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The Cheffers Family
The Cheffers and the Parish of St.
Keverne.
Andy Millward - 2002
Since moving into the parish in 1999 I have been
too busy to attend to family history matters but
having got to know the area slightly I decided
recently to spend some time finding out more of
the Cheffers in this parish.
The first thing to do was to look through my
files and I was surprised to find how much I had
on St Keverne and even more surprising was the
number of times the family was mentioned in
relationship to the hamlet of Tregarne where we
are living.
The parish of St Keverne was divided for
administrative purposes into four sections called
“Turns” and the smallest of these is
Turn Tregarne which consists of 11 farmsteads and
two small villages, Porthallow and Porthoustock.
All of these are at least early medieval
settlements and many of them are older with
evidence of prehistoric earthworks and field
systems. Turn Tregarne occupies about a seventh
of the area of the parish and is an area of first
class farm land which is sheltered from the
prevailing westerly winds.
The family were certainly present here in the
sixteenth century with Thomas Cheffers paying 4d
in the Cornwall Subsidies of 1543. This was a tax
imposed by Henry the VIII to finance war with
France and only payable by those who owned
£1 of goods or land or who had an annual
income of £1 from any source. It seems from
the amount that he was paying that he was fairly
affluent. We also have evidence from the parish
records of christenings, marriages and deaths in
the latter half of the sixteenth century but
these are fragmentary as the records are somewhat
damaged.
The same records show a large number of Cheffers
living (or dying) in the first half of the
seventeenth century but the best source for how
prolific the family was is the Protestation
Returns of 1641. In the turmoil before the start
of the Civil War between King and Parliament it
was decreed that all adults over the age of 18
must sign to declare that they supported
“the true reformed Protestant
religion”. We find nine, male, adult,
Cheffers signing this return, three of whom are
called Richard!
St Keverne was active in the various campaigns
of Civil War with Cornwall declaring for the
King. The local squire was Hannibal Bogan of
Lanarth who was also in command of the Militia
and he certainly served in various actions
including a revolt after the main tumult had died
down and he marched the St. Keverne Militia into
the next Parish of St. Martin and fortified the
ancient earthwork at Gear, from which he was
driven back to St Keverne after being defeated at
the bridge over a creek of the Helford River. How
many of the family were involved in these
troubles it is impossible to say but the poll tax
of 1660 after the restoration of the monarchy
mentions seven Cheffers, but four of them are
female.
At this point the wills that we have found come
into play and I must pay tribute to Jane Gibbs
for all her hard work in transcribing them. In
1624 we have Willam Robard alias Cheffers, a
fisherman of St. Keverne, dying and he mentions
thirteen beneficiaries called Cheffers including
four called Richard!!
Between 1624 and 1698 we have ten wills from St
Keverne including five from chaps called Richard
Cheffers. The wills seem to indicate that they
were farmers who did a bit of fishing or
fishermen who did a bit of farming but the fact
that they had wills indicates that they were not
day labourers and had property. It is doubtful if
they owned the property but they would have
leased it from the landed estates who seemed to
own most of Cornwall.
In Cornwall the property was usually let on the
“three lives” system. In drawing up a
legal document the lease would be for ninety nine
years or three lives and three young persons
would be named. Bearing in mind the problems of
infant mortality this was not such a safe
bet.
When we purchased Tregarne the vendors, Chris
and Sue Harris asked why we wanted to move to
Cornwall and I mentioned that my Mother’s
family came from the Lizard. They asked what was
the family name and when I replied
“Cheffers” they exchanged glances and
then explained to us that just behind the meadow
we had just purchased with our new home was a
field called “Chaffers Ground”. I was
told that a lease existed and was in the
possession of one of our neighbours whose family
had farmed land in Tregarne for many years and a
few weeks ago I asked if I could borrow it. To my
surprise my neighbour produced twenty documents
on parchment together with a number of typed
transcriptions.
These give a very full picture of the manner in
which the land and the tithes have been
transferred through the years. The tithe was the
payment due to the church on the produce of both
land and sea but these had been sold on at some
time in the 18th century and were sold to further
entrepreneurs and subdivided into parts.
The earliest document is a tithe agreement in
Tregarne, dated 1712, between William Cheffers
and two brothers, Nicholas and Anthony Penrose
and mentioning their parents, Thomas Penrose and
Joan, and an agreement of 1704. Also included in
the agreement is “ a garden in the eastern
end of a field called Mennallack.” This
field name still exists and its location is
defined on the 1845 Tithe map.
In 1726 a lease was drawn up on this same area
of land with the addition of other named fields,
a dwelling house and barn together with orchards,
sheds and stables. This was between William
Cheffers of Mawgan in Meneage and Anthony Penrose
of St Keverne. For the sum of £160 William
agreed to transfer all the listed land and
buildings to Anthony. The lease to be for
“Fourscore and Nineteen years” and
the three lives named are his brother Nicholas
Penrose, his son, Anthony Penrose Jnr and William
Cheffers son, Angell. This choice caught my
interest because why would one man name the son
of another in a business transaction but when I
looked at my family tree I find that William had
married Grace Penrose in 1701. So it was all
being kept in the family.
