John Cole born in 1780 married Mary Barker in 1804 and they had six children Benjamin [1805], John [1807], Susanna [1809], Thomas [1811], Christopher [1814] and Edward [1817]. In 1846 John senior and his son Benjamin were joint tenants of 162 acres of land that later became part of Manor Farm and Tommy Cole the son of Benjamin had 29 acres that also became part of the Farm. Five years later the situation was still the same and Christopher Cole was working as a labourer for Tommy Cole who married Sarah Bentley in 1817 and fathered five children, Esther [1818], John Smith [1820], Thomas [1822], Marianne [1824] and Mary Ann [1826].
Esther married John Wilson of Rievaulx in 1841 and they had a son James in 1843 who married Eliza Thewlis in 1872. Their son James Herbert Wilson married Ethel Seddon in 1906 and their son James Harold Wilson born in 1916 became the Prime Minister of Great Britain and later took the title Lord Wilson of Rievaulx. It is not likely that Esther Cole, farmer’s daughter born in 1818 could have imagined that she would have such a distinguished great grandson.
The last direct descendant of the John Cole who was a farm tenant in 1677 was Sarah the daughter of Mary Ann and granddaughter of Tommy and Sarah who married Thomas Ellis in 1865 and died at Mount Pleasant Farm in 1936 at the grand old age of 90. This ended the 260 year tenure of the Coles of Old Byland but as Sarah’s grandson Francis Edmund Ellis still farms at Mount Pleasant Farm the period of the family connection with the village has already extended to over 325 years. Although this section covers the first tenant farming families it is interesting to note that Francis Edmund married Mabel Sturdy whose great great grandfather Cornelius who arrived in Old Byland at the beginning of the 19th century. Another Cole connection was the marriage in 1888 of Sarah Ann the daughter of Sarah Ellis nee Cole to John Thomas Prest and their son Frank was at Reins Farm from 1925 until 1958.
ABRAHAM
The earliest surviving record of this family was the presence of Roger at the boundary perambulation in 1650 and is likely to have been the father of Jane who was baptised in 1670 and he may have had brothers as Francis Abrams married Phyllis Turner in 1662, Valentine Abrams son of John and Mary nee Binks was baptised in 1677 and John and Elizabeth children of James Abrams were baptised in 1677 and 1678. None of the above males were listed in the Hearth Records of 1673 but five years later Widow Abraham paid annual rent of £1 10s for a cottage and garth so it is probable that John, Roger and James either worked as live-in labourers on farms or lived with her.
She paid the same rent in 1700 and the family fortunes had slightly improved by 1717 when jophn Abraham paid rent of £5 13s for a messuage and Mary Abraham paying £5 1s for another one. It is assumed that John son of James was the father of Mary born 1702 and that John [1709] and Isaac [1712] were sons of another John who married Elizabeth Prest in 1707. Isaac married Ann Whitfield in 1740 and they appear to have been childless and John married Jane Hugill in 1742, one of their sons was named Isaac after John’s brother and they had four other sons William [1744], John [1746], Joel [1754] and Jonah [1756]. James Abraham for whom no baptismal record could be found married Elizabeth Shaw in 1715 and they had two sons James [1715] and John {1720] and yet another John Abraham described as a shoemaker married a lady named Mary who gave him three children Robert [1726], Thomas [1738] and Elizabeth [1744].
