Pennance Family History
Pennance – People & Places Miscellany
Apart from the mining document mentioned in the introduction, there is
yet another in the same collection at Truro museum (ref NET/1/8) dating
from 1413. This documents a John
Whalesbrow granting to John Pennans and his wife Elisoda and their issue, ‘one
acre English in GAILSYTHNY (now Goldsithney) and ‘four acres English in
NANTURANT, the lessees to have rights of buying and selling at St James Fayre.’
Going back even further we have a Nicholas Pennans who is recorded in
the Lay Subsidy records of 1327 as having paid 18d subsidy to Glasney College (at
the time there were disputes as to how much of the tithes should go to the
Vicar at St Gluvias and how much to Glasney College).
PENNANCE MANOR
Situated near Pennance
Point, it was called “Penans” in 1313 and is shown on the Burghley Map with a
road sweeping towards it from Golden Bank and a branch road from Trenoweth (now
under part of the present Golf Course - after 1921).
In 1639 the Manor of
Pennans was owned by Sir Nicholas Slanning, who was the Governor of Pendennis
Castle from 1635 to 1643 and was Member of Parliament for Penryn from 1640
until he was killed in a Civil War Battle near Bath in 1643. It was then
inherited by Mr. James Modyford Heywood of Maristow, Devon.
In 1788 it was sold to the
Rev. Joseph Richards and Capt. Shuidham Peard, R.N.
In 1770 William Blackwell
paid 10/8d Poor Rate on Pennance and in 1780.
In 1818 John Bone paid 30/-
rates on Pennance and by 1821 he was a Budock Church warden.
By 1841 this area was
divided into nine parts
·
the Farm, with house, barn,
stables, cottage, etc. and 131 acres, was owned by G.C.Fox (since 1835) and
occupied by James Bone.
·
Pennance Mill, with mill,
mill pool, cottage, also house, barn, stables, orchard, etc. and 17 acres,
owned by G.C.Fox (since 1835) and occupied by Benjamin Pellowe.
·
The Beach (Newporth) at low
water was owned by G.C.Fox.
·
Cape Pennance, with brick
kiln, waste and five fields of 26 acres, was owned by G.C.Fox (since 1829) and
occupied by James Bone.
·
Pennance Mine Grounds of 3
acres (between Pennance Hill and Hard-to-come-by) were owned by Jane Dunstan
and occupied by Pennance Mine Adventurers.
·
Jane Dunstan also owned two
other parts of Pennance - three fields of 8 acres, occupied by Edward Goodman,
and two fields of 17 acres, occupied by Benjamin Pellowe. William Gibbons owned and occupied two
“Pilchard Fields” (near Swanpool) of 5 acres and also
owned five other fields of 9 acres, which were occupied by Benjamin Pellowe.
PENNANCE MILL (Pennance Mill – The Farmhouse and
Millwheel)
The Mill of the Manor of Pennance was situated on the West side of the
road to Maenporth, whilst the Farm was on the East side. On the Peard Map of 1769 both of these
properties were shown with the millpond, which was fed by a leat curving round
the hill from the Buddock River, on the hillside above the Mill itself. Several pathways let to it from Golden Bank,
“Mainport” and Crill.
In 1788, it was sold to Mr Samuel Tresidder of Tregoniggies by J M
Heywood. Then in 1811 the Tresidder Family sold it to John Bone. In 1810, the West Briton Newspaper
advertised “The Corn Mill of the Manor of Pennance, with 20 acres, tenant John
Bone” for sale. In 1818, John Bone paid
70/- rates on the Mill, which was a large sum for those days. In 1835, John Bone sold the Mill and
Tenement to George Croker Fox of Grove Hill, Falmouth.
By 1841, Benjamin Pellowe was leasing the Mill, also the Farm and some nearby fields, from Mr G C Fox. Mr Pellowe was then a farmer, aged 45, with a wife and seven children.
CONSTANTINE
This was the
birthplace of Ales Pennance and others (see the IGI listing on the data sources
page), christened in the church below on 12 December 1584, daughter of William
Pennance and Jane? A beautiful little
village with a very atmospheric church and a very helpful incumbant.
