Chedzoy, Mrs Sophia

Singer

Collection date: Aug 1906

Area: Somerset - Bridgwater Surrounds

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Mrs Sophia Chedzoy of Puriton (1835-1908): age 70, 2 songs 14 Aug 1906: Sophia was baptised Sophia Wheadon at High Ham church on 20/9/1835, daughter of John Wheadon, labourer and his wife Harriet. In the 1851 census she was listed as age 16, glover.

On 17/7/1859 at High Ham church Sophia married Henry Chedsey, son of Samuel Chedsey, labourer and his wife Betty (Ancestry website reads surname as Chidsey). In fact Henry was baptised as Henry Chedzoy in Stoke St Gregory 13/7/1828, son of single woman Hannah. Henry left home as a young man and went 8 miles east to High Ham, where eventually he married Sophia. The couple then moved 11 miles north to Puriton village, where they raised 5 children. Henry worked as an agricultural labourer and his surname was always spelt Chedzoy until 1901, curiously, when it was Chedzey and that was the spelling at his burial on 23/4/1910. Likewise when Sophia pre-deceased him and was buried on 7/3/1908 aged 70, her surname was spelt Chedzey. The name is very common in mid-Somerset and it is usually spelt Chedzoy.