Tempest Family History

For the first 24 years of my life, I opened my bedroom curtains and looked straight across at Peckwash Mill with its tall chimney. We lived at Flaxholme Dairy run by my father, John Bernard Mason Jnr and his wife Phyllis nee Porter. Next door was Flaxholme Farm owned since 1922 by my grandparents, John Bernard Mason Snr and his wife Emily nee Oakden.

For all of my WW2 Childhood we used to walk down the fields, past the signal box, down the lane beside the railway and under a little tunnel. This tunnel took us underneath the main railway line from London to Leeds, all 4 tracks of it, and across the meadow, always full of buttercups. We came to the River Derwent. My father and his 2 brothers used to bathe in the river and it was a good feature of Flaxholme Farm in their opinion. "After a hot days hay-making in the 1930s my father wrote to my mother "I'm going to drown myself tonight!!" On the Flaxholme side the banks of the Derwent were sandy and good for paddling. We called it our seaside. We looked across at the dirty dis-used mill and big boys used to dive from the remains of the sluice gates. We looked at the artificial banks which we knew used to support a little railway track and a train which in the 1890s carried rags in and paper out of Peckwash Mill. There was also a chunk of concrete, we called it our stone table. It was a lovely place to play.

When I married Peter Hargreaves and we lived in Little Eaton, we used to walk past Peckwash Chimney with our 2 sons, Christopher Paul and Robert Alan I would always touch it. Neither my grandparents nor my parents ever mentioned the Tempest Family although we always knew that the Blue Mountain Cottages had been built for the workers in the Peckwash Mill. On starting Family History in 1991 and tracing my Mason Family, my search took me to Lichfield Record Office where I found the Will of my 3x Great-Grandfather, John Mason. Two of John Mason's daughters Mary Mason and Sarah Mason had married two Tempest brothers, John and William Tempest. They lived at Burley House, Flaxholme which they had built in 1828. This Tempest Family, the farming Tempests had sprung from farmers who lived at Burley Grange, on Quarndon Lane in the late 1600s. These Burley/Tempest Families also linked in to the Cockains.

In the years between 1992 and 1993, becoming more involved with Local History, I recorded Little Eaton Memorials and found loads of Tempests. Around this time at Local Studies Library, Irongate, Derby I found an excellent genealogy table prepared by Steven Glover for his Directory in 1829. (see letter below). Using this I was soon realised that my farming Tempests were cousins of the Paper Mill Tempests. I was amazed at the achievements of this family especially when I heard that Peckwash Mill was the biggest Paper Mill in the Country. A second mill opened in Little Eaton called Brook Mill. This mill made all the Jacquard patterns for the Nottingham Lace Trade and all the paper for blue sugar bags. The Tempest Family built and acquired several large mansions in the Little Eaton area. We have Eaton House, Derwent House, Peckwash House and the Poplars.

Given the size of the Tempest Family and their achievements around 1900, it is amazing that nobody has got in touch with me, although my name appears on several genealogical lists. There are only seven families of Tempests in the phone book. I do hope that this study falls into the hands of a local or family historian and it gives them as much enthusiastic interest as it has given me.