Constantine is situated in the deanery and Hundred of
Kerrier. In 1869, it was bounded on the east by Budock and Mawnan, on the south
by Helford Creek, which separates it from Manaccan, St Martins and
Mawgan-in-Meneage, and on the west and north by Wendron, Stithians and Mabe.
The parish is named after its patron, Saint Constantin. The village is
mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Saint Constantin.
Civil
Registration
The parish of Constantine is in the Falmouth
Registration District and has been since 1st July 1837; there were
sub-districts at Constantine, Falmouth, Mylor and Penryn.
Constantine
parish was part of the Falmouth
Union for Poor Law administration and parish relief. Overseers' Accounts
(1719 to 1760) are available in the Cornwall Record Office.
Constantine Church
The parish church is
located in OS Grid Square SW7329 and was dedicated to St Constantinus. It
comprises a chancel, nave, south aisle, north aisle, and an extreme north or Bosarne
aisle. The arcades are of native granite supported on monolith pillars; the
south arcade has six pointed arches, the north seven, and the extreme north
three. A part of this last aisle was screened off for a vestry. Besides the
south porch, there is a priest's entrance and a north door. The tower is of
three stages and buttressed, the buttresses terminating in statues. The
pinnacles are pannelled with Gothic tracery, and the uppermost stringcourse of
the tower is ornamented with quadrefoils. The church was given to the dean and
chapter of Exeter by Peter Quivil, the Bishop, on 21st July 1285.
The Baptismal font.
(all
pictures taken by Maurice Pennance Easter 2000)
Genealogy
The On-line Parish Clerk (OPC) scheme
operates a look-up service to help family historians. This service is new so
available information may be limited. The OPC for Constantine is Andy Coot.
Population Stats
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PENNANCE POINT
Here’s a nice walk
through Pennance Point if you fancy it one day. It’s 10.5 miles so maybe you’d
want to take it in sections. Not a lot
to say about Pennance Point itself so here are a few pictures courtesy of J. Butler.
Pennance Point
The campaign to
reclaim our ancestral land begins Monday at 9.30am after breakfast. Please assemble on Maenporth beach with
pitchforks at the ready…..oh and a picnic hamper & a bottle or two in case
it’s sunny!
J
PENNANCE
COTTAGE
This
piece of real estate lies on the road to Helston from Maenporth and will do
very nicely for my retirement if I can get the current encumbants to
vacate. I did knock but no one was
home! Notice the plaque on the wall
just to the left of the top floor window?
It’s enlarged below.
PENNANCE
BURIAL CHAMBER
SW 44765 37541 (GPS 15min)
Coutesy of http://web.ukonline.co.uk/megalithics/index.htm
I would like to have my ashes scattered here when I eventually
snuff it. Something about returning to
ones roots!
Described
on OS maps as a "Chambered Cairn", Pennance actually belongs to a
class of monument known as an entrance grave. A small cairn covers a simple
gallery, which expands in width towards the rear, forming a characteristic
wedge shaped plan. Entrance graves
have an extremely restricted distribution, they are found only in the very
western tip of Cornwall, the Sicily Isles, and perhaps, some related tombs in a
very small region of SE Ireland. Entrance graves
are dated to the late neolithic, cremation burials with bronze age urns are a
frequent find in these tombs, and there have been no finds of early neolithic
material.
After seeing so many dolmens stripped of their mounds in this region, Pennance
was a welcome surprise. Much of the original covering cairn still exists here,
with several prominent kerbs on its periphery. The cairn has been built on a
S-N slope and its architecture adjusted correspondingly, the southern kerbs
being much higher than the northern. A run of four contiguous kerbs to the
south displayed a possible size grading towards the entrance, a large single
kerb also exists on the corresponding northern edge of the mound.
The
chamber sidewalls are constructed of drystone walling, with beam-like capstones
making up the roof. The chamber is very low, after crawling in, you can only
lie flat, so we were unable to take any internal panoramas. The floor of the
chamber seemed to be earth, so it may be that its level has risen over the
centuries as soil has blown in.
