Rodwell family in Harston
Hilary Roadley with additional information provided by Warwick Rodwell
James Rodwell (1842-1922) – shopkeeper, small time farmer & coal merchant
James Rodwell (son of Susan and Thomas Rodwell) was born in Swaffham Bulbeck in April 1842 and married Susan Fordham (B:1843 Swaffham Bulbeck)in early 1864. Photo No 1 shows them around 1870. After Susan died (5 Apr 1896 age 52 Buried Harston Baptist graveyard) he later married Elizabeth Hancock (nee Smith) in Harston who also come from Swaffham Bulbeck. James started off as a labourer in Swaffham Bulbeck but by 1871 he was the foreman of coprolite works in Guilden Morden. By 1875 he had moved to Harston.
James and Susan had a family that grew up in Harston (see family tree pdf below). There were 2 daughters – Annie Lucy (B:1864), and Louisa (B:1867) and 3 sons – James Edwin (B:1871) and George and Herbert born Harston in 1975 and 1977 respectively. See photo No 2 of James with four of his children. They became Baptists at that time, and hence their tombs are in the Baptist Church graveyard. Also, there are multiple entries in the church registers.
In 1881 census James was recorded living on the High St in Harston as a grocer and farmer of 17 acres, employing 1 man. He was no longer recorded as a shopkeeper after 1896. From census records he appears to have lived very near where the present (2025) shop/PO is at No 28 High St or possibly on opposite side of road at or near No 29 shop. We don’t know which shop was his. By 1890s he lived at 41 High St. By 1901 he was a haulier and coal merchant as well as farmer, in 1897 selling 1 ton of coal to the school (board). The photograph No 3 shows one of his traction engines towing a ‘train’ of three waggons, piled high with sacks of grain.
James Rodwell was a well-known figure in Harston. In 1880 he collected money for Addenbrookes Hospital and in 1894 he was elected to the first Harston parish council. He was still on the PC in 1896 and 1904 but in 1917 he was disqualified from the Parish Council due to non-attendance for 12 months.
James rented or owned various properties or land in the village (and in Cambridge). In 1881, 2acres 2 rood 7 perches ‘on the Green’ of William Silk’s estate, was let to Mr Rodwell, at £8 10s pa. We know from another family that in 1905 (‘Jimmy’) James Rodwell sold 135-9 High St land (about 2 acres) to Harry Wilson but we are unsure whether it was James or his son, James Edwin. The 1910 land valuation map showed James owned, but rented out, Brickfield House (133 High St) and fields near to the north, while he rented (from Mrs Jones) and lived in the house at No 41 High Street with over 14 acres of land (plot 219 on map). Photo No 4 was taken in front of No 41 High St about 1890-95 as James’s wife Susan died in 1896 so it must have been taken before then.
In his later years James lived there in semi-retirement where he had operated his business from the many buildings situated at the rear. The photo No 5 taken c1909-10, at the front door of No. 41, shows James on the right, son George on the left and grandson Thomas George in the centre.
Another photo, No 9, shows James with horse and cart, but where is it in Harston? It looks possibly like a public house in the background – maybe the Coach & Horses but the trees and open space do not look familiar.
Probate for James states he died 20 Jul 1922, at the time living at 33 Priory Rd Cambridge. He is buried in Harston Baptist graveyard. His effects totalled £8074.
James Edwin Rodwell (1871 – 1948) carried on the farming business
James married Elizabeth Parnell (1868 -1955) in 1897 in Royston. They had 4 daughters- (Grace B: 1899) and Mabel (B: 1900) both born in Royston, then Evelyn (B:1904) , Ida (B:1906) and one son Harold James Rodwell (B: 1907) born in Harston.
1901 the family lived at Roebourne, 11 Royston Rd, James as a fruit farmer – there were 3 acres of apple orchards behind the house. The 1910 land valuation map also recorded him as a farmer with 3 1 2 acres and Roebourne still had orchards behind the house in 1955 (photo 15) when it was sold.
Roebourne House had been let out in 1912 to Annie Watson (organist for Baptist church) and her cousins- Gill family until Annie Watson died in 1951. Elizabeth Rodwell, James Edwin’s wife, may have occupied the house briefly as she appealed for a companion/housekeeper there in May 1952 (Saffron Walden Weekly News). She died in June 1955 and the house was put up for sale.
From 1911 or earlier, James Edwin & family lived at Lime Tree House & farm, High St as a forage merchant and farmer, where The Limes estate now is. He was renting it and the adjoining land at the same time as owning and renting out Roebourne, 11 Royston Rd. At some point he must have bought Lime Tree farm as he put in a planning application in 1934 for a street of houses behind Lime Tree House fronting onto High St- see plans.
Kelly’s directory includes James Edwin Rodwell as a farmer in Harston from 1908, including his son from 1916. At least from 1920 James Edwin Rodwell lived High St, Great Shelford, but he still owned land and an orchard in Harston. Between 1925 & 1929 no Rodwells were recorded on Harston commercial lists.
James Edwin was well known in the community, and was chosen as a village constable in 1896 and 1901-10 and in 1913 village constables including Messrs Rodwell, were paid £1 5s a year. He was also President of the Baptist Church YPCA- Young Person’s Christian Association Oct 1913 and April 1914 (Cambridge Independent Press.) 1915 J Rodwell junior loaned car and gave gifts for VADs for Gt Shelford hospital.
After his father’s death, James Edwin carried on the farming business, until he died in 1948, living then at Rectory farm, Gt Shelford, when the Rodwell magnificent Burrell traction engines and ploughing gear were all sold.
In 1913 (April 18 & 25 Cambridge Independent Press) Mr J Rodwell occupied (but didn’t own) a property for sale “near The Old English Gentleman. This was a 9-room brick & slate house, orchard and outbuildings with ca. 15 acres arable land and 514 ft frontage on the road, Has ‘prospective building value’, since ‘substantial attractive villas have been erected on the opposite side of the road recently’. “
Could this be Lime Tree Farm or 41 High St although they were not near the Old English Gentleman? No building was in 1901 but this may have changed by 1913.
Harold James Rodwell- James Edwin’s son
In 1920 Master Harold J Rodwell lent slides to Harston Baptist Sunday school, although he lived in High St , Gt Shelford with parents & family by 1921.
Kelly’s directory recorded him as a poultry farmer in 1933 & 1937 but in 1948 as executor of his father’s will he was recorded as an estate fruit farmer.
Local people still remember him and his family living at Lime Tree Farm in the 1930s onwards. Joyce Carter said “Mr Rodwell had a farm where the Limes area is, which kept pigs, etc and the boys from school helped – all the boys seem to have part time jobs on the farms”.
Another memory recalled that “The Rodwells lived in a big house, Lime Tree house, no 62 High St, to the right of the Police house, and where the Limes road entrance now is, with Lime Tree farm behind it. There was a tennis court in front of the house fronting the road.
John Wick’s memories tell that Harold James Rodwell (Jim) used to farm Limetree farm, where Miss Collen later had her Riding school, and at one time he had been a contract ploughing man with Steam engines, but I believe they were before he came to Harston.
Ida Rodwell – James Edwin’s daughter
John Wick memories : “It must have been the mid-fifties when Ida Rodwell, a friend of my parents, had previously bought the house and shop as a residence. (5 Royston Rd). The shop, previously the Post Office, had not been used for years and after a while she took advice about opening the shop again from my Grandfather, John Hall a shopkeeper in Barrington but living with us in Harston. She named it ‘Odds and Ends Corner”, and stocked crisps, sweets, a few handy foods and haberdashery items. (In 1955 she was given permission to sell stamps in her shop. She also gave a talk and demonstration on ‘Recovering Eiderdowns’.) She ran the shop for a few years then left the village to do self-financed missionary work in Durban South Africa.”
Louisa Ann Rodwell (1867-1948) – ran the Three Horseshoes
James’s daughter Louisa Ann ran the Three Horseshoes although the inn was in the name of Charles William Haylock, her husband. Bill had a reputation for ‘drinking the profits’ and Aunt Louie kept the business going. One of the family also ran the Dovecote Tearoom.
It is fairly certain that in the 1920s photo 6 of the pub with a group of men outside the man at the back with no hat is Aubrey Rodwell Haylock (1902-69), Louisa’s son. The one in the middle is my Louisa’s brother George, riding a motorized bicycle and makeshift sidecar. George had been a cycle-maker in Ely around the turn of the C20. Attached is an image of him with one of his other motorized cycles (No 7)
A pet goat called Wilfred was kept at the Three Horseshoes by Aunt Louie. It drank beer and was a favourite with the customers. Everyone was so sad when it eventually died that its head was mounted on a shield by a taxidermist, (photo No 8) and that continued to hang in the pub. When the Haylocks retired in 1937, her brother George Rodwell rescued Wilfrid, and hung him in the hall of his house in Essex. When they died, their grandson Warwick Rodwell inherited Wilfrid, who now presides over the inner hall of his house in Norfolk.
Connection with the Thompson family
Warwick Rodwell informed us that Rodwells also have connection with the Thompson family that lived at Trigg Farm on Station Rd. “I was interested to see the Thompson family tree on the website. I am descended from Charles T and Miriam Howard, via their son Henry T (1853-1924) and Alma Ann Hinkins; he was my great grandfather, and their daughter Mary Ann Priscilla Thompson (1875-1960), my paternal grandmother. These and other Thompsons do not appear on the published tree, which could be expanded to include them.”
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