Nat Gould

Ellen Elizabeth Adams 1855-1940

Ellen Elizabeth Adams was born in 1855 at Alstonefield in Staffordshire, the daughter of William Adams and his wife nee Hannah Wood 1812-1902, was baptised at Alstonefield on 29 April 1855.

When the 1871 Census was taken she was recorded as being as general servant in the household of Anthony Beresford of Alstonefield, a landowner aged 99 years (born in 1772) together with her elder sister Mary Adams.

The Green Farm

In 1879 she was married to James Gibbs Bestwick. He was born in Alstonefield in 1843. They lived at The Green Farm in the centre of Alstonefield village.

In 1881 the farm was being jointly run by James Gibbs Bestwick and his elder unmarried brother William Bestwick (born 1841). With them at the farm was five-year-old Martha Adams, the niece of Ellen Elizabeth Bestwick. Working there as a general domestic servant was Elizabeth Austin aged fourteen (born in 1867).

William Bestwick was no longer at the Green Farm in 1891, but with James and Ellen Elizabeth Bestwick there were nephews Charles Adams and Herbert Adams. Their father had been killed in an accident in 1886. Charles Adams was aged 21 and was working on the farm, while thirteen-year-old Herbert Adams was at school. The Adams brothers were still there when the 1901 Census was taken, although Herbert Adams had by then joined his elder brother in working on the farm.

Neither of the nephews was there when the 1911 Census was taken, and James Gibbs Bestwick and his wife were running the farm with the resident assistance of one female servant and two men, one of whom was widower John Phillips of Warslow (aged only 28 and born in 1883).

James and Ellen Elizabeth Bestwick had one child, who had died by 1911.

It had been their intention to bequeath their farm to Charles Adams, their nephew who had worked for them. However he married without their approval, and they disinherited him.

Ellen Elizabeth Bestwick died on 8 December 1940 aged 86 years, and was buried at Alstonefield. Her husband James Gibbs Bestwick had died on 27 May 1925 aged 82 years. There is a gravestone inscription there to their memory.