William is placed in the lease as being a
resident of the nearby parish of Mawgan but he
was born and married in St Keverne as were his
three sons and he must have moved to Mawgan in
his mature years. The Parish records for Mawgan
are few and far between for the early part of the
eighteenth century and I am not sure if I will be
able to trace him through these.
To complete the family history side, William is
the brother of my five times Great Grandfather as
listed on the family tree that Anna (USA)
produced for us in 1995.
The remaining leases show the transfer of land
and tithes on this property through the years and
as I read through them I was hoping that the
buildings mentioned would turn out to be where we
are living but it turns out to be the farm next
door. But when you consider that we had came upon
Tregarne out of the blue, fifty yards out is not
bad!
Various other documents have come to light and
one that caught my attention is entitled
“God’s Wonderful Deliverance”
published in 1798. This recounts the story of how
John Sandys of Lanarth was blown out to sea in
his fishing boat during the Autumn of 1704 and he
and his crew ended up in Brittany.
Even though Britain was at war with France
(surprise, surprise,) their Breton cousins gave
them shelter and when the weather abated they
sailed back to Coverack.
To celebrate their deliverance they held a
service at St. Keverne church and “The
clerk, John Cheffer, sung part of the second part
(from the 18th verse) and the third part of the
107th Psalm”.
I looked in the Church rates book and in the Turn
Tregarne section found :”John Cheffer for
mending church books and cloats- 1s” and
further on “John Cheffer for being
clerk-£4.” This continues until 1726
when another person is receiving the
£4.
The Church rates book is a record of income and
expenditure between 1721 and 1745 and shows
Abraham Cheffers paying his poor law rates for
the properties mentioned in his will of 1740 and
in 1737 he becomes church warden and thus
responsible for the running of the accounts.
Amongst these is a payment of six shillings and
eight pence for the “burial of Mathew
Cheffers”.
In 1740 we have “Widow Cheffers”
paying for the farms at Treloyan and Rosenithon
and in 1745 we find “James Cheffer..buried
in church-6/8d”
The archivist at the Record office tells me that
this was the customary fee for burial in the nave
but if you paid more you could be buried nearer
the altar.
My favourite piece of research concerning the
family and St. Keverne comes from the Cornwall
Muster Roll of 1569 when Queen Elizabeth decreed
that a nationwide muster be held and the purpose
of this was to assess the number of horse and
footmen that it could count on to defend the
country and see that everyone had the proper
armour and weapons according to law.
The categories that they were listed in were
heavy and light cavalry but Cornwall could only
muster three heavy cavalry, these being what we
would today call Knights in armour and very few
light cavalry. This is an indication of the
poverty of the county. The Lizard parishes could
not even muster suitable horses for either of
these roles.
Next the men were listed as Archers (1st and 2nd
class), Billmen, Pikemen and Harquebusiers
(matchlock gun) and amongst the Parish list for
Turn Bean stands Archer (2nd class) John Cheffer
who also owns a bill. But alone amongst the
parishes of the Kingdom, St. Keverne, had a
number of men who owned a “sling and
bag”.
Slingers had gone out of fashion two hundred
years before as, like archery, it demanded
constant practice to sling a stone or lead bullet
with accuracy for 250 yards.
Could it be that the local Blue Elvin pebbles
were particularly suited to this activity or is
it a further example of the individuality of St.
Keverne folk?
Whatever was the reason they required a high
level of courage as their role was that of
“skirmishers” and they would have
advanced in front of the army to harass the
formation of the battle squadrons of the
opposition. To do this armed only with a piece of
rope and a bag of stones speaks volumes.
The last reference we have of the family in the
parish is the death of William Cheffers of
Porthallow being found drowned in Mounts Bay in
1822 and I decided to check on the local
newspapers.
Firstly, I looked up the West Briton and was
surprised to find how little local news was in
the paper. The majority of it is taken up with
news from London and the latest news bought in
from Hamburg. But amongst all this was a series
of accounts regarding how bad the weather had
been recently. Then we find the reported loss of
several vessels including the “Rose of
Gweek” which was on a smuggling
expedition.
I could find nothing further in subsequent
issues of the West Briton and so changed over to
“The Royal Cornwall Gazette” and
there we find a fuller account of those
drowned:
William and John Gilbert (brothers)
William Chaffer
William Curtis
I have looked up burials on the net but I can
only find the burial of William Cheffers and
William Curtis in St. Keverne so the others must
be buried elsewhere. Curtis (Courtis) is recorded
as “drowned in Mounts Bay” as
well.
I also note that the “Rose” is
registered to James Richards and that the maiden
name of Mary Ann Cheffers is Richards. Richards
is a fairly common name still in these parts but
it does suggest a family enterprise.
I find that we have William Gilbert being born
in 1792 to Robert and Sarah in the parish and we
also have John Gilbert being born to them in 1799
and I suggest that these are two of the deceased
smugglers. I can find no other family connections
between the various smugglers but I have yet to
check all the records and I will be very
surprised if it was not a family venture.
This is the last entry that we can find for the
Cheffers in St. Keverne Parish and no grave slabs
or other monuments survive. as yet I have not
been able to unravel their land holdings or
farms.The only record of four hundred years of
hard work are a field name and various entries in
the parish records.
Andy Millward,
Tregarne,
St Keverne,
Cornwall
8 July 2002..
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