occupation

Farmer

dates

Born: 1830

Married: First wife, Hannah (née BARTLETT);

                second wife Mary Ann MARGETTS

Died: 1888

residence

Initially Bletchingdon; later Wood Farm, Tackley; finally Sandford. (All in Oxon)

submitted by

John STEAD (great-grandson)

Background information

The Rogers family were farmers from Kirtlington.  Samuel, William’s father, moved to Manor Farm, Bletchingdon, however, in the 1820s.  William was the third of Samuel and Ann Zillah’s five sons, the youngest of whom, George, died in infancy.  As the second son, Thomas, was destined to take over Manor Farm, William set up house at Wood Farm, Tackley, after marrying Hannah BARTLETT, the daughter of the keeper of the (long since closed) Red Lion Inn at the top of Islip Road, Bletchingdon. (The BARTLETTs were another long-standing family of Oxfordshire farmers, although Hannah’s mother came from Ripon in North Yorkshire!)

When William and Hannah’s ninth child, William Bartlett, was born, in 1870, Hannah died in childbirth.  After a decent interval, William married Mary Ann MARGETTS (from Deddington), who had been their servant/housekeeper.  By the time of the 1881 census, they and a number of their children - from both marriages - were farming at Sandford, although some of the elder children were then living with their uncle, Thomas, at Manor Farm, Bletchingdon.  William died in 1888 and his son Alexander William (not born at the time of the picture) eventually took over Manor Farm, Bletchingdon from Thomas and continued the Oxford line there. 

The family group picture shows William ROGERS and his first wife Hannah, with 6 of their first 7 children, and was taken at Wood Farm, Tackley. We suppose that the picture must have been taken after the death of Ada Katherine (3rd child, born in 1860), and probably about a year after the birth, in 1867, of Arthur Harold.