Five Ursulas and the Chapel’s Chapple: The Name’s the Same
Ursula Chapple: 1720-1798
Ursula How: 1761-1836
Ursula Herniman: 1796-1797
Ursula Herniman: 1801-1879
Ursula Herniman Berryman: 1828-1889
Jonathan Chapple: 1690-?
Names from
centuries ago occasionally intrigue me, often because they have fallen out of
favor and I am surprised at how popular they used to be. Ursula is one of those
names that always catches my eye, especially after it was used as the
villainess’ name in The Little Mermaid. Now when I see the name Ursula, I immediately
associate it with a large purple octopus/woman. So discovering four generations
of Ursulas in my family tree amused me, as did my discovery regarding Ursula
Chapple’s father.
Ursula
Chapple, my fifth great-grandmother, was born in West Bagborough, Somerset,
England in 1720. Her parents were Jonathan and Ann Chapple. I have found no
record of her actual birth date, but her baptism took place on October 12,
1720. This record, below, shown below, reads: “Ursula, ye daughter of Jonathan
Chapple, minister, and Ann his wife, was baptized October 12 1720.”
I was interested in the word “minister” following my sixth-great-grandfather Chapple’s name. I reviewed the other baptism records on the page, and no other father had such a notation after his name. In present times, minister is a title for a church leader—a pastor. Was it used in the same way in 1720? According to a glossary of religious terms used in the Anglican Church in the 17th century, a minister was a “person having responsibility for leading or co-ordinating preaching, public worship and pastoral care; often used as a general term for a clergyman such as a rector, vicar or curate.” (source below) So it appears that Jonathan Chapple was aptly named: he held some sort of religious job in his local parish—a Chapple in the chapel!
To return
to the Ursulas, Ursula Chapple married William How in Taunton, Somerset, on
November 9, 1746. They had several children, including a daughter named Ursula
How. She was born January 25, 1761. On November 21, 1786, Ursula How married
Robert Herniman in the neighboring town of Lydeard St. Lawrence, Somerset. They
settled in Crowcombe, and had several children, including my ancestor James How
Herniman.
They also had two daughters named Ursula. The first Ursula Herniman was born in 1796, and died a year later. Her burial record is below.
Between two and four years later, the Hernimans had
another daughter they named Ursula in honor of her mother, grandmother and lost
sister. This Ursula was baptized along with her sister Ann on December 20,
1801. One might assume the girls were twins but for the rector’s note that “Ursula
private baptize Nov. 16. 99”. This would indicate that Ursula was born in the
fall of 1799, was baptized at home, and was publicly re-baptized with her new
sister Ann two years later in 1801.
Ursula Herniman married Henry
Butland on June 3, 1822. The young couple moved to Clerenwell in Middlesex,
England and had several children. One of their daughters, Matilda, had the
middle name Ursula, but that was the last generation of Ursulas in the family
line. Ursula Herniman Butland died in 1879 at the age of eighty.
Ursula Herniman’s sister Sarah
named one of her daughters Ursula, thus continuing the tradition for a fourth
generation. Ursula Herniman Berryman was born to John Berryman and Sarah
Herniman Berryman in 1828. She married William Coniber or Conibeare, and they
had several children, but no other Ursulas. Ursula Berryman Conibeare died in
1879.
So for over a century, my family
tree had a succession of women named Ursula. Perhaps by the mid-nineteenth
century, the name had fallen out of fashion. Whatever the reason, after those
four generations of Ursulas, the name never re-appears among my ancestors.
Sources:
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