Penelope Wentworth Wickham (née Sober)

Penelope Wentworth Wickham née Sober, wife of James Wickham, sister-in-law of Richard Stroker Wickham (q.v.), cousin (or possibly sister) of her co-claimant Anna Gordon Goding (q.v.), awarded compensation for the ownership of enslaved persons in Barbados.

1. Unsourced online family tree gives Penelope Wentworth Sober, daughter of John Sober (1739-1795) and Penelope Blake (?-1774), married James Wickham 06/12/1819 in St James, Barbados. Another unsourced online family tree gives her with the same parents and the paternal grandmother Mary Cumberbatch (1722-1752) who was the daughter of Abraham Cumberbatch (1685-1750). This Penelope Wentworth Sober in fact appears to be the aunt of the claimant Penelope Wentworth Wickham nee Sober - the first Penelope died a spinster in 1833 and mentioned her nieces Penelope Wentworth Wickham and Anna Gordon Goding in her will. It was Penelope Wentworth Sober the younger who married James Wickham in 1819.

2. The first Penelope Wentworth Sober, along with her brothers Hope Elletson Sober, Abraham Cumberbatch Sober and John Sober are left legacies in the will of their father’s second wife Martha Bersheba Sober, dated 26/04/1795. A later codicil of this will leaves the Barbadian estates to Hope Elletson Sober “for his life only, as I believe his attachment to the Indian is not legal and his chn are illegitimate in justice to the rest of my family.” The will also mentions Hope Elletson’s “handsome legacy from his grandmother and aunt”. Hope Elletson worked for the East India Company in Madras and his will, dated 1807, divided his assets between his three children Abraham Evans Sober, Penelope Sober and Maria Caroline Sober; disputes over his estate must have followed as the assets were not distributed to his legatees until 1846. Penelope Sober, daughter of Hope Elletson, married Captain M.R. Mabon in 1814 and died prior to the distribution of the estate in 1846. As Penelope Wentworth Wickham nee Sober was not the daughter of Hope nor of Abraham, it seems most likely her father was John Sober the younger, brother of Hope Elletson Sober and Abraham Cumberbatch Sober.

3. There were 7 children born to James Wickham and Penelope Wentworth Wickham and baptised in Barbados between 1823 and 1839: Mary Isabella (28/01/1823), Harriet Pinder and Penelope Sober (both baptised 08/03/1826), Ann Gordon (17/01/1829), James Holligan (09/01/1833) Helen Jane (23/01/1837) and Jane Helen (05/04/1839).

4. By the census of 1841, Penelope Wentworth Wickham was living in Summer Place, St Cuthbert, Edinburgh, age 40, “Independent means”, not born in county, with Penelope Sober Wickham, age 15, Harriet Pinder Wickham, 15, Anne Gordon Wickham, 14, James Holligan Wickham, 9, Mary Duiguid Wickham, 7, and Jane Helen Wickham. 4, all born out of county. The birth/baptism of Mary Duiguid has not been found, but her marriage in Edinburgh to William Inglis on 13/04/1851 confirms her as the daughter of James Wickham. Mary's place of birth is given in the 1851 census as Glasgow, though this may be an error.

5. Penelope Wentworth Wickham of 5 Dean Hough, Edinburgh, wrote to the Compensation Commission on 25/12/1842 with regard to the claim of David Moyes Macgibbon (q.v.) who was married to her husband’s sister.

6. At the marriage of the eldest daughter Penelope Sober Wickham on 16/11/1845, her father is given as “the late James Wickham, sometime of the Commissariat Department.”

T71/900 Barbados claim no. 5004.

1. http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=AHN&db=gill01&id=I8787 and http://homepage.ntlworld.com/bob.cumberbatch/images/Images/CumberbatchOfBarbados.pdf [both accessed 17/04/2012]. PROB 11 1818 Will of Penelope Wentworth Sober, Spinster of Upper George Street Bryanstone Square, Middlesex.

2. James C. Brandow, Genealogies of Barbados families: from Caribbeana and the Journal of the Barbados Museum and Historical Society (Baltimore, Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc, 1983) p. 512. Email from Grahame Taylor, 04/06/2014.

3. www.familysearch.org batch nos. C513941 and C513954.

4. 1841 census online; www.familysearch.org batch M11990-3. 1851 census for Scotland, Mary D. Inglis at 73 Stirling Street, Barony, Glasgow.

5. Barbados claim no. 57, T71/1611 unnumbered batch of letters, dated 25/12/1842. See separate entry for David Moyes Macgibbon.

6. General Register Office for Scotland, Marriages OPR, 685/1 680 Edinburgh, 17/01/1845.

We are grateful for the assistance of Bob Cumberbatch and Grahame Taylor in compiling this entry.