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| St Ives from the harbour in 2010 |
This is a view of St Ives, taken by me in 2010. It's the harbour at low tide with the parish church in the centre background. From the viewer's point of view, the road to the right of the slipway is The Wharf. I'm hoping that if you select the photo it will come up bigger.
Thomas and Sophia went on to have twelve children, at least three of whom died in infancy. William, born 1839, was our ancestor and the father of Sophie Newland (nee Pearman). The family remained living in the Brixton / Camberwell area of South London, but did return to St Ives for a visit at least once. Two of Thomas and Sophia's children, Thomas and John, were baptised at the Primitive Methodist Church in St Ives (built 1831) on the 13th of November 1836.
John Baker was born in Stutton, Suffolk, a small village not far from Ipswich. His move to St Ives is probably explained by the fact that he was a merchant seaman and probably washed up at St Ives at some point (hopefully not literally!). So far, I haven't been able to go any further back with his family tree.
John and Hannah had at least nine children, several of whom died at a young age. The only two children who moved away from St Ives seem to have been our ancestor, Sophia, and her younger brother William. In the 1841 census Hannah was living at Back Road, St Ives with two of her younger daughters and also her grandson, John Pearman. Hannah's brother, John Grenfell, was next door. Back Road was a couple of streets back from the harbour in the narrow part of town between the harbour and Porthmeor beach. The area is a maze of cobbled streets and fishermen's cottages. Apart from the traffic it's probably not that different nowadays to how it was in 1841.
Hannah's husband, John, and son, William, are recorded as being in Ipswich at the time of the 1841 census. They were staying at an inn there. John's occupation was mariner and William's was sailor. A Google search suggests that there was a trading route between Ipswich and St Ives, starting out from the River Orwell, heading south and navigating round the Thames estuary, then along the south coast to Falmouth and finally round Lands End and up towards St Ives. There were lots of tricky rocky outcrops to negotiate! William was only twenty one at the time of the 1841 census. In 1857 he was awarded his Master Mariner's certificate of competency, enabling him to captain merchant vessels. He was married and living in Bristol.
St Ives in the 19th century was not only a port for the fishing industry. It also served as a port for the export of tin and the import of coal. Some merchant shipping records from 1835-1837 have been indexed. From reference BT112/2 we can see that John Baker undertook various voyages from St Ives. He travelled to Shields at the mouth of the River Tyne aboard the Superior in December 1836. John and his son, William, were both on board the Maria for two voyages to Irvine, Scotland in December 1835 and June 1836. In January and December 1837 John set out for Lyme aboard the Integrity. There were three shorter trips up the coast to Padstow in December 1837 and June and December 1838, I can't decipher the name of the ship. From the records available, it seems that John was in the coastal trade rather than the foreign trade and he was probably put in charge of small trading vessels. He would have had to have a detailed knowledge of the British coastline, tides, rocks and so on.
By the time of the 1851 census John and Hannah were living on the Wharf at St Ives. There were no children living with them and John's occupation had changed to fisherman. By this time, presumably, the coastal trade was decreasing with the arrival of the railways and John may have decided that fishing was a better option for him. In December 1854 he was awarded a pension of £3-8s by the Royal Hospital, Chelsea as a Greenwich pensioner. I haven't seen a mariner's pension before. After his death in 1860 a pension of £2-4s was awarded to his widow, Hannah Major Baker. She died in 1862, twelve years before her granddaughter, Sophia Pearman was born.
Nowadays, Aspects Holidays have an office on the Wharf. They have a webcam which live streams a view of the harbour. You can see the view here. It's best viewed during the daytime and you have to watch a very short advert for St Ives first. It's the view from John and Hannah's window but nearly two hundred years later!