James Evans, Auctioneer

James Evans was born on 20 Jun 1827, the third son of Richard Evans of Pendeford Hall.

He is listed in the 1861 and 1871 census as an Auctioneer, living with his mother in Tettenhall. His father died in 1859 and this seemingly gave him some opportunities to progress his career.

The ‘downsizing’ of the family ambitions had already started in the early 1850’s when his father was struggling with the simultaneous blows of low agricultural prices and the collapse of the coaching business and in particular the demand for large stables of coaching horses, no longer needed with the advent of the railway. With his two older brothers, both married, and one abroad, by the early 1850’s, it seems to have fallen to James to be the main agricultural manager for his father. The Wolverhampton Chronicle at the time mentions him in the context of the vegetable production on his father’s Pendeford estate, winning prizes and, for example, donating hundredweights of vegetables to the South Staffordshire hospital. This commercial awareness in turn seems to have led to James to partner with William Fereday to form ‘Fereday and Evans’, Auctioneers proclaimed in the same journal 1860, a few months after his father’s death.

Wolverhampton Chronicle 4 Apr 1860

Wolverhampton Chronicle 4 Apr 1860

Like many ventures pursued by him and his six brothers there is little record of this auctioneering business going very far. The Chronicle relates a flurry of auctions and activities in 1860 and 1861, but then nothing. In 1871 James is still living at Tettenhall with his mother, now aged 44 and unmarried.

James died the next year 6 Apr 1872 leaving his mother executor of his estate, valued at less than £600.

Sources and Notes

  • William White Fereday was born in Penn 1826 and would have been a contemporary of James. The London Gazette records his bankruptcy on 18 Jul 1862
  • His birth is recorded in the Evans Bible

 

Last updated on 16 April 2023 by JJ Morgan