Thomas Etheridge

Awarded the compensation for enslaved people on Merryfield in St John Jamaica as trustee of John M. Tucker and Mary Tucker, for which he claimed with William Sale. Sale was not named in the award and was presumably the William Sale 'late Master Mariner now retired from business' of Westbury-on-Trym Gloucestershire whose will was proved 20/7/1835.  

1. Probably the Thomas Etheridge who in 1851 was living at Henley Villa Westbury-on-Trym Bristol aged 59 'out of business' born Henbury Gloucestershire with wife Mary aged 59, daughter Isabella aged 21 and son Alfred aged 16 'clerk to iron merchant' both born Bristol. If so, then probably also the same man formerly of 9 Buckingham Place and late of 4 Upper Victoria Place Clifton who died 7/5/1859 and whose will was proved 4/7/1859, effects under £4000. However, the Thomas Etheridge gentleman of Bristol whose will was proved 21/11/1850 and who was the father of Thomas Etheridge d. 1859, might possibly have been the awardee as trustee.

2. The beneficiaries, John M. Tucker and his wife Mary, are conceivably John Millard Tucker the Bristol surveyor who was appointed Engineer to the Bristol and Exeter Railway and whose will was proved 27/5/1850.

T71/854 St John no. 8. Thomas Etheridge & William Sale Great Britain, trustees of John M. and Mary Tucker. T71/1606 Letter from JMTucker 3/5/1836 from 28 Corn St Bristol asking whether this claim has been reported on; PROB 11/1850.

1. 1851 census online; National Probate Calendar 1859; PROB 11/2122;  Times 8/9/1860 p. 1 shows the late Thomas Etheridge of Clifton Bristol in the announcement of the marriage of Thomas Etheridge's son of Australia.

2. David Greenfield, I.K.Brunel and William Gravatt, 1826-1841: their professional and personal relationship, PhD thesis University of Portsmouth (2011) p. 64 in 1836. Tucker had applied for the post of County Surveyor of Somerset in 1818, when he stated that he had spent 11 years as principal clerk to the land surveyor and engineer William White; PROB 11/2113.