Grubb Family Tree

From the The Annual monitor... or, Obituary of the members of the Society of Friends in Great Britain and Ireland, 1895.

Jonathan Grubb, 86, 17 6 mo. 1894.

Birmingham. A Minister.

Jonathan Grubb was born at Clonmel, Ireland,
on the 12th of First month, 1808, his parents
John and Sarah Lines Grubb, removing to
England, under what they believed to be a
divine call, when he was about twelve years of
age. They resided first at Bury St. Edmunds,
and afterwards at Stoke Newington and Chelms-
ford, finally settling at Sudbury, Suffolk, where
their remains are interred.

Early in life he imbibed a taste for natural
history pursuits, and became a very ardent orni-
thologist. He was also a very clever botanist,
and retained his interest in these subjects until
late in life. He could tell the name and detect
the notes of almost every English bird; and when
over eighty years of age could tell one of his
grandchildren who was taking up the pursuit of
botany, the English and Latin names of every
plant she could find, and indicate the locality
and soil where each was most likely to grow.

In early life his health was not very robust,
and on one occasion, when he was travelling alone
in Ireland, he was taken seriously ill, and was
laid up for some time at a country inn, in the
north of that island. His parents were at the
time residing at Chelmsford, and his mother, on
receiving intelligence of his illness, immediately
started with her daughter Hannah to go to him.
It was in the old coaching days, and they had
engaged and paid for their seats in the Holyhead
coach from London, and were about to start on
their long journey, when his mother said to her
daughter, " Hannah, I cannot go, I am forbidden
to go" and in spite of the daughter's remonstrance,
sacrificed the fares, and returned to Chelmsford.
Her son, Jonathan, arