John POWELL (1806/7–1890)
His first wife Mrs Elizabeth POWELL (1815/16–1880)
St Giles (Ss Philip & James) section: Row 39, Grave J32
Above: IN AFFECTIONATE REMEMBRANCE OF ELIZABETH WIFE OF JOHN POWELL / WHO DIED JANUARY 17, 1880, / AGED 64 YEARS
Below: ALSO OF JOHN POWELL / WHO DIED SEPTEMBER 10, 1890, / AGED 83 YEARS
John Powell was born in Colesbourne, Gloucestershire in 1807 and baptised there on 1 May. He was the son of the farmer Walter Powell and his wife Mary.
His first wife Elizabeth was born in Charlton, Gloucestershire in 1815/16.
They do not appear to have had any children, and this may be a late marriage. They are hard to find in the 1841 and 1851 censuses.
At the time of the 1861 census John Powell (54) was a farmer of 19 acres employing six men and four boys, living at Church Street, West Hanney, Berkshire with his wife Elizabeth (45) and one servant.
By 1871 census John Powell (64) was a farmer of 300 acres employing eight men and three boys, living near Henley-on-Thames at the Farm House at Flint Hall, Hambleden with his wife Elizabeth (55), his nephew Joseph Powell (22), and one servant.
They retired to Park Town, Oxford by the beginning of 1880, and Mrs Powell died there:
† Mrs Elizabeth Powell died at the Terrace, Park Town at the age of 64 on 17 January 1880 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 21 January (burial recorded in the parish registers of Ss Philip & James’s and St Giles’s Church).
At the time of the 1881 census John Powell, a widower of 70 described as a retired farmer, was living at 8 The Terrace (now 61 Park Town), and his niece Ros [sic] M. A. Powell (aged 20 and born at Handsworth in Staffordshire) was acting as his housekeeper, helped by one servant.
John Powell must have disappointed his relatives when at the age of 73, on 29 January 1884 at St Giles's Church, Oxford he married his second wife, the widow Mrs Mary Greaves of 16 St Giles Road East (the south end of the Banbury Road). She was born in Brackley in Northamptonshire in 1821/2, the daughter of Edmund Potter, gentleman; and her first husband, John Greaves, had been a farmer of 400 acres at Elsfield.
The couple continued to live at Park Town, where John Powell died six years after his wedding:
† John Powell died at The Terrace, Park Town at the age of 83 on 10 September 1890 and was buried at St Sepulchre’s Cemetery on 13 September (burial recorded in the parish register of Ss Philip & James’s and St Giles’s Church).
His personal estate came to £3,778 6s. 7d., and his will was proved by his two nephews, who were both farmers: Walter Stephens of Taynton, and Nicholas Walter Powell of Sandford St Martin.
At the time of the 1891 census his second wife Mary Powell (68) was living alone at 8 The Terrace (61 Park Town) with one servant. She died at 8 Park Terrace at the age of 72 on 16 November 1893. She was buried on 20 November, and as her burial is recorded in the St Giles's register, she too may be buried in this vault, although there is no inscription to her.
Her effects came to £1,624 11s. 1d., and her bank manager was her executor.
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