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Mrs Lavinia Elizabeth Margaret Mary JESSOP née Soanes (1864–1923)
Her son Reginald Joseph JESSOP (1891–1913)
St Paul’s section: Row 13, Grave A11

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The cross lying on this grave does not belong here, and bears the name of an unrelated family.

Bostock was able to make out all the above text, but the kerbs have worn further, and today it is only possible to see the name REGINALD J. JESSOP running along the diagonally slanting edge of the right-hand kerb.

 

Lavinia Elizabeth Margaret Mary Soanes was born at 5 Penson’s Gardens, Oxford in 1864 and baptised at St Ebbe’s Church on 16 October. She was the daughter of Thomas Arnold Soanes and Naomi Lavinia Ann Prickett. who were married at St Paul’s Church in Oxford on 7 September 1863: both were then living at Jericho Street, and Thomas was a tailor and Naomi a carpenter’s daughter.

Six of Lavinia Soanes’s younger siblings were also baptised at St Ebbe’s church: Thomas Arnold (1866), Margaret Harriett (1868), Alice Letitia (1869), Rosamund May (1871), Arnold William (1876), and Ethel Lilian (1877). Her youngest sister, Rosalie Theodora, was baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church in 1879.

The family moved from 5 Penson’s Gardens to Chaundy’s Place in Paradise Square between May 1866 and November 1868. At the time of the 1871 census Lavinia (6) and her younger sister Alice (1) were living at Chaundy’s Place with their parents Thomas (28), who was a tailor, and Naomi (27).

By the time of Ethel’s baptism in August 1877, the family had moved to 49 Leckford Road. Alice (16) was here at the time of the 1881 census with her parents and her sisters Ethel (8) and Rosalie (1), and her widowed grandmother Harriett Prickett (71).

On 25 April 1882 at Ss Philip & James’s Church, Oxford, Lavinia Elizabeth Margaret Mary Soanes (18) of Leckford Road married Joseph William Jessop (21). Described as a butcher of Cardigan Street, he was the son of Richard Jessop senior and his wife Mary Reville: for more about his background, see his parents’ grave.

Lavinia and her husband Joseph Jessop had fourteen children:

• William Richard Jessop (born at 102 Cardigan Street on 3 November 1882 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 1 December)
• Arnold Alexander John Jessop (born in St Frideswide’s parish on 2 August 1884 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 31 October)
• Frederick Henry Jessop (born at 106 Cardigan Street on 22 March 1886 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 14 May)
• Lily Emma Jessop (born at 106 Cardigan Street on 18 June 1887 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 7 October)
• Cyril Thomas Jessop (born at 106 Cardigan Street on 9 August 1888 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 29 September); died at same address aged 18 months and buried in St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 16 February 1890
• Daisy Rosamund Jessop (born at 106 Cardigan Street in 1889 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 27 September)
• Rose Lavinia Jessop (born at 106 Cardigan Street on 18 September 1890 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 31 October)
• Reginald Joseph (born at 106 Cardigan Street on 4 October 1891 and baptised at St Paul’s Church on 30 October)
• Gerald Stanley Jessop (born at 106 Cardigan Street on 22 November 1892 and baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church on 10 January 1893); died at same address aged under two months and buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 10 January 1893
• Walter Basil Soanes Jessop (born at 112 Kingston Road on 26 August 1894 and baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church on 20 September); died at same address aged eight months and buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 10 May 1895
• Cecil Herbert Jessop (born at 72 Southmoor Road on 1 July 1896 and baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church on 30 August); died at same address aged 2½ and buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 19 December 1898
• Norman Soanes Jessop (born at 72 Southmoor Road on 7 December 1898 and baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church on 6 January 1899)
• Ivy May Jessop (born at 72 Southmoor Road on 14 November 1900 and baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church on 25 December)
• Rupert Charles Jessop (born at 72 Southmoor Road in 1903 and baptised at Ss Philip & James’s Church on 8 February).

The family lived at 102 Cardigan Street until c.1885, and then moved to 106 Cardigan Street, where they can be seen in the 1891 census. Joseph (28) was still working as a butcher, and was at home with his wife and their first six surviving children.

By the following year, 1892, Joseph Jessop had changed his job to that of an insurance agent the family had moved to 112 Kingston Road. By 1898 he was working as a painter & decorator.

By mid-1896 the family was living at 72 Southmoor Road, and they can be seen there in the 1901 census with their eldest son William (18), who was a waiter, and five of their younger children. Arnold (18) is hard to find, but was probably working as a servant; and Frederick (15) was a servant to the lodging-house keeper at Longwall House.

Between 1890 and 1898 four of their fourteen children died in infancy, and were buried in St Paul’s section N12, which appears to have been reserved for babies and infants.

In 1911 Joseph and Lavinia were home at 72 Southmoor Road with six of their children: William (18) was now a house painter like his father; Daisy (21) assisted her mother in the house; Reginald (19) was a plastic art restorer; and Norman (12), Ivy (10), and Rupert (8) were still at school. Arnold (28) was now a footman to Lord Hylton in Marylebone. Two more children had left home: Lily (23) was a draper’s assistant lodging in Holborn, and Rose (20) was living with her grandmother Naomi Soanes who kept a lodging house at 109 Southmoor Road. Their son Frederick Henry Jessop (25) had probably already emigrated to Australia, where he married Martha Strong Lomman.

Their son Arnold was married in 1912:

• In 1912 in the Tiverton district, their son Arnold Alexander John Jessop married Emily Westcott.

Their son Reginald died in 1913:

† Reginald Joseph Jessop died at 72 Southmoor Road at the age of 21 in 1913 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 19 February (burial recorded in the parish register of St Paul’s Church).

Two more of their children were married in 1913/14:

• In 1913 in the Headington registration district, William Richard Jessop married the dressmaker’s bookkeeper Annie Eva F. Bennett. She was the daughter of the college servant James Bennett of 232 Iffley Road;
• In 1914 at St George’s, Hanover Square, Lily Emma Jessop married Reginald Newton Thatcher.

Joseph William Jessop died in Uxbridge at the age of 64 in 1926, and was presumably buried there. It is unclear why he was not with his wife and family.

Two more of his sons were married in the late 1920s

• On 18 July 1927 at St Aldate’s Church, Oxford, Norman Soanes Jessop (28) married Ida Emma Cox (29). He was described as a salesman of 3 Dingwall Road, Croydon and she worked as a solicitor’s clerk and was the daughter of the college servant John Edward Cox;
• In 1929 at St George’s, Hanover Square, London, Rupert Charles Jessop married Hilda M. K. Hawkes.

By the time of her death in 1943, Mrs Lavinia Jessop was living at 17 Plantation Road in north Oxford:

† Mrs Lavinia Jessop née Soanes died at 17 Plantation Road at the age of 73 in 1943 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 22 September (burial recorded in the parish register of St Paul’s Church).

She was buried with her son Reginald, who had died 30 years earlier.