John IV’s will contained several helpful provisions (helpful in the sense that they enabled us to trace the family with greater accuracy, but also, of course, helpful to the beneficiaries).  We have set out some of these provisions below.

 

• John Baker IV was obviously a wealthy man.  His will contains several bequests of money and property.

• To his son James he left Russells Place in Worplesdon (occupied by John Passenger).  This had been settled on John Baker IV by his mother, Mary Martin (who acquired it from the death of John Baker IV’s cousin, Henry Baker of Littlefield).  In case you were wondering why John’s mother had the surname Martin and nor Baker, we mentioned earlier that John Baker IV’s mother remarried in 1722 after her husband’s death and therefore changed her name from Mary Baker to Mary Martin. 

• £10pa to be paid to his wife Ann.

• He left to his son-in-law John Lee all property in Worplesdon occupied by James Atfield.  The property should be sold and £150 paid to John Baker IV’s daughters Sarah Lee and Ann Martin (he notes that he has already provided for his 3rd daughter Mary, wife of Henry Ledger).  The residue to be shared between Ann Martin, Sarah Lee and Mary Ledger (see 2 paragraphs above) and her children.

• He left rents from his lands in Pirbright to his son James and to John Lee until his grandson (John Baker VI) reached 21.

• An annuity of £14pa to his late son John V’s widow, Sarah (reduced to £4 if she remarries).

• Allowances made for educating grandson John Baker (John VI) and granddaughter Sarah Baker (both children of John V).

• All real estate to pass to grandson John V when he reached 21 (in 1777).

• £150 to Sarah when she reached 21. 

• Various bequests to son James and daughters Ann Martin, Sarah Lee and Mary Ledger and their children.

 

This information seems remarkably fresh, considering it is over 250 years old.  In 1771 the first cotton mills of the Industrial Revolution were starting to be built, and the French Revolution was still 18 years away.

John Baker V (1724-1767)

 

• 1749:  Married Sarah Martin of Woking, aged 30, daughter of George Martin, a higgler (ie travelling salesman).  They married in Richmond.  

• 1751:  Henry born (died 1751), a daughter (illegible) was born in 1754.

• 1755:  John Baker jun died – presumably a young son, whose birth does not seem to have been recorded.  In the same year John Baker V was recorded as being a Tythingman (ie a leader or spokesman for the Manor Court).

• 1756:  John (who became John Baker VI) born, a few weeks after his elder brother, John (above), died .

• 1764:  Was a Pirbright Juryman.

• 1767:  John V died while his father was still alive (and therefore John V never got to inherit Bakersgate).  

• 1774-76:  John V’s wife, Sarah paid Poor Rates due on Bakersgate (once her son, John Baker VI reached 21 (in 1777), he then paid this sum).

• 1790:  John V’s wife, Sarah, died, aged 70.  The Parish Burial Register notes that she was “mother of John of Bakers Gate”.

John Baker VI (1756-1798)

 

• 1782:  Appears on the first Land Tax records as owning and occupying a Pirbright property (which was Bakersgate).  He paid £10 4s, which was exceeded in Pirbright only by James Honer at Heath Mill.  

• 1784:  Married Elizabeth Attfield at Stoke (broadly where Stoughton is today)

• 1789:  Elizabeth produced a daughter, Elizabeth.  John’s will referred to another daughter, Sarah, but we cannot trace her in any of the records.  There were no other children of the marriage, thus bringing the male Baker dynasty to a juddering halt.

• 1797:  Was a Pirbright Juryman.

• 1798:  Upon his death in 1798 John left to his wife:  Bakersgate, 2 fields near Rickford Mill (Highland Field and Highland Mead), Stoughton Place (which later was to become Stoughton Barracks) and various other properties.

• 1800:  John VI’s wife Elizabeth sold Bakersgate to Samuel Greenfield.  The Baker family’s ownership of Bakersgate had finally come to an end after perhaps 400 years.  But in 1800 the Napoleonic wars had recently started, and Beethoven was in his prime – there were still to be 200 years of post-Baker family history to be written.

• 1807-17:  John VI’s wife Elizabeth was probably living at Stoughton Place with her daughter, Elizabeth.

• 1841:  Elizabeth was living at Hascombe Place, south of Godalming

• 1848:  Elizabeth died at Hascombe Place (but was buried at St Mary’s Worplesdon) aged 84.

 

Elizabeth Baker (1789-1864)

• 1807-17:  Elizabeth was probably living at Stoughton Place with her mother.

• 1851:  Living at Stoughton House – Independent means with 2 servants.  Described herself as a widow (although we can find no evidence of her marriage).

• 1861:  Living at Stoughton Farm (ie the same place as in 1851), still with 2 servants, but this time she called herself a Landed proprietor.  She again described herself as a widow.

• 1864:  She died at Stoughton House aged 74 and is buried at St Johns, Stoke Church in Guildford.

 

Thus ended the Baker dynasty of Bakersgate.

2  The Worplesdon Bakers

We know that the Baker family was farming in Worplesdon (as well as Pirbright) in 1586, and possibly earlier.  This continued under John Baker 0 (1568-1626), who was presumably the son mentioned in the 1586 will of an earlier John Baker of Pirbright.   John married Catherine Ockley in 1591 and had 12 children.
The 1664 Hearth Tax records tell us that there were 2 Baker households in Worplesdon in 1664, headed by a Richard Baker and a Henry Baker respectively.  Richard and Henry were 2 of the 12 children of John Baker (1568-1626).  As far as we can tell, both Richard and Henry farmed in the Littlefield area of Worplesdon (between what is now Fairlands Estate to the east and Frog Grove Lane to the west).

The Land Tax records from 1782-1832 show that the Baker families still owned 2-3 properties in Worplesdon at that time.  However by the time of the 1841 census the land holdings had disappeared, and the handful of Bakers remaining in Worplesdon were working mainly as agricultural labourers (as well as one milkman and one publican).

The “Richard Baker household” progressed as follows:

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• Richard Baker (1613-c1700).  Married Elizabeth Russell in 1641

• Richard Baker (1642-????).  Married Anstis (surname unknown) in 1663, she bore 2 children, but died in 1666.  He remarried Elizabeth Batt in 1667 and they produced 7 children.

• Jasper Baker (1669-1757).  Married Jane Ockly in 1691.  

 

During the 1600’s, the Richard Baker household became Quakers:  The first to do so seem to have been Richard (born in Pirbright in 1642 and baptised at St Michaels), who in 1663 married Anstis (Baker (born c1645).  [Anstis is an unusual name to our ears, but it is connected to the name Anastasia.  It derives from the Greek word for Resurrection.]  Their children were brought up Quakers, as were several further generations of Worplesdon Bakers up to (and possibly beyond) the 1800’s.  
 

Many of the Quaker Bakers were buried in a part of Worplesdon which was given the apt (but macabre) name “Burying Place”.  It later became Burying Place Farm, and today it lies very close to Rokers (near the A323 roundabout).

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The second of the 2 Worplesdon Baker households – the “Henry Baker household” ran:

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• Henry Baker (1604-??).  Married Mary Stevens in Ash in 1629.

• Henry Baker (1638-1708).  

• Mary Baker (1676-????).  In 1694 she married John Baker III (from the Pirbright Bakers), who is referred to above.  She had a younger brother John (born 1678, died 1757).  After John Baker III’s death, she remarried George Martin in 1722 (refer above).

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