Agnes FRANCIS (alias FLEXNEY)

1856 - 1932  (76 years)

• Name	Agnes FRANCIS (alias FLEXNEY)
  Birth	15 Mar 1856	32 Colston Street, Bedminster, Bristol   [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
  	In 1851 (Bedminster District 1n) this address was occupied by Elizabeth JOSE (64), b. Minehead, Somerset, and her family. No known connection to Agnes FLEXNEY.
  		Map showing numbering of Colston Street
  Christening	[Searched and not found in St. John's, Bedminster, St Paul's Bedminster, Methodist Hebron Back Lane Bedminster, Methodist Ebenezer British Road Bedminster or St. Mary Redcliff (only 1856-1857 searched) St. Luke's not opened until 1861]. Colston Street was also close to Langton Street Methodist Chapel, which might have been attended by Agnes's mother.
  Gender	Female
  Census	07 Apr 1861	Redcliff Parade East, Bristol   [2]
  	Age: 5
  	Listed as Agnes FLEXNEY (her mother as Agnes FRANCIS, widow) below the names of her FLEXNEY uncles.
  		Agnes FLEXNEY & family 1861
  Census	2 Apr 1871	14 Guinea Street, Bristol   [3]
  	Schoolteacher
  	Age: 15
  		Map showing numbering of Guinea Street
  		Guinea Street 10, 11 & 12 Guinea Street shown on the left. Built in 1718 for Captain Edmund Saunders, a wealthy merchant and said to be Bristol's most successful slave trader.
  		Mary FLEXNEY, Agnes HUTCHINGS & Agnes FRANCIS 1871
  Residence	7 Aug 1880	42 Guinea Street, Bristol   [8]
  		Guinea Street, Bristol from Bathurst Basin Number 42 no longer exists. New Cut Construction In 1807 a traveller, surname of Malcolm, passed along what is now lower Guinea Street and crossed the line of the New Cut, then under construction. This is an excerpt from his description of the works. It is apparent that even at that time manual labour was being replaced by steam power. "An unpleasant lane leads from the (Gibb) ferry to the verge of the new canal. As I passed this, a labourer advanced, and requested that I would return, as a person had at that instant fired the train of a ball of gunpowder, by means of which the workmen loosen the otherwise immovable rocks of the site. In an instant the explosion occurred, and I saw a thousand splinters of various sizes hurled into the air, that as instantaneously fell, in a dangerous shower, in a circle probably 400 feet in diameter. The shock had not only rifted the rock immediately surrounding the powder, but immense fragments were removed from their beds, where wedges were driven into them, and they are thus reduced small enough to be raised with cranes by four men, into the carts which are conveyed up the sides of the banks on stages, by operation of steam-engines erected on the verge of the canal, that turn several wheels, and those two others, with chains of vast length and strength round them, which by their revolutions lower empty, and raise the filled carts attached to the chains. A temporary bridge, erected with the stone and intended mortar, crossed the canal at that time; but the fierce red of the sand in the latter ruined the appearance of the work. Iron bridges are, however to be exclusively preferred."
  Census	3 Apr 1881	42 Guinea Street, Bristol   [6]
  Census	5 Apr 1891	42 Guinea Street, Bristol   [9]
  Census	31 Mar 1901	19 Salisbury Road, Bristol   [4]
  		Crofton House, 19 Salisbury Road, Bristol BS6
  Death	21 Mar 1932	Bristol Reg'n District
  	Agnes F NEALE, aged 76, Vol. 6a Page 287
  		Ex-Councillor's Bereavement Mrs Neale of 19, Salisbury Road, Redland was formerly a teacher at Redcliff School, and was closely associated with the work of St Mary Redcliff.
  Burial		Edward & Agnes NEALE Gravestone at Canford Crematorium, Bristol
  Notes	Father named as Edward Flexney, solicitor's clerk, on birth certificate, but as James Francis, solicitor, on marriage certificate. 1861: Surname is given as Flexney, though her mother is listed as Francis, widow. 1871: Surname given as Francis, mother Hutchings by now. Name given as "formerly Francis" on son Thomas's birth certificate.
  Person ID	I115	Gadd
  Last Modified	3 Oct 2023

  
  

  Father	James FRANCIS,   b. 08 Jan 1809, St. George's Hanover Square, London, Middlesex d. 17 Mar 1874, 2 Kent Terrace, Ventnor, Isle of Wight (Age 65 years)
  Mother	Agnes FLEXNEY,   b. Abt 1828, Witney, Oxfordshire d. 17 Dec 1902, 14 Guinea Street, Bristol (Age 74 years)
  Marriage	Almost certainly not married. Daughter took mother's maiden name until her own marriage. Mother described as Agnes Francis, widow, in 1861 census. The description "James FRANCIS, Solicitor" comes from daughter Agnes's marriage certificate, but no James FRANCIS exists on relevant Law Lists. Agnes's father is described on her birth certificate as a "solicitor's clerk". This James FRANCIS has been chosen as the only person of the name working in the legal profession at the time and of an appropriate age - we have no other evidence that he was Agnes's father. James was remarried and resident in Bushey before Agnes's pregnancy. Agnes was resident in Witney in 1851, but may have followed her sister (Mary Ann WOODCOCK) to Bristol shortly afterwards. It is possible that James would have been required to lodge in Bristol if his employer was involved in the Assizes [in 1855 there were no Spring Assizes, the Summer Assizes began on 2nd August]. A William FRANCIS (quite possibly James's son) was lodging in a hotel in Clifton in 1871 in his capacity as Clerk of the Peace for Middlesex, along with a number of others involved with the Assizes. Alternatively, Agnes might have been employed in some capacity in Bushey, or she may have worked in James FRANCIS's household while he was still resident in London, and transferred with him to Bushey. This is not entirely unlikely: Charlotte HUNT, a dressmaker from Witney living in Regent's Park District in 1851 was in 1841 the domestic servant of a solicitor (Joseph BLUNT) in Upper Gower Street, St. Pancras. Agnes had two brothers who had settled in London by this time: 1. Richard, whose wife Emma was visiting Fanny WRIGHT (nee FLEXNEY) in Bournemouth in 1891 - perhaps coincidentally very near to the home of James's daughter, Sibella FRANCIS. 2. Frederick, who married in 1854, and whose daughter born in Islington in April 1855 was named Priscilla Agnes.
  Event	Jun 1855
  	Daughter conceived
  Photos		Map of Bristol in 1937, before many roads were obliterated by the Blitz and post-War redevelopment.
  Family ID	F64	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	Edward Isaac NEALE,   b. 12 Apr 1857, Bristol, Gloucestershire d. 27 Oct 1951, 11 Quantock Road, Weston Super Mare (Age 94 years)
  Marriage	19 Aug 1878  [8]
  		Edward Isaac NEALE marriage to Agnes FRANCIS (FLEXNEY) 1878
  Children	+ 1. Annie NEALE,   b. 12 Apr 1879, Bristol, Gloucestershire d. 1964 (Age 84 years) + 2. Thomas Edward NEALE,   b. 15 Jul 1880, 42 Guinea Street, Bristol d. 5 Nov 1936, Bristol, Gloucestershire (Age 56 years)   3. Maria Agnes "Mamie" NEALE,   b. 1881, Bedminster, Somerset d. 24 Nov 1949 (Age 68 years) + 4. Arthur NEALE,   b. 1883, Bristol, Gloucestershire d. Aft 1932 (Age > 50 years)
  Photos		Map of Bristol in 1937, before many roads were obliterated by the Blitz and post-War redevelopment.
  		Baptism of four NEALE children, 1885
  Family ID	F41	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	22 May 2020

  
  

• Photos

  Agnes is on the left of this photo, taken at the wedding of her son.

  
  

• Sources

  [S25] Information provided by Diana Knowles/Jones. [S361] 1861 Census, (7 April 1861). [S354] 1871 Census, (2 April 1871). [S359] 1901 Census, (31 March 1901). [S360] 1891 Census, (5th April 1891). [S355] 1881 Census, (3 April 1881). [S428] FRANCIS, Agnes - Birth Certificate. [S380] NEALE, Thomas Edward - Birth Certificate, NEALE, Thomas Edward - Birth Certificate, (7th August 1880). [S1] Census.