 June 1869, when he married Henry Warren and Mary Smith.
By this time, the post of curate at Earnley, adjacent to East Wittering, had been vacant for some time and had been advertised in the Pall Mall Gazette in February 1869, under the patronage of Rev. G. Cornwall, at a stipend of £60 p.a., although just prior to his installation as Vicar of Empshott, the stipend had been advertised at £185 p.a.
Thomas remined at Earnley for the remainder of his life, a further 33 years. In July 1874, he became the rector of the parish of Earnley with Almodington. [Although there had been a church in Almodington, the two parishes had been united in 1524. The church had long since gone out of use and by 1848 it had become a ruin.]
In 1876, Thomas was also appointed curate at East Wittering, retaining this post until his death.
In the 1891 Kelly’s Directory for Sussex, the living at Earnley was described as having annual tithes of £290 net, plus 7 acres of glebe land
By 1898, Thomas was suffering with chronic gout and took little part in the activities at Earnley church. His last appearance in the parish register was on 16 April 1898, when he officiated at the wedding of Harry Burnett and Minnie Sharpe. Future services were conducted by curates or by priests from neighbouring parishes.
Marriage and children
On 2 August 1865, Thomas returned to East Wittering, when he married Fanny Maria Sparkes, the daughter of Charles Sparkes, the local farmer; both were aged 35. The service was conducted by his brother-in-law, Rev. James Miller and Rev. J Cooke, vicar of East Wittering.
The couple had five children:
James Thomas Harvey. Born 8 September 1866 at Empshott, Hampshire, where he was baptised on 20 September.
Charles Edward Hollis. Born 10 December 1867 at Empshott, where he was baptised on 30 December.
Jane Edith Fanny. Born 14 November 1869 at Earnley, Sussex, where she was baptised on 19 December.
Anne Emily Mary. Born 11 July 1871 at Earnley, where she was baptised on 31 August.
Dorothea Millicent Eugenie. Born 11 December 1872 at Earnley, but baptised by her father at Birdham on 23 February 1873 in the temporary absence of Rev. James Miller.
At the 1871 census, Thomas and Fanny, together with their three eldest children, were living at Earnley Rectory, with three servants, a cook, a nurse and a groom.
Ten years later, the three eldest children had all left home, leaving Thomas and Fanny with the two younger daughters, plus one general servant. James and Charles were both pupils at Surrey House School on Norfolk Place in Littlehampton, while Jane was living in Birdham Rectory with her aunt Jane and uncle Rev. James Miller.
The eldest son, James (now training as a law student) died on 6 June 1884, aged 17, from typhoid fever and peritonitis. Almost exactly a year later, Thomas’s wife, Fanny died on 15 June 1885, from breast cancer, aged 54. James and Fanny were both buried in Earnley churchyard.
Two years later, on 15 June 1885, Thomas (now 57) re-married to 40-year old Eleanor Watson Sargent. She was the sister of Rev. Henry John Sargent, the rector at East Wittering, who conducted the marriage ceremony. The couple continued to live at Earnley rectory for the remainder of Thomas’s life.
Death and burial
Thomas Clement died at Earnley rectory on 21 April 1902, aged 72. The causes of death were gout (4½ years), melancholia and cystitis (7 months).
He was buried in Earnley churchyard three days later. The funeral service was conducted by Rev. Henry Arthur Bowden, now the curate at Earnley.
The cross on his grave incorrectly gives his date of birth as “August 3rd, 1829”, whereas the Baptism register at St Lawrence Church, Alton gives his date of birth as 13 August.
Subsequent family history
Thomas’s widow, Eleanor survived him by 32 years; she died at Richmond Avenue, Bognor Regis in June 1934 and was buried alongside her late husband at Earnley on 27 June 1934.
Charles Clement became a bank clerk; he married Adeline Blissett in 1898 and died in Ontario, Canada in November 1940.
Jane never married; she died in Teddington, Middlesex in August 1948.
Anne married George Ross Sargent, (also a bank clerk) the brother of Rev. Henry John Sargent, in July 1904. She died in Bognor Regis in July 1959.
Dorothea married Edward Kendall in Bombay, India in December 1894. He became a district judge in Oudh, India until he retired in 1918. She died in Bognor Regis in November 1965.
Sources
Ancestry.co.uk
1841 England Census
1851 England Census
1861 England Census
1871 England Census
1881 England Census
1891 England Census
1901 England Census
Cambridge University Alumni, 1261–1900
Deacon’s Court Guide, Gazetteer & County Blue Book of Sussex, 1881
Hampshire, England, Church of England Baptisms, 1813–1921
London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754–1938
UK, City and County Directories, 1766–1946
UK, Clergy List, 1897
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West Sussex, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754–1936
West Sussex, England, Church of England Deaths and Burials, 1813–1995
ACAD (A Cambridge Alunni Database). CLMT848T: Clement, Thomas
Brighton Gazette:
25 December 1856. County Intelligence
14 May 1857. County Intelligence
12 January 1860. Trial of Prisoners
Find a Grave: Rev Thomas Clement
Freereg.org.uk:
Earnley Parish Register: Burial Fanny Maria Clement 1885
Earnley Parish Register: Burial Thomas Clement 1902
Earnley Parish Register: Marriage Sargent – Clement 1887
East Wittering Parish Register: Marriage Sparkes – Clement 1865
Hampshire Advertiser:
1 November 1862. Fraud Upon the Admiralty
27 June 1863. Marriages
Hampshire Chronicle:
23 July 1864. Ecclesiastical Matters
5 August 1865. Marriages
Hampshire Telegraph: 29 December 1855. Ecclesiastical Intelligence
John Bull: 6 February 1869. Wanted – A Curate
Morning Advertiser: 16 November 1857. Ecclesiastical Intelligence
Morning Herald: 20 November 1869. Births
Pall Mall Gazette: 5 February 1869. Clerical Appointments and Vacancies
Portsmouth Times & Naval Gazette:
12 July 1862. Serious Charge Against the Widow of a Warrant Officer
26 December 1863. Marriages
30 July 1864. The Rev. Thomas Clement
12 August 1865. Marriages
Sussex Advertiser: 1 January 1856. Chichester.
Sussex Agricultural Express: 3 January 1857. Cocking
Sussex Express:
5 November 1859. Horrible Cruelty
6 July 1861. Testimonial to the Rev. Thomas Clement
26 April 1902. Deaths
Sussex Online Parish Clerks: Earnley with Almodington
West Sussex Gazette:
25 December 1856. Chichester
13 September 1866. Births
The Times: 25 April 1902. Deaths