Pages

Wednesday 10 March 2010

Leacock School - Can Anyone Solve This Mystery?



Every so often when I am sipping tea and browsing images, my heart goes into reverse. I have just picked myself up off the floor now to tell you what I found. Here you can see a sampler stitched by Elizabeth Philpot in 1791 which is up for auction at Leland Little Auction & Estate Sales, Hillsborough, North Carolina on 20 March 2010 and below you can see a sampler in the Haslemere Educational Museum, UK by Martha Russell also in 1791. Both girls were aged 8 and were from Leacock School. We have not been able to trace Leacock School which is possibly in Hampshire, UK. If anyone can help, it would be wonderful. The verse is from the 84th Psalm and is marked New Version.

6 comments:

  1. I love a mystery and I was like gosh I have heard of Elizabeth Philpot but could not remember why. I took out my school books in Anthropology and lo and behold there was Elizabeth's name. Well she was one of the first Fossil collectors. She did move to London and here is a Wikipedia article on her. Hope this is a start for you. If these are the one and same person.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Philpot

    ReplyDelete
  2. Well, I live in Hampshire UK and grew up In Surrey - not a million miles away from Haslemere, but I've never heard of a village called Leacock. Certainly there is Lacock in ?Wiltshire - home of Fox Talbot who discovered the single lens reflex camera.(Also used to film a lot of olde worlde TV programs and films). I Googled it and there is one in Pennsylvania.
    Regards
    Sue

    ReplyDelete
  3. I also live in Hampshire and have never heard of a Leacock School - Laycock seems a good suggestion.

    However you could try the Hampshire Records Office

    http://www3.hants.gov.uk/archives.htm

    to see if they know anything.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thank you so much for all your helpful contributions - this just gets more and more interesting.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Not sure if you have seen my Jane Philpott sampler that I just reproduced, but it was stitched in 1837 in Ramsgate, which isn't far from Hampshire at all. I also have Sarah Philpott's sampler (Jane's sister) stitched in the same year also in Ramsgate. I wonder if there are any relationships between these Leacock samplers and the Philpott samplers I own?

    ReplyDelete
  6. How wonderful if the Philpots are related - Leland Little says that : Research indicates that the maker is probably Elizabeth Philpot (b,. 1783) of Fordingbridge, Hampshire, England, daughter of James Philpot (1742-1823) and Ann Mills (b. about 1747)... but that is just an indication....

    ReplyDelete