Welcome to the family website of James Moody & Sons

I do hope you enjoy exploring this website. If you are interested in Basingstoke and it’s families there is a lot of information here.

It is a little ironic that my great-grandfather, James Moody, who figures in the title, is still something of an enigma to me. I have much more information about his children and their families than I have about him. 

For me the most interesting sections here are the diaries of my grandmother Ethel L Butler (nee Moody) and her brother, James Butler Moody, and the emotional correspondence from France to my second cousin, Nancy Powell.

I would like to acknowledge and thank Anthony Evans for putting this website together and to cousins Jo and David Banks, great grandchildren of Mabel Moody,  for all their work on an earlier version.

Enjoy!

Brian Butler

James Moody of Basingstoke was a cabinet maker and house furnisher with a business and home at 17 London Street, Basingstoke. He was born in 1826, the son of James Moody and Phoebe Baker, who were proprietors of the Anchor Inn in Basingstoke.

By 1841 he was a cabinet maker’s apprentice. He married Amelia Hedges in 1850 at Bishopstone Church, Wiltshire. They had four children: Alice Mary Moody born in 1852, Jane Moody born in 1853, Gilbert James Moody born in 1855 and Amelia Hedges Moody, born in 1857. Amelia died on July 10th 1857 aged 33 after a short illness and her daughter Amelia died on August 13th following. James appears to have married Amelia’s sister, Emma Hedges, in Lambeth in the autumn of 1858. They had two children, George Frederick Moody born 1858 (about 6 weeks after their marriage) and Florence Evelyn Moody born in 1860. Both these children died in infancy. Emma died in 1864 aged 34. James married his third wife, Elizabeth Paice, in 1866 in Basingstoke. Elizabeth was born in 1844 in Brown Candover. They had six children:

Ethel outlived her siblings and when she died in 1971, aged 97, she left a large family archive, which we are making available online. This included a large quantity of photographs dating back to the 1860’s, many of which do not have names on the backs. This collection has been supplemented by a smaller collection left by her niece, Nancy Powell daughter of Blanche Moody, who died in 1996. We will be posting some of the photographs on the ‘can you help’ page, and if you are able to identify any of the people we would love to hear from you

Explore the interesting day-to-day events in the lives of family members