Person:Sarah Dixon (33)

Sarah Dixon's origins have yet to be established for certain. If the age quoted when she died was correct then she was born around 1746.^[3]

Sarah's first confirmed sighting is on 25th February 1775, when she married at Great Wymondley to Thomas Primet. They went on to have eight children baptised at Great Wymondley between 1776 and 1787, including twins in 1781. Their second child died as a baby and one of the twins died when she was only two years old.

Sarah's eldest son, John, married in 1798, and Sarah's first known grandchild was born the following year, although both John and the baby died early in 1799. In 1801 Sarah's daughter Sarah married, and more grandchildren followed from later that year.

In 1803, Sarah's daughter Ann died as a young woman. Sarah therefore outlived four of her eight children.

Sarah was buried at Great Wymondley on Christmas Day 1822. She was said to be 76 years old. Her burial records that she had lived at 'Spring Hall' but it has yet to be established where this was. There is today a Spring Cottage on the western edge of the parish near the border with Hitchin and the source of the River Purwell, and Spring Hall may have been in that area.^[4] She had lived to see at least 25 grandchildren born in her lifetime, albeit some of these had died young. Thomas outlived her by six years.

1.   Church of England. Parish Registers of St Mary's Church, Hitchin. (Hertford: Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies).

   1748 / Born Oct 16, Bapt Nov 11 Sarah Daughter of William & Esther Dixon, Cordwainer

2. ↑ ^2.0 2.1 Burials register, in Church of England. Parish Registers of Great Wymondley. (Hertford: Hertfordshire Archives & Local Studies).

   BURIALS in the Parish of Great Wymondley in the County of Hertford in the Year 1822
   No.	Name	Abode	When buried	Age	By whom the Ceremony was performed
   21	Sarah Primet	Spring Hall	25th Dec[embe]r	76 y[ea]rs	W. Lax

3. ↑ One possibility is that she was the Sarah Dixon baptised at Hitchin on 16th October 1748, daughter of Esther Dixon, formerly Tomalin, and her husband William Dixon, a cordwainer. This Sarah had a brother, John, baptised in 1744, who is one candidate for the John Dixon who married Esther Ellice at Great Wymondley in 1776. Both Sarah's and John's marriages were witnessed by a Stephen Rowley (who does not appear to have been a regular marriage witness), suggesting they may well have been related. However, the John Dixon who married Esther Ellice was probably the John Dixon who had been an apprentice in 1766, making a baptism in 1744 perhaps too early. In the absence of further evidence, it is therefore considered uncertain whether the Sarah who married Thomas Primet in 1775 was the child baptised in 1748 or not.
4. ↑ There was an enclosure map prepared for the parishes of Great and Little Wymondley in 1811, which should be checked to see if it labels Spring Hall. Needs to be confirmed at Hertfordshire Archives.