Introduction
Elinor Shipway died in July 1760 at the age of 65 – not bad going for the period she lived in. The closest of her family had preceded her to the grave but her will suggests she still had the comfort of her extended family. She had helped establish the Cross Keys Tavern and, with her husband, had seen its expansion. This is the final instalment of Elinor’s involvement with what is now Tudor House museum. It sets out the scene for the next stage of the Cross Keys and a story that we will feature in a future Tale from Tudor House.
Introducing the Tyrer Family
Of particular interest to us in Elinor’s will is the mention of:
…my cousin Eleanor Tyrer the wife of John Tyrer of the city of Worcester aforesaid Painter…
This Eleanor inherits £10 along with:
…one half part of all my wearing apparell (both wollen and linnen)…
Eleanor Tyrer’s mother was (a) Mary Bird who had married Thomas Hooke back in 1707 when she was 22. Whilst the marriage took place at St Oswald’s Chapel, Mary and Thomas are both listed as being of St Helen’s. Given the ages and dates we have, plus the use of cousin here, it suggests that Eleanor’s mother Mary was:
- a much younger sister to Elinor’s father Georg
or
- the child of some elder brother
However, the term cousin should not be taken too strictly as it was used in a more general way than we do today. A better term for our understanding would be kin.
Eleanor Hooke herself was born in 1715 (baptised at St Helen’s). She was married John Tyrer, the painter, in 1741 at St Helen’s.
Tyrer’s Take-over
Eleanor Tyrer is of interest because John Bird needs to meet his obligation of paying his sister £40. To do this he sells both of the properties he has inherited. One of the properties he sells is to none other than John Tyrer. John Bird came out on top in the deal. He sold the Cross Keys property alone for £119 10s 0d (equivalent to about £13,000). Unfortunately, there is no record of how much the other property went for.
Records show John Tyrer holding a license to sell beer at the Cross Keys until his death in 1779. Eleanor, his wife, would have lived with him up until her death in 1775. She was buried at St Helen’s.
Hypocrisy
Elinor states in her will that the bequests must be discharged within a strict time-table. John is allowed six months to come up with the money to pass on to Martha. The other beneficiaries are all to receive their bequests within two or three months of Elinor’s death.
This rather smacks of irony or even, perhaps, hypocrisy. Along with her will are two other documents coming from Thomas Shipway’s sisters. Thomas died in 1748/9 and specifically left a ring and 1 gold Guinea to Sarah and Elizabeth, respectively. Yet, letters from both, dated 1760 and sent to John Bird, finally acknowledge that they had received them.
So Elinor, as Thomas’s executor, had failed in her duty to make the bequests her husband had stipulated. She had effectively “sat on” what was rightfully Sarah’s and Elizabeth’s inheritance for twelve years. Had she simply forgotten? If she had, then how did John Bird know that these items were still outstanding? Or was there some bad blood between Elinor and her in-laws? In her own will she gives nothing to any member of the Shipway family. Perhaps Sarah and Elizabeth had repeatedly tried to access what was theirs over the dozen or so years between the respective deaths of Thomas and Elinor. Then upon Elinor’s death they petition John Bird for what is rightfully theirs and he obliges. Close your eyes and try to imagine the ring firmly on Elinor’s finger (or on a chain around her neck), Elinor stubbornly refusing to let go of it right to the very end.
What of the Weavers?
Tudor House Museum, quite rightly, makes great show of its weaving heritage and its links to clothiers in general. Yet in this tale only once has anything to do with that trade been mentioned – the possible link to the weaving trade of Elinor’s father Georg. Why is that?
We know that, by the period our account covers, the Cross Keys Tavern was very much the main focus of business in #40 (and quite probably #38 too). That is one undoubted factor. A more general factor, however, is that weaving and cloth making in Worcester was all but gone from Worcester by this time. A contemporary survey of the city, made just a few years after Elinor’s death, in 1779 by George Young, states:
[the] clothiers trade has entirely declined not a single loom … in the whole city