DR THOMAS WILLIAM LANCHESTER
Thomas was born in 1805 in Coney Weston, Suffolk. He married Clarissa Baker on 25th April 1832 in North Walsham, Norfolk.
He was a graduate of Erlanger College in Germany. He was a Member of the College of Surgeons of England and a Licentiate of the Apothecaries Society of London.
By 1841 he was living in Yoxford at Sans Souci (A12) with Clarissa and their two children Clara and Henry and servants Mary Brown, Marianne Walter and Joseph Jermy. On the 1851 census there were additional daughters Mary Adelaide, Anna Laura and Harriet Jane, all born in Yoxford. Servants were 29-year old cook Joanna Pearson, Amy Cullingford, housemaid, 22, Hannah Mountain, nursemaid, 16 and 21-year old Henry Bailey, groom.
By 1860 Thomas had eye problems and was unable to practise. The family left Yoxford and in 1861 were living in Bracondale Road in Norwich, where they remained. Mary and Harriet were at school and Thomas was employing one house servant. Ten years later Anna and Harriet were at home, unmarried. In 1881 Mary, by then a Rector’s wife (Edward Kerslake) was visiting with her two daughters aged 15 and 13. The family employed a cook and a housemaid.
Thomas died 13th February 1886 and left an estate of over £2,680. Clarissa lived for another ten years, dying 8th January 1896. She left an estate of over £5,450 to her son Reverend Charles Preston Lanchester (born in 1834 but does not appear on 1841 or 1851 censuses; graduate of Clare College, Cambridge) and her son-in-law Reverend Edward Kerslake.