This post is about the grandsons of Henry & Mary, the sons of John & Peggy, William & Jane and Henry & Elizabeth.

John & Peggy’s Sons

William Lanyon 1810-1898

William was John & Peggy’s eldest son, he was born almost four weeks before they married in Dec 1810. In 1833 he married Mary Ann Bennett at St Allen, they emigrated to Wisconsin, USA before 1840. He was a blacksmith and ironmonger. He and Mary had fifteen children, fourteen sons and one daughter who died in infancy.

• William 1834-1908 he was born in St Allen, he was a produce merchant at Mineral Point Wisconsin, in 1855 he married Maria Thomas – seven children
• Josiah 1835-1835 died in infancy
• Mary Ann 1836-1840 died in infancy
• Cyrus 1838-1838 died in infancy
• Cyrus 1839-1904 he was a lawyer and he married Mary Jane Vivian in Wisconsin in 1865 – no children traced
• Josiah 1841-1924 married Jane Trevorrow at Iowa, Wisconsin in 1862. He set up a machinist shop and foundry and a zinc smelting business in Pittsburg with brother William. They had extensive zinc interests, buying ore and owning three smelters. He was also a director of Joplin National Bank. They had five children.

• John 1843-1906 married Francis Jones in 1867, he was a hardware merchant – seven children
• Henry 1846- 1851 suffocated age 5 in a blacksmith’s furnace
• Simon 1847-1911 worked as a machinist, married Mary Simmons in 1879, she died in 1883, they had no children. His second wife was Kate Richards, they married in 1901, no children.
• Albert Charles 1850-1935 he worked as a contractor in a cement works, he married Margaretta Stupinsky in 1876 in Michigan, no children. He married her sister Minnie Stupinsky in 1929, no children.
• Samuel 1851-1927 was a ‘moulder’ and worked in a machine shop, he married Jennie Williams at Grant, Wisconsin in 1884, they had one son who died age 2.

• Edwin Vincent 1855-1923 he was a blacksmith and married Augusta Imogen Sherman at Mineral Point in 1876. Five children. In 1912 he married his brother Simon’s widow Kate Richards.

• Robert Henry 1855-1923 was a machinist at a zinc mine, he married Clara G Gorseline at Jasper, Missouri in 1887, they had four children

• Delos B 1856-1864 drowned in a cistern

William senior and Mary Ann Bennett were married for 65 years.

Henry Lanyon 1812-1876

Henry was the second son of John and Peggy Vincent. He was working as a farm labourer at Polstein, St Allen when he married Grace Rose Anna Bennett in 1839. He later worked as a butcher and farmer. They had nine children:

• Olivia 1840-1917 was a dressmaker and a farmer in Hertfordshire, spinster
• Ellen 1842-1848 died young
• William 1843-1925 born in St Allen married Charlotte Couch at Northill, Cornwall in 1875 and moved to Essex, he was a farmer, two children, one died in infancy

• Henry 1846-1886 was born in St Allen and married Mary Hancox Raby at Lancashire in 1873. Henry was a commercial traveller in drapery, based in Exeter. Four children. He died aged 40 of congestion of the lungs, pleuro pneumonia and congestion of the brain, coma.

• Ellen 1848-1924 married Nathaniel Reed, a farmer, at Bodmin in 1870 and later moved to Hertfordshire. Seven children.
• Simon D 1849-1933 he was born in St Allen but emigrated to Wisconsin in 1870. He was a farmer and a coal merchant. He married Ellen Treseder in 1871 – six children.
• James 1852-1924 he was a farmer and married Mary Grace Reed at Lewanick in 1884. They had four children, three died in childhood. In 1911 he married again to Martha Helen Souden at Plymouth. He lived in Hertfordshire. He left a will leaving his estate to his only surviving son James with an unusual clause:

“….provided he does not marry a relation by blood as I wish to mark my great objection to marriage between blood relations ….”

Last Will & testament of James Lanyon Probate 13th Aug 1924

(This clause was sent to the High Court and found to be invalid.)

• Edith 1854-1940 the census lists her as a farmer and a spinster, she died in Hertfordshire in 1940.

• Edwin 1857-1922 he was also a farmer, in 1890 he married Mary Ellen Hayne at Camelford, Cornwall, she died of Typhoid fever in 1893 and in 1895 he married Mary Anne Keast at Truro. They moved to Hertfordshire and Edwin died at Bishops Stortford in 1922. They had one daughter.

