Oulton Broad

[Shirley]

Hi just joined.  I am researching my ancestry and in particular my great grandfather Quantrell Harry Stebbings who was the innkeeper of the Commodore Inn at Oulton Broad in the late 1800s.  I wondered if there were any photos out there of the Inn.

 

 

[BroadScot]

Hi Shirley,

Welcome to the NBN Forum Hopefully some of our more mature/silver surfers will be along soon to help you

Iain

[JennyMorgan]

Hi Shirley, coincidentally I have an old spirit bottle with 'Stebbings' embossed upon it but no mention of the Commodore. Re a snap, I'm sure I have one of the general area, including the pub, but not one specifically of the Commodore, I'll have a look..  

[JennyMorgan]

Best 'general shot that I can find, Commodore is to the right of the tall 'chimbly' about one third in from the left.

[JennyMorgan]

This is a third hand copy of a painting in a book by a man called Colman-Green so is hardly quality. Bang in the centre is the Commodore! Hardly a photogenic pub, the back of which overlooks Oulton Broad. It was also the local watermen's pub so, I suspect, was largely ignored as a holiday destination. 

[Shirley]

Hello all.  Thank you for your replies.  Just wished my parents and grandparents were still alive to ask about my great grandfather.  I seem to be on a mission to find out as much as possible.  Stebbings seems to be a very popular name in the Broads.

 

Shirley

[ranworthbreeze]

Hello Shirley,

Welcome to the NBN forum, I hope that forum members can help you with your research.

Regards

Alan

[Maxwellian]

Welcome from me too

[JawsOrca]

 from me. Hope you learn all you seek.  

[JennyMorgan]

Stebbings is/was certainly a popular name around the Lowestoft/Oulton Broad area. Perhaps great, great granddad was the local milkman?

My father and his father and his father etc.etc. were all wine merchants or publicans. The Stebbings family that my father and I knew were also wine merchants at one time. Going back some time though.

It was Stebbings the butchers that my father regarded as a good friend, no idea if its the same family though. If I remember correctly a Stebbings won 6m on the Lottery, not you was it Shirley?

[Shirley]

Hi Jenny - no I definitely did not win the lottery and my great grandfather wasn't the milkman.  I know he was the innkeeper at the Commodore Inn according to the 1891 Census.  His wife at the time was Harriett but she died and the old rascal seems to have married twice more.  Sadly he had 14 children with his first wife but many of them died as babies.  I guess in those days that was quite common.  Some research through the  Heritage Workshop has said the Commodore Inn and adjoining windmill were demolished in 1902 and they have found information to suggest my great grandfather became a beer retailer at 109 Bridge Street and its  now a wine bar.  All fascinating stuff!!

 

 

 

 

 

[Timbo]

3 hours ago, JennyMorgan said:

Stebbings is/was certainly a popular name around the Lowestoft/Oulton Broad area. Perhaps great, great granddad was the local milkman?

My father and his father and his father etc.etc. were all wine merchants or publicans. The Stebbings family that my father and I knew were also wine merchants at one time. Going back some time though.

It was Stebbings the butchers that my father regarded as a good friend, no idea if its the same family though. If I remember correctly a Stebbings won 6m on the Lottery, not you was it Shirley?

During the war years a man with a slight German accent visits  Oulton Broad, walks into the local pub asking for Stebbings.
"Whven ze cock crowz ze vind from Vwroxham ist chilly jah?" he says to the landlord.
"Sorry bor, yew'll be wantin Stebbings the Spy, two doors down!" replies the landlord!

Welcome aboard Shirley!

[Regulo]

Family trees!!!! My cousin Melanie spent much time researching ours, but came to a grinding halt when she realised all our male ancestors seem to have been named with a combination of Alfred Augustus Enoch. Many A.A.E's and E.A.A's with a few A.E.A's thrown in, totally confused her! Added to that we had a female who produced 7 male children (that she could trace) ALL named Edgar. Most were passed on to other family members, probably due to her mental incapacity. So you can guess which side of the family I take after. 

[Polly]

Oh dear Ray!  Most of my dad's lot were called Robert or Richard with a few Lydia's thrown in for good measure. Mum's lot partly came from Mayo so the transliteration of names from Gaelic and the famine diaspora makes it a bit impenetrable. Now Phill's on the other hand 'came over with the Conqueror' and one was one of the four knights what did for Thomas A'Beckett, but he is posh, eats his fish and chips without the paper.   But uses a plate of course!

[JennyMorgan]

My mum. bless her, was a bit of a Mrs Bouquet. Both her and her sister became quite fanatical about their family tree. Great, really pleased to discover a Royal connection, a Lord Balfour being the father, despite it being a 'wrong side of the sheets' affair. Became more and more keen to gain more information, until they uncovered a skeleton or two in the cupboard, or so they thought, a spot of inevitable, traditional inbreeding, Norfolk & Suffolk coastal style. Their fad soon became a subject that wasn't talked about!  Personally I have never had anything other than a passing curiosity about such things, maybe one day though.

[Polly]

I came across a house in an odd position, just inside a carpet factory gate, and wondered about who lived there. Many years later I discovered that my great grandmother was probably married from there, her brother was the occupant.

[JennyMorgan]

Don't think that any of mine were quite that close! Mum's family tree on one side was very clearly Colby, Bean and Mickleburgh, all from one village, Pakefield near Lowestoft. For well over four hundred years the three families did what comes naturally on a diet of fresh herrings and seaweed, to a point where a Colby married a Colby and so on. Quite how close the bloodline was I don't know, perhaps that was the undiscussed skeleton! 

[Timbo]

Uncle Albert's (My Dad) side of the family were ploughmen and farm labourers. My Mum's side of the family owned the farms. Much inter marriage between the two families (probably where my skills in playing the banjo and my webbed duck feet come from). I have three bundles of letters from Mum's side of the family,the first dated 1835 onwards from Australia. Young Amos has left the family farm in Aylesbury and gone to Australia where he works as a 'cowhand'. His letters home detail the hardships of living in thousands of miles of emptiness as well as the day to day running of cattle on a huge scale including prices for beef, grazing etc. Each letter includes a message to 'mother' that there is 'little hope of finding a wife' as 'there are no prospects in five hundred miles'. I was pleased to note that the final letter which details the several thousand acres that now middle aged Amos owns is signed your dutiful son Amos, his wife and two sons.

The second bundle of letters is from the same family, yet another Amos, a sergeant farrier in the Blues and Royals the dates are obscured but are 1800's and the address given as the Khyber Pass. The paper used is from the 'Temperance Society' but the first letter tells the parents 'not to worry I have not given up the drink but free paper is given should you profess to do so and paper is a valuable commodity here'. Why so valuable a commodity I will leave to the imagination.

The final bundle of letters are once again the same family, once again an Amos. This time they are letters from the front in the first world war. They detail the end of hostilities and Amos' journey back to the French coast ready to leave for England. The last letter details orders to go back into France to help with the removal undetonated ordnance but 'just one more week and I leave for home'. The final envelope contained a photograph of Amos' war grave. Killed clearing the ordnance.

[Polly]

How sad.

[Chelsea14Ian]

Hi Shirley and  from me,as you can see if you need help with info on many things members have the answers.Do you still life in the area,have a boat etc.

PS Jenny is in fact Peter.

Look forward to hearing more about you

Ian

[JennyMorgan]

PS Jenny is in fact the name of Peter's boat!

[TeamElla]

Our family tree was planted by a man from Norfolk who has since returned to his native county.

He comes and admires it from time to time.

The flippin enormous thing is a sycamore and it's siblings populate the entire area, much to the annoyance of my neighbour....

[JennyMorgan]

Rather than sycamore I always thought Norfolk family trees were of a somewhat straighter species !

[TeamElla]

[Shirley]

Hi Ian, sadly I don't own a boat or have ever lived in Norfolk.  I am actually in Hampshire.  My interest is purely to find out as much as I can about my ancestors.  I have managed to get a photo from the Lowestoft Record Office called "sheep roast on Oulton Broad 1891 sponsored by my great grandfather at the Commodore Inn but I have no idea if he is actually on the photo and no living relatives left who might know.