Right of the Bosun’s Locker in Falmouth is one of the most interesting of the town’s ‘opes’ (or alleyways), Upton Slip, a particularly narrow ope that runs down steeply from a fan-lit doorway in Church Street. Tucked just behind the Locker, which largely shelters it from the east wind, is a charming, three-storey property known as Upton’s Cottage. 

One grey week in February, I drove down to the wonderful Cornish Archives, Kresen Kernow, in Redruth to search for clues to the history of this special home, named after local smuggler-turned-Mayor, Richard Upton.

Owners Barbara Pearce and her husband James bought the property in November 2015. “The Falmouth civic society believed the houses were built about 1708 but had no evidence. Six cottages were built originally, but four were condemned and demolished in 1959. No. 3 and 4 were saved from demolition by the residents, an elderly couple, who refused to leave.

We had recent deeds and information, but we really wanted to find out more about the older history of the house. Its location, close to the harbour, made us wonder if it was originally a commercial building. And did Captain Upton, who the cottage was named after, ever live there?”

RICHARD UPTON’S COTTAGES

In 1684, Richard Upton, the master of a ship in Plymouth and a successful smuggler, moved to Falmouth with his young family. He had decided to give up his life of crime and offered the authorities in Falmouth information about corrupt Customs officers and frauds connected with the trade in tin. It was a move which led to a successful career in the Customs Service, helped by the announcement of Falmouth as a Royal Mail packet station in 1688, a key strategic role which involved carrying mail and messages to and from all corners of the expanding British Empire. This success eventually led Richard to become Mayor of Falmouth in 1708 and again in 1715.

To find out the earlier history of the cottage and its links to Richard Upton, I studied manorial and estate records for the area, the most useful being a large lease book (Kresen Kernow, archive reference: K123) for Lord Kimberley’s estate containing information on land and property ownership in the area dating back to around the time of the town’s incorporation in the mid-1600s. 

By slowly piecing together names of leaseholders, plot numbers and dates (very slowly, as there was no map, and hundreds of pages of leases, listed in alphabetical order of leaseholders rather than by date or plot number), I was able to sketch a plan of the plots, which were each defined by their position to surrounding leaseholder’s plots and streets, for example: “Plot no.120. Johanna Angood, 1704. Bounded to the north by the Slip, east by Henry King, south by Bolitho and west by Church St.”

The resulting plan pointed to the likelihood that the cottages, at least no.’s 3 and 4, are older than previously believed and were probably built some time between 1659 and 1693. The evidence comes from an entry for a lease to Richard Upton on 2 November 1693, which noted a house already in existence on our plot. As there is no other evidence of a house on this plot of land prior to the cottages, it is most likely that this ‘house’ was the early core of the cottages. The house was referred to as ‘Lillicrap’s house’ (the previous owner and a local developer), and in a later lease of the plot in 1760, the cottages were referred to as ‘Upton’s Lillicrap’s tenement’, implying that the tenement that existed on the plot in 1693 and the cottages were one and the same. There is, however, no evidence that Upton ever lived in the cottages himself, and given that he held leases on several other properties at the same time, it is likely that he sublet the cottages to under-tenants.

HOUSES WITH ‘WORK-A-DAY CHARM’

The cottages are simple and understated, giving the appearance of worker’s houses. And it’s this authenticity that makes them so valuable, as the only remaining examples of the type of houses and cottages which once crowded the waterfront during Falmouth’s first era of real prosperity. They are lasting symbols of the town’s rich history and development as a thriving seaport for international communications in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and of the area’s riverside trade and industry.

From the evidence, it seems likely that no.'s 3 and 4 formed the original ‘core’ of the building, which was later expanded to add no.5 and no.6 (photographs from the 1950s show a slightly higher roofline and a different style chimney, in a different position on the roof) and no.1 and no.2 — which was a walled garden until at least 1802 (as evidenced by the lease book). This theory is also supported by the footprint of the building on a 1773 map of the town, which shows a clear gap between the building and the Slip (where the garden once was). The 1773 map also shows that Bosun’s Locker was not yet built at the time, affording the cottages an uninterrupted view of the harbour for at least 70 years and, possibly, much longer. We know that the Locker was built by 1802, as it was mentioned in William Harvey’s extended lease, and an increase in the amount of land tax due on the plot between 1798 and 1799 may suggest that the cottages were further expanded during that period and/or the Locker was built that year. 

THE CANNIBAL COURT CASE AND OTHER DRAMAS

Deeds, wills, electoral registers, directories, census records, newspaper reports and more filled in the timeline of no.3’s owners and occupiers beyond the 1700s. And newspapers, in particular, provided evidence of the many tragedies and dramas shared by the Slip’s residents over the years, including a young neighbour of the Thomas family at no.3, Elizabeth Gilbert, being witness to an indecent assault on the Slip in 1864, the near-drowning of another neighbour’s boy, nine-year-old Robert Mathews, in 1866 and a drunken sailor who, that same year, fell twenty feet off a roof in the Slip at 1am.

Then, in 1884, Upton Slip was mentioned in the proceedings of the notorious ‘Mignonette Cannibal’ court case. One night in September, one of the harbour police in Falmouth overheard three sailors informing customs officers that they had killed and eaten a young cabin boy called Richard Parker in order to survive after their yacht sank in a storm after crossing the equator. The sailors were rescued and arrested but because of the terrible circumstances of the case, their sentence was reduced to six months in prison. The dinghy from the ship they sailed on was stored as evidence on Upton Slip at marine store dealer John Buckingham’s warehouse, which was no doubt a talking point for the residents.

PRESERVING UPTON’S COTTAGE FOR THE FUTURE

Only 14 years after Mr and Mrs Sedgeman (then aged 83 and 76) of no.3 saved the cottage from demolition in 1959, it was grade-II listed. “When you look at the photos and read the report condemning it, it’s surprising it’s still standing. When we bought it, we had to gut it to do a complete renovation from the roof down to flood prevention works, so hopefully, it will last for many years to come.”

It was a real pleasure to tell the story of this resilient and characterful cottage and to know that it will be displayed in the house for visitors to enjoy for years to come. “Before commissioning the research, we had made a few enquiries of our own, but Rebecca was able to discover so much more. Thank you so much for all your hard work; it is very much appreciated.”

House History Package Details:

Barbara commission the Premium house history package, which includes fifty hours of professional research (including two to three days in local and national archives), and comes with a beautifully designed A2-sized wall print and accompanying printed storybook, including a longer version of the story, a house timeline and a full list of sources consulted, alongside findings, record transcriptions and analysis, and images of all archive documents and material uncovered.

“The package we received was so much more than we were expecting and extremely thorough. The storybook and the file of images contain such an enormous amount of fascinating information and pictures, which we have really enjoyed reading through.

We love the wall print, and when the framers have finished, it will take pride of place in the living room at the cottage.”

Learn more about the Premium house history package: