Bishop of Shrewsbury

Family tree: Richard John Bishop ancestors

Eliza Hotchkiss’ first marriage was to Richard Bishop in 1913. Their first son Jack was born in Froncysyllte in Wales, where there is the most magnificent aqueduct stretching across the valley.

Richard’s mother was Mary Jane Cheshire and her father was born in Upton Magna, a tiny village through which Richard made his way to the brick works daily, according to Jack. While he lay dying of TB, Richard instructed his cousin Samuel Cheshire to look after his family after he was gone.

Richard Bishop’s father was also Richard (born in 1858) and was known as ‘Uncle Dick’ - he was reputed to be a bit of a lad.

Uncle Dick’s father was John Bishop, born in 1813 in Berriew, Montgomeryshire. He married Elizabeth Clay in 1839 and they had eight children. Following her marriage at the time of the 1841 census, it appeared that Elizabeth was living with her mother Isabella Clay in Spring Gardens, Shrewsbury along with two of her children, Ann and Charlotte. Meanwhile, John Bishop was living with his widowed mother and siblings close by in Canal Buildings Shrewsbury. By 1851, John was a railway labourer and the family were living together.

It seems that the move from Berriew was made by John’s parents John and Catherine. She was born in Welshpool in 1784 and married John of Walesbird in 1813 in Berriew and two of their children were born there before the move.

However, the generation before, another John Bishop born in Welshpool married Nancy Sarah Larton of Shrewsbury. Three of their children were born in Shrewsbury before the move to Berriew, where four other children were born.

Jack Bishop

Uncle Dick Bishop,
Eliza's father-in-law

The last of the line...

Three families toiling mostly on the land, all striving to survive through deprivations and wars; the children making their way in the world as best they could (two of the Cheshires forced into emigration to uncertain and frightening futures); but not a single person will carry on the branches of Cheshire, Hotchkiss or Bishop. Most of them, poor as church mice, lived in the glorious countryside of Shropshire and the borders and only a handful of descendants continue in that fair county.