Michael DANBY
( - 1772)

 

Mary COUCH
(~1738 - 1791)

 

 

m. 18th April 1797 St Andrew’s Holborn, London

Benjamin Couch DANBY

Hannah GURLING

 

bd. 1772, Northallerton

Bapt. Sept 19th 1772, Northallerton
occ. Forensic wig maker/ hairdresser/ perfumier
dd. abt 1832

Buried. Jan 28th 1832, St Bride Fleet Street, London

 

Facts and suppositions:

On his death early in 1832 Benjamin left a fortune of around £14,000 (worth around £743,671 in today’s terms).  In his lengthy Prerogative Court of Canterbury Will Benjamin lays out in great detail how is trustees Simon Saunders and John Hunter are to invest his assets in order that his daughters Anna, Charlotte and Mary Ann may draw upon the dividends.  He further details how the fortune is to be redistributed in the event that anything should happen to one of them.

 

His son Benjamin Couch Jr receives an allowance of a guinea a week (about £55.78) to us and thus fares significantly worse than his sisters, though this hardly leaves him a pauper.  We know than Ben Jr spent time at sea and we can only imagine what the relationship between father and son must have been in order for the bias of his will to have been weighted so heavily against him.  In any case Benjamin the younger was murdered later the same year.

 

Benjamin was apparently a well known wig maker in the Temple and his will indeed tells us that he had several Chambers and residences there.

 

In a family where most of the men were butchers, Benjamin’s profession is unusual.  However, his nephew Henry, the son of his brother Michael was like his uncle a hairdresser.  We do know that Henry lived for a time and was married in London.  Perhaps Henry was sent to serve an apprenticeship with Benjamin  there before his later return to Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

Children:

 

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