Fairfax’s sword came into the possesion of the Websters in a round about fashion!! James Webster (1767-1855), a merchant in Hull, had two sons, John and Richard, who as young men were millers. John married Mary Rhodes. Richard married Sarah Clayton. The John Websters remained in Derbyshire. The Richard Websters went to Yorkshire (and later to Jersey), eventually their home life came to grief. Their son, Richard, had a good education, and was sent to France and Germany. It was while in Bonn, on the Rhine, that Richard, with his fellow students, after a picnic set the Rhine woods on fire, only just in time escaping the fury of the German authorities. In after years he often said: “Well, I didn’t set the Thames on fire, but I did the Rhine”. It was while he was abroad that he was persuaded to launch out into strange waters I.e. to go out to Russia, a great venture in those days when all Russians were looked upon as savages. However he soon found himself in clover with a French family and became clerk in the office of Mr. Allard in Kherson, whose main business was running a washery where raw wool was washed by women standing in tubs (with one end knocked out and with a large board in front of them) using the river water. To get to this washery which was in the Dnieper they had to cross in a rowing boat. Richard always patronised Avksenti Ivanovich Kovalenko who had a sailing boat, skippered it himself, hired a sailor, and carried on a business with Allard, loading unwashed wool from Kherson and taking it to the washery. Though of peasant origin, he was a clever businessman and eventually persuaded Richard to join him, thus establishing the Company Kovalenko and Webster. They possessed 2 passenger steamers (Russalka and Turgenieff), 1 ocean going cargo boat (Piotr Karpov), 5 or 6 tugs named after members of the two families (Emma, Elsie, Marie, Agrafenna, etc.), and some 56 or so barges which were suitable for the Black Sea.
When Richard became well established out there and after he was married he got his brother Thomas to come out and join him. Unfortunately the Dnieper river fever was very rife at that time and he soon contracted it and died. Several of Richard’s children died there also.
It was after this that the Richard Websters decided to go and live in Odessa. As he helped so many members of the family he was called the “Joseph” of the family. He paid for the education of his sisters (who were then living in Derby with their Uncle and Aunt John and Mary Webster), and later he sent them to France. When, finally, his father’s many ventures came to nothing, he helped the old couple (who had come together again) and kept them to the ends of their lives in Jersey, where they had gone for the old lady’s health, as she suffered too much with asthma in Yorkshire.
As stated above, the girlhood of Amelia and Mary Rae (while their parents were estranged) was spent at 4 Babington Lane, Derby. There Arthur Woodhouse came a courtin’! First Amelia, who would not have him, and later Mary Rae, who married him in Derby.
Richard, evidently coming to see his sisters, came to care for his cousin, Emma (daughter of John Webster), whom he married in 1866. It was spring time and she demurred a long time before undergoing the long journey. Impatiently he wrote to her “The very month tells you to March”. When Emma arrived in Russia she had such a huge trunk (which in after years was always called the Grand Trunk) that the porters refused to handle it and the contents were flung out onto the ground for the Customs to inspect. Great was her consternation at seeing her wedding finery, household linens and other effects thus treated. They were married, like another couple, by a Presbyterian Minister, who failed to follow the required legal proceedings so they were informed the marriages were illegal! As babies were on the way, the marriages had to be put right by an Act of Parliament.
Amelia came to Odessa as mother’s help to her brother’s family and at once became engaged to Mr. Brenan (employed at the Odessa Water Works), much to the indignation of Mr. Wagstaff (of the Consular Service) who fell in love with her at first sight. Soon after her marriage Mr. Wagstaff married a Swiss governess who was renowned for her beauty, but whose frigid and haughty manners gave her the name of “un coeur de glace fricasse de neige”. After presenting him with three daughters, Edith, Lucy and Marie, she died of consumption. A few years later Mr. Brenan also died of consumption, so eventually Mr. Wagstaff was able to marry his first love and said it was the re-setting of an old saw! Her initials being S.A.W. (as originally Sarah Amelia Webster).
Arthur and Mary Rae were married in a Wesleyan Chapel in Derby. Mary Rae lived at first with her husband in Yorkshire where they carried on a hotel business, which however failed, and then “Joseph” persuaded them to come out to Russia where he made Arthur Woodhouse his shipping agent in Nicolaieff. On their way by sea their first baby William was born on the ship off the coast of Algiers. When landing at Odessa no sailor would agree to carry the infant down the steep plank off the ship, there was no proper gangway. It took the cool head and courage of Richard’s wife Emma to do that, flanked before and behind by a sailor. Later Arthur Woodhouse became Trading Vice Consul in Nicolaieff and eventually Consul in Riga, where he died.
The three Woodhouse sons and Winifred were at school in Jersey (with grandparents) and subsequently came out to Russia. William entered the Consular Service, Clayton his Uncle’s shipping office, and Thomas, as engineer, later also entering the Consular Service. Winifred married Henry Carlisle in Riga.
With regard to Richard Webster’s family, only three daughters survived:
Amelia, who married Theodore Platts (of the Water Works, Odessa)
Elsie, who married Robert Fleming (merchant)
Marie, who married her cousin John Webster (who carried on the shipping business, coal business, Jute Works, Champagne factory etc., also was Lloyd’s assistant agent. He was also Cadbury’s representative for South Russia).Unfortunately the Fairfax sword was stolen in Russia.
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