Simon Lanyon 1815-1888

According to the stained glass window in St Allen church Simon was the fourth son of John & Peggy. His brother Josiah was baptised after him but may have been born before him as the Chicago census estimates his birth year as 1811. Another child must have died before he was baptised and does not appear in the records. Simon married Mary Batten at St Allen in Jun 1838, three months later their son Simon Henry was born. By 1840 they had emigrated to Wisconsin. He was a farmer. He and Mary had nine children:

• Simon Henry 1838-1897 he was a zinc manufacturer and capitalist! He married Emily Matthews Dabb and they had two sons, Alvin and Arthur. Alvin was one of the richest men in Pittsburg, Kansas and both he and his brother Arthur were cashiers at the National Bank of Pittsburg. Simon kept a diary about his journey back to Cornwall in 1889. During his trip he arranged for a memorial window to be erected in St Allen church.

Photos: Simon Henry, Alvin and Arthur

• Mary Ann Batten 1841-1917 Mary was the first Lanyon born in America! She married George Carter at Wisconsin in 1872, one son
• William John 1843-1918 he was a farmer in Nebraska he married Elizabeth Jane James at Grant Wisconsin in 1866 – seven children

• Caroline 1844-1904 married Elijah Webber in 1875 lived in Pittsburg, Kansas – two children
• Josiah 1846-1855 died young
• Sophia 1848-1859 died young
• Robert James 1850-1858 died young
• Reuben Searle 1853-1903 he was a zinc dealer married Martha Jane Bennett in 1880 at Wisconsin and lived in Joplin, Missouri. Seven children.
• Franklin Watson Samuel Vincent 1859-1892 married Lavon Curtis Willard in 1884 at Crawford Kansas, four children

Josiah Lanyon 1816-1898

There were three Josiah Lanyons baptised within eighteen months of one another: Josiah baptised March 1815 the son of William Lanyon and Peggy Exter Richards, Josiah baptised 18th Jun 1816, the son of Simon Lanyon and Dorothy Hoskins and Josiah baptised 26th Jun 1816 the son of John Lanyon and Peggy Vincent.

Josiah the son of John and Peggy married Esther Brenton at St Merryn in 1838, they then headed to London to make their fortune. Josiah was working as a carpenter when in 1844 aged 29 he got into a fight with Thomas and Lucretia Pike. He was charged with stabbing, cutting and wounding Thomas with a screwdriver and beating Lucretia. Josiah was drunk and lucky to be found guilty of a lesser crime and sentenced at the Old Bailey to just a month in Newgate prison.

Along with his brothers he emigrated to Wisconsin where he worked as an undertaker and cabinet maker. In the 1880s they moved to Chicago and he died there in 1898.

He and Esther had nine children:

• Elizabeth Caroline 1839-1910 she was born in Newington, Surrey and married Gilbert, Belden Maxfield, a labourer, in 1859- four children
• Esther 1841-1927 born in Newington, married Byron Purinton, a farmer, at Iowa Wisconsin in 1860 – five children, she died in California in 1927
• Kate 1843-1899 born in London, married Samuel Hocking, a smith, at Mineral Point, Wisconsin in 1867- seven children
• John Brenton 1845-1931 born in London, he was an undertaker like his father, married Mary Hopper in 1870 and in the 1880s moved to Chicago – four children
• Mary Jane 1847-1931 married her widowed brother-in-law, Samuel Hocking in 1901, no children
• Charles Henry 1849-1925 was a harness maker he married Ann Whistler in 1875, one child who died in infancy
• Richard Norman 1852-1935 he was a sign painter and a shipper of clay goods, he married Harriet Emma Buck in 1873 at Ontario Canada, they lived in Chicago and had ten children
• Byron 1855-1925 he was a jeweller and watchmaker and married Sarah Wilson at Alameda California in 1878, they had one child
• Frederick William 1859-1930 was a salesman, he married Gertrude Beale in 1885 and they had two daughters. In 1903 he married Katherine Bauman Astleford at Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Paul Lanyon 1817-1897

Paul was born in 1817 and baptised in 1824 at St Allen. He was a farmer and married Johanna Kendal in 1846 at St Mawgan in Pyder, Cornwall. By 1870 they had emigrated to Wisconsin and then onto Omaha Nebraska where Paul and Johanna both died in 1897.

Paul and Johanna had five children:

• John 1817-1897 he was a farmer at St Mabyn in Cornwall. In 1869 at St Neot he married Olivia Stephens, three children. Olivia died in 1875 of TB and in 1876 John emigrated to Wisconsin where he married Annie Lavinia Sherrell, they had six children together, they moved to Minnesota and he died there in 1911.

• William Henry 1852-1932 emigrated to Wisconsin in 1867, he was a physician and married Evalyn Trobee, they lived in Joplin, Missouri and had three children
• Samuel Searle 1856-1929 he was a druggist he married Eva Dena Hagan in 1895 and they lived at Omaha, Nebraska – two sons
• Esther Ann 1857-1925 married George Theodore Brazee at Lafayette Wisconsin in 1881, one son. She died at Omaha. Nebraska in 1925

• Anne Louisa 1859-1940 married Charles H Graham, a glass stainer, three children. She died in Manhattan in 1940.

Robert Lanyon 1829-1909

Robert was born at St Allen in 1829 He emigrated to Wisconsin and in 1854 married Mary Ann Grose Curnow at Mineral Point. He was a wheelwright and wagon maker and later worked in the smelting business. They had two sons:

• Robert Henry 1857-1933 he was a smelter manufacturer and appears to have had an illegitimate child with Rachel Beecher in 1877, Albert Beecher, Robert then married Minnie Stearns Snow in Crawford Kansas in 1886. They had five children.

• William 1862-1938 was a smelter owner and married Annie Georgine Willette at Williams Ohio in 1888. They moved to St Louis, Missouri and had four children. William was described in his son Robert’s marriage announcement as: the ‘ex-mayor of Pittsburg, Kansas and millionaire mine and smelter owner”. His son was described “…has given up his course at Yale and married Miss Alice Lillian O’Connor, 19 years old, a vaudeville actress. They were married in New York.”

John Lanyon 1832-1916

John was born abt 1832 and baptised in 1837 at St Allen. He emigrated to Wisconsin in 1855 and married Annie Plimmer in 1866, she died in 1867 and he married again to Amelia Osborne. John was a grocer and dry goods merchant. They had three children:

• John Everett 1869-1917 he was a salesman in a shoe store. Bachelor
• Nettie B 1875- aft. 1940 spinster
• Arlington Osborne 1877-1958 he was a post office clerk and married Lucile M Reed at Joplin, Missouri in 1902, two children

Samuel Lanyon 1833-1908

Samuel was born in 1833 and was twenty three years younger than his elder brother William. He was a woollen cloth buyer and Manchester draper and married his first wife Cecilia Edwards at Camborne in 1860. She died in 1866 “after a painful illness, the beloved wife of Mr Samuel, draper.” (her illness was TB.) They had two children:

• Frederick Vincent 1861-1923 he was a draper’s assistant and a clerk and a bachelor and died at Helston in 1923
• Herbert Hyne 1865-1866 died in infancy

Samuel married again this time to Lucy Ellen Brown in York, England in 1868. They had four children and emigrated to Chicago.

• Lucy Florence 1869-1901 born in Manchester, England and died in Illinois, USA, spinster
• Eleanor Mabel 1872-1906 born in Manchester and died in Illinois, may have married someone called Keyes
• Edith Ellen 1877-1925 born in Manchester and died in California in 1925, spinster

• Samuel Herbert 1879-1961 born in Manchester and married Florence Lee Foljambe in Cuyahoga, Ohio in 1904. He was the manager of a street car company, he died in California in 1961. They had two daughters.

Eliel Lanyon 1824-1909

Eliel was John and Peggy Lanyons second youngest son, he never married or had children. he was a farmer of 100 acres and lived at Henver in the ‘old house’ where John and Peggy had lived. He was also a methodist lay preacher and is remembered in a beautiful stained glass window at St Allen church.

This is where we must leave John & Peggy’s sons and grandchildren. So many of them emigrated to the United States especially Wisconsin. John and Peggy like so many parents with emigrant children probably never saw them again once they had left. If letters were exchanged they probably took months to arrive and yet Simon Henry Lanyon returned to St Allen in 1889 and erected a beautiful stained glass window in their memory even though he would have been too young to remember them.

In a family that likes to perpetuate the same names every generation I find it unusual that there is not a single daughter with the name Margaret or Peggy. Out of at least 62 grand children there are no Margarets or Peggys and just 5 grandsons named John.