Mary Prior was born to her parents, Richard and Jane, probably in 1804. She was baptised on 25th March that year in Symondsbury where her parents had married about nine and a half years earlier. She already had a brother, Richard, who was about three years old and would have had an older sister, Martha, but she had died as an infant about six years before Mary was born. No other siblings have been found until her younger brother Henry arrived and was baptised, again at Symondsbury, some 16 years after Mary in 1820.
They were not a wealthy family, her father Richard was a labourer and, as was not unusual then, it would appear that few of the Priors could write employing a "mark" rather than signing the few official records that survive like Marriage Registers, etc. Mary's older brother Richard appears to have been found guilty of smuggling just before Christmas in 1835 and was imprisoned for six months. Less than a year after his release he was in court again having been charged with larceny but this time he was found not guilty and acquitted.
The family seem to have avoided the censuses fairly effectively with the one exception being Mary's younger brother Henry. In 1841 he's recorded as a twenty year old living away from his family at Atrim in the Marshwood Vale and ten years later he was listed again, now married and living with his Wife Louisa and their first three children George, Albert & Esau at "Higher Ash".
Mary's first appearance in a census would seem to be in 1861 when she was recorded as being aged 52, living and working in Barrack St, Bradpole as a domestic servant for a 76 year old Joseph Balston. Balston died just a year later and left both Mary and his other servant, Ann Bartlett, legacies of £10.
The next trace we have of Mary is when she's named in the Will of Hannah Clare of Lower Strode (now Great Strode) who she is working for as a servant. Hannah Clare, having no children and having been predeceased by her brother John, was the last of her family line. When she drew up her Will and then died a few weeks later in the summer of 1866 she left many legacies to her friends locally. She also made provision for the poor of the parish, leaving a large sum to be invested so that the profits could be used for "the purchase of bread coals and fuel" which were to be distributed amongst the poor residing in Netherbury, Bowood and Ash ever year at Christmas. She also left money to two local hospitals – the Dorset County Hospital and the Weymouh Eye Infirmary.
She didn't forget the people who worked for her either. She left £400 and a years wages to her servants Elizabeth Old & Mary Prior and several smaller legacies to other staff members and their families. She also left instructions to dispose of many of her personal possessions amongst her employees with Mary being left a bed, bedstead, bolster and pillows, a quilt, six blankets, four pair of sheets, six pillow cases and two suits of mourning.
The 1871 census lists a 65 year old Mary still living at Lower Strode but now as a Dairywoman and Domestic Servant for Henry Saunders Edwards along with his wife, Maria, and their two young children. A decade later she's retired and is living on her own in High St (now St James Rd).
The next entry in the 1881 census and possibly Mary's next-door neighbour is a dressmaker, Sidney Warr, who was also given a legacy of £50 by Hannah Clare and when Mary Prior drew up her own Will in 1883 it was witnessed by Sidney Warr. An 80 year old Mary died just under a year later on 17th March, 1884 and was buried in Netherbury.
In her Will she left her "Bed and bedding and bed clothes" to her niece Sarah Jane Prior and it's tempting to think they were the same items left to Mary by Hannah Clare eighteen years earlier. A nineteen year old Sarah Jane was working as a Domestic Servant to Frederick Wilburn, Curate of Netherbury, and his wife Jessie in 1871 but it hasn't been possible to track her down after that and it's not known where she was living when she inherited her legacy. Mary decreed that her "wearing apparel" should be divided between her three other nieces Louisa Joy, Harriet Crabb and Hannah Kenway. She instructs that the rest of her estate should be divided equally between her four nieces and her nephews John, Samuel, George, Esau, Harry, and Albert as well as "the widow of my deceased Nephew William". It is assumed that all these nieces and nephews are the children of Mary's younger brother Harry. George, Albert & Esau were all listed in the 1851 census and there are baptismal records for Sarah Jane & Harry but it has not been possible to find records for who the parents were of John, Samuel, William, Louisa, Harriet and Hannah and it is possible that they were the children of her older brother Richard.
One thing that supports this idea is the special condition she includes for Albert's legacy
"But with respect to the share of my said Nephew Albert Prior I direct that if at the time of my decease he shall be an inmate of the Forston or any other Lunatic Asylum the share so given to him shall be divided between his Brothers Esau and Harry and his Sister Sarah Jane in equal shares."
This rather implies that Albert, Esau, Harry and Sarah Jane had different parents from the rest of her nieces and nephews but doesn't explain why George was left out. There's a baptismal record for George Pryer, son of Henry & Louisa at Salway Ash on 25th October, 1846 and he's listed in the 1851 census. There could be many reasons George wasn't included in this extra sub-division of Mary's estate and we'll probably never know why.
There is also the possibility that Mary had other brothers and sisters that we don't know about. The sixteen year gap between Mary's and Harry's births is unusually long and the family seems to have remained largely undocumented.
The only other legatee, apart from Sarah Jane, that it has been possible to find any details about is Harriet Crabb. The census of 1881 shows her living in Oldham, Lancashire. From that we know she was born in "Hyde near Bridport" in 1852 and is living with her husband, Albert John Crabb who was born in Uploders a couple of years after Harriet. The 1911 census states they'd had eleven children in total but only six were still surviving: George, Charles, Alice, Ethel, Emma and Albert – all born in Oldham since 1879. Unfortunately it hasn't been possible to identify Harriet's parents.
