The Origins of the Turner Family

The Origins of the Turner Family

The Turner family had many ties with business and the professions. The first mention in Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage of the Turner family is of a Hugh Tumer (Will dated 1558) of Sutton Coldfield in the Midlands. The first of the family recorded in the lineage was Richard Turner (m. 1567), a barrister-at-law at the Middle Temple, London.  originally from Sutton Coldfield in Warwickshire. (fourth great grandfather to Sir Edward Turner 2^nd Bt, ) Richard’s descendants were, like him, businessmen and professionals, rather than wealthy landowners, and were generally centred on London. His Son Edward Turner (d 1626), was sometime mayor of Leicester. Thus Richard’s great-grandson, John Turner (1622-94), was a London merchant and Vintner, as was his son, John (1650-1708).  He was born at St Dunstan and All Saints London. He was the son of  William Turner  1626-1671 and Mary Cartwright 1626 -1689    

Elizabeth Turner nee Caplin died c.1747, Married 1685 John Turner of Sunbury (1650-1708). 

Sunbury House Middlesex

It was not until the life of Sir Edward Turner (1691-1735) that the Turners began to make a name for themselves among the country gentry and to accrue wealth from the land. Edward rose to greater heights in the business world than his forbears, becoming the Director and Chairman of the Honourable East India Company Service. He was created Baronet in 1733, at the age of 42, and married Mary, the eldest daughter of Sir Gregory Page, Bart., of East Greenwich. The Page family also owed their fortune to trade and were described as living with great splendour and hospitality‟ and acquiring significant estates in Bedford and Kent. The marriage between Sir Edward and Mary turned out to be a fortuitous one for the family later in the eighteenth century when Gregory Turner, inherited the Page Kent estates, adding Page to his name to become Sir Gregory Page-Turner. Sir Edward purchased a landed estate centred on Ambrosden, in Oxfordshire, which included a house built in the 1670s by the then owner, Sir William Glynne. Edward moved into this house, but his son, Sir Edward Turner (1719-66), Second Baronet, built a larger house and laid out Ambrosden Park after his inheritance in 1735. The Second Baronet also inherited other landed estates from his uncle, John Turner, of Sudbury, Middlesex, and further fortunes from another uncle, Edward Turner. By 1752, the Turners owned substantial estates and a significant fortune which placed them in a more than equitable position.

Elizabeth Turner is mentioned in a local news account of a fire at her house in Sunbury :  

FIRE AT MRS. ELIZABETH TURNER’S HOUSE AT SUNBURY. AUGUST 1724 

A reward of up to 200 guineas was offered for jewellery, watches and silver plates lost in a fire at Madam TURNER’s house in Sunbury on 8th August 1724. The advertisement included a detailed list of the property.1 The value of all the property was £20,000.  Julian, a 14-year-old ‘Blackamoor' boy from the West Indies according to one source, was committed to Newgate for stealing about 30 guineas from Madam TURNER and wilfully setting fire to her house. He had confessed to Sir Francis FORBES. Julian had been with the family for about five years. Initially Julian denied starting the fire and he accused a maid-servant of bribing him with 4 guineas to do so, but he later confessed and said he did it by putting a candle under a bed. Mrs TURNER and her family later retired to the house of a neighbour, Mr MORRICE, and there were hopes that much of the property lost in the fire, including £400 in cash, could be recovered. Julian was convicted at the Old Bailey on 14th October 1724 of stealing 20 guineas and burning the house of Elizabeth TURNER and sentenced to death. He was detained in pitiful conditions at Newgate and while there he was baptised with the name John. Another source said that Julian was Indian and he had been stolen from his parents at "Maduras (sic)". His first master, Captain DAWS, presented him to Mrs. TURNER.  Julian, together with Abraham DAVAL (for forging a lottery ticket) and Joseph BLAKE, alias BLUESKIN (for burglary) were executed at Tyburn on 11 November 1724. Then the surgeons took Julian’s body, it was almost torn to pieces by the mob who opposed them. Elizabeth TURNER, a widow of Sunbury made her will on 13 June 1737 and she added a codicil on 7 July 1737. The will was proved at the Prerogative Court of Canterbury on 22 July 1747 (TNA PROB 11/756). She left her large Bible and her large Testament to her nephew Sir Edward TURNER Baronet. It is possible that this was the Elizabeth TURNER whose house at Sunbury was destroyed by fire in August 1724.

The Will

The will transcribed below identifies John Turner as "the elder", and as a London merchant. It was made when "weak in body", and dated June 18th, 1694. Probate was granted to John, Elias, and Edward Turner (three of his four sons) four months later. It is the will of a relatively elderly man, given his four sons all appear to be over the age of majority of twenty-one. The eldest son is identified as John Turner, also a merchant of London, with further sons William, Elias, and Edward.

The will identifies John Turner the elder's former residence as the "Hamlett of Radcliffe in the parish of Saint Dunstan Stepney in the County of Middlesex", but does not specify his abode at the time of making his will, beyond "London". The John Turner of the will of 1694 is likely to be the same John Turner listed by Hotten in Suffolk Lane, London, in 1677, given that the 1694 will mention a warehouse in Suffolk Lane. Suffolk Lane (or Suffolk-Lane) was a street off Thames Street, relatively near the northern bank of the River Thames.

John Turner the elder retained a warehouse in "Suffolk Lane in London", which was apparently rented out. Other London or near London property mentioned is as property at "Hand Alley alias Newstreete without Bishopsgate, and "seven Messuages or Tenements and Lands situated in Ratcliffe."

Farmland is mentioned in, which was bequeathed to John Turner the elder's son Edward, as well as land in "Chester alias in the County of Hertford[shire]"

John Turner in the English Admiralty Court in the 1650s

A "Mr John Turner", merchant of the City of London, is mentioned in the affidavit of Frederick Ixem, a London notary publique, made in December 1657 in the English Admiralty Court. Since this mention is thirty-seven years prior to the above-mentioned will, it is not certain that the will and the deposition match.

The affidavit was made "On behalf of Mr Sam: Wilson and Company touching the Vosse", of whom John Turner was evidently a member, though probably junior to Samuel Wilson, who was also described by Ixem as a merchant of London. Ixem's deposition records a bill of sale for the ship the Vosse, dated in Amsterdam on July 23rd (new style), which had been delivered to Ixem in London on December 18th 1657 (old style) to be entered into the records of the English High Court of Admiralty for "perpetual remembrance". Such entering of a foreign-bought ship into the Admiralty Court records would have been to fend off future legal disputes, should the Vosse, under English ownership, later be arrested by English privateers, or English men of war, and alleged still to be Dutch-owned.

The John Turner and Samuel Wilson of Ixem's 1657 affidavit are likely to have been London merchants engaged in the Spanish and East Indian trade.

- In the late 1640s and early 1650s, John Turner, was a chief factor at Teneriff in the Canary Islands for three London merchants prominent in the Canary wine trade: Rowland Wilson senior, his partner Martin Bradgate, and Henry St John. G.F.Steckley, in his analysis of John Paige's Canary wine trade, has suggested that the chief factor, John Turner, shipped over 1,100 pipes of Canary wine annually between 1645 and 1647 and that the three partners supported by their chief factor accounted for 20% of the import of Canary wine to London in the late 1640s.^[5]

- The same John Turner as above is mentioned in letters of John Paige from the years 1650, 1651, 1652, 1654 and 1655. [ADD REFERENCE]

- Furthermore, G.F. Steckley has identified a number of commercial letters written by John Turner from the Canaries to various correspondents, together with commercial accounts in English and Spanish.^[6]

- A "Samuel Wilson" and a "John Turner" were two of twenty-three petitioners in a "Humble petition of the merchants trading for Spain", dated September 20th 1655. Other merchant signators to this petition included Christopher Boone and John Page [alt. Paige].^[7]

- The name of Samuel Wilson (without mention of John Turner) appeared in an English Admiralty Court case in 1657 relating to trade with Spain in 1654 and 1655. He was described as Samuel Wilson the younger in the court depositions of the mariner Richard Hussey^[8] and the London merchant Hannibal Allen.^[9] These depositions related to a dispute brought by George Margetts and Company, freighters of the Saint Lucar Merchant in the years 1654 and 1655, against its owners. According to their testimony, Samuell Wilson the younger was the owner and proprietor of three-sixteenths of the said ship in these years.

- Twenty months later the name of Samuel Wilson is again mentioned in the English Admiralty court, this time in the company of Thomas Plampian and John Turner (all merchants of London), regarding the seizure of the ship the Francis and John by the Dutch East India Company near Bantam in the East Indies.^[10] Interestingly, a number of London merchants engaged in the Spanish trade in the 1650s became active in trade with the East Indies. Known examples include John Page [alt. Paige], who collaborated with the prominent London merchant Maurice Thompson, in a private venture to Bantam; Christopher Boone, who was a friend and relation of the merchant George Oxenden (a private trader in Surat in the late 1650s and President of the East India Company in Surat in the 1660s); and Arthur (later Sir Arthur) Ingram.^[11]

Likelihood of a match between John Turner of the Admiralty Court in the 1650s and John Turner of 1694 will

It is reasonably likely that John Turner the chief factor for Rowland Wilson senior, et al. in the 1640s and early 1650s, the John Turner of the HCA depositions in 1657 and 1659, and the John Turner of the 1694 will be the same man.

The key to making this identification are:

1. Evidence that John Turner of the 1694 will was a vintner. He is described as such in the 1670 marriage allegations of his daughter Elizabeth and her future husband the merchant Samuel Dawes, both of whom are clearly identifiable in the 1694 will

2. The link in the 1694 will between a warehouse in John Turner's possession in Suffolk Lane, off Thames Street, and the business address of a John Turner in Suffolk Lane in the 1677 London Directory of Merchants and Bankers

Of possible relevance is that Rowland Watson senior was an employer of the John Turner of Tenerife in the Canaries in the 1640s and early 1650s. Speculatively, Rowland Watson may be related to Samuel Watson (alias Samuel Watson the younger) with whom John Turner of the HCA records of 1657 and 1659 is commercially connected in Spanish and other trade.

There is a will of Samuel Wilson, Merchant of London, proven in December 1681, thirteen years prior to the will of John Turner. Should transcription of Wilson's will (not yet tackled) name a John Turner linked to the hamlet of Ratcliff in Stepney, this will strengthen the linkage of the above-mentioned will of John Turner to the Admiralty court deposition made by Frederick Ixem.

John Turner family tree in Miscellanea Genealogica Et Heraldica (London, 1880)