John Charles BLAKE (1824–1919)
His son Charles BLAKE (1854–1931)
St Michael section: Row 18, Grave D45½
JOHN CHARLES BLAKE BORN AT STANTON HARCOURT MAY 3, 1824. DIED MARCH 8, 1919.
[Other side]: ALSO OF CHARLES BLAKE, B0RN JUNE 24, 1854. DIED NOV. 6, 1931
John Charles Blake
John Charles Blake was born in Stanton Harcourt on 3 May 1824 and baptised there on 23 May. He was the son of the farmer Nathaniel Blake and his wife Catherine, who had three other children baptised at that church: Ellen (1817), Catherine (1820), and Elizabeth (1822).
Blake was still in Stanton Harcourt in 1843, when he renewed his game licence.
He was living in Oxford by 21 December 1849, when he was granted a joint wine licence with Charles Shillingford. Their shop was at 41 & 42 Cornmarket in St Michael’s parish (now the EE phone shop, right).
In the first quarter of 1851 in the Faringdon district, John Charles Blake married Laura Lamb, and they had seven children. For more details about his married life and his family, see the separate grave of his wife and two of his children.
On 31 December 1850 the partnership between Charles Shillingford, Thomas Phillips, and John Charles Blake as wine and spirit merchants and brewers at 41 & 42 Cornmarket and at Bicester under the firm of Shillingford, Phillips, and Blake was dissolved by mutual consent.
John Charles Blake was still a wine merchant at 42 Cornmarket at the time of the 1851 census, living over the shop with his wife and two of his clerks and a house servant.
Between 1854 and 1864 two members of the partnership, William Shillingford and John Charles Blake himself, were granted a joint wine licence.
By 1860 Blake had given up business at 42 Cornmarket and moved with his family to The Crescent in Park Town. He continued to trade as a wine merchant and publican, however, as he and his partner William Shillingford now owned the Star & Garter pub at 20 Cornmarket on the other side of the road.
In 1861 John Charles Blake was at home in Park Town with the youngest children Nora (3), Louisa (2), and Rosa (ten months), looked after by their housemaid and nursemaid, while his wife was paying a visit to her brother with their two older children.
In 1864 it was reported that Blake lived in South Crescent in Park Town, but claimed for his freehold house at 15 North Crescent, and his (Conservative) vote was retained.
In 1868 and again in 1871, Blake was granted a wine licence in his sole name in St Michael’s parish, presumably for the Star & Garter.
In 1871 he was living with his family in Iffley, but by 1881 they had moved to Worcester Lodge, Woodstock Road, and by 1891 to 34 Norham Road.
By 1901 Blake (76) was retired and living at 14 Park Crescent, (now 27 Park Town) with his wife Laura (82); they were still there in 1911.
His wife died on 2 February 1919 and was buried in the grave where two of their children had been buried in 1853 and 1874. John Charles Blake died just a month later, and was buried in a new grave: St Michael’s parish evidently made an effort to squeeze it in, even though he no longer lived in that parish, in the same line as that of his wife’s grave:
† John Charles Blake died at 27 Park Town (then 14 Park Crescent) at the age of 94 on 8 March 1919 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 10 May (burial recorded in the parish register of St Michael’s Church).
An article about John Charles Blake appeared in the Oxford Journal Illustrated on 19 March 1919 (p. 12) entitled “Death of Oxford’s Oldest Druid”, accompanied by a photograph of him taken at his Park Town home ten years earlier when he was 84.
His effects came to £2,246 15s. 6d., and his executors were his unmarried daughters Ellen and Catherine, and the solicitor Thomas Lamb.
Charles Blake
Charles Blake was born at 42 Cornmarket on 24 June 1854 and baptised at St Michael’s Church on 19 July. He was the eldest surviving son of John Charles Blake and his wife Laura.
In 1871 Charles (16) was a clerk, boarding at Clifton in Bristol, but by 1881 he had returned to Oxford and was working for his father as a wine merchant’s clerk and living with his parents at Worcester Lodge, Woodstock Road.
At the time of the 1891 census Charles, a single man of 36, was a mineral water manufacturer living at 56 Hamilton Road, Preston with two boarders.
In 1901 Charles (46) was living at Acre End Street, Eynsham, presumably with his uncle, as he is described as nephew in charge; the only other occupants of the house on census night were two servants. For the first time he was described as married, but he does not appear to have been living with his wife.
In 1911 Charles (56) was living alone in an apartment at 25 Somerset Road, Southsea, and described himself as a wine merchant’s clerk. Again, he stated that he was married.
Charles Blake died in Summertown in 1930, and was buried with his father:
† Charles Blake died at 56 Hamilton Road, Summertown at the age of 77 on 6 November 1930 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 10 November (burial recorded in the parish register of St Michael’s Church).
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