29. John and Mary Beale of Worcestershire and Northern British India

Vainer members of the Beale family may claim that the name describes a particularly handsome family. Others are sure that it derives from a specific place in Durham, even though the name is commonest in Dorset and the South. Curley is probably Irish, even if Mac Thoirdealbhoigh (son of a man in the shape of Thor) does not seem to translate naturally... Ireland does have the Curley Islands though. Or it might come from a French place called Corlay, or even be a nickname based on a curlew.

Established researchers of the family are convinced that our link back to the UK is via John and Mary, and the records exist of their birth in the UK and reappearance to marry in India. This being the case, with the usual cautions, my oldest direct ancestors we know about in this part of the family are: John Beal (1766, Wribbenhall, Worcestershire), Mary Hancock (1766, Wribbenhall) and Mary Curley (1798) herself. Wribbenhall is the settlement opposite Bewdley on the Severn.

Bewdley church (my photo)

Bewdley is a picturesque place (its name translates as beaulieu - 'beautiful place'), a market town on banks of the river. My photos are here. The Beale family, thought to be our family, were a significant merchant family, operating Severn trow barges to Gloucester and beyond (and possibly later connected with Kruger, Beale, & Co, merchants of Bristol). Beale's corner, just over the bridge on the Wribbenhall bank, was their home.

Bewdley Bridge (my photo)

Beales Corner, Bewdley (my photo)

Severn Trow Spry (painting by John Sprockett)
Spry is preserved at Gloucester Docks

Gloucester Docks (my photo)

John Beale (1793, Alderminster nr Stratford, Warwickshire) married Mary Curley (1798, Bewdley). My photos of Alderminster are here. Bewdley church was 50 years old when she was christened there. The Telford-designed bridge was built in the year of her birth, its medieval predecessor having been swept away in a flood.

Alderminster Church (my photo)

John had entered service as an apothecary with the East India Company's European Bengal Army in 1817. In today’s terms, the position of an Apothecary in one of the East India Company Armies was somewhere between that of a senior nurse and a doctor. However, as apothecaries had surgical training, a junior doctor is probably the best description. (FIBIS). He was at Fort William, Calcutta the following year with the 59th foot.

Flag of the East India Company (credit)

The couple married in Cawnpore (Kanpur), Uttar Pradesh, India in 1825.

They had twelve children:

• 47.1.1 - Robert William Beale (1826)
• 47.1.2 - Colin Beale (1828)
• 47.1.3 - Helen Augustus Beale (1829)
• 47.1.4 - Alfred Lionel Beale (1832)
• 47.1.5 - Alice Evelina Beale (1834)
• 47.1.6 - ? Beale (1835)
• 47.1.7 - Agnes Penelope Beale (1836)
• 47.1.8 - Ronald Malcolm Beale (1836)
• 47.1.9 - Eliza Matilda Beale (1839)
• 47.1.10 - Frances Emiline Beale (1843)
• 47.1.11 - George Walter Beale (1845). George died in 1846.
• 47.1.12 - Evelyn Augustus Beale (1847)

More on these individuals in Chapter 47. 

 

In 1836, he was at the Medical Depot in Cawnpore; some time around 1850, he moved to the Police Hospital in Calcutta, where he stayed for the rest of his career. John retired from the army in 1857 to Chunar, where he died in 1876. The Indian Rebellion (sometimes called the Indian Mutiny or the First War of Indian Independence) came to Cawnpore in the same year: nine apothecaries were killed.

Crimean War and Indian Mutiny Memorial, by Sir George Gilbert Scott, 1861 (my photo)

This town was founded by Babar, founder of the Mughal Dynasty, in 1525. That empire held the fort 1772 when it was captured by East India Company, who established a depot of Artillery and ammunition.

Chunargarh (Chunar) Fort from across the Ganges (credit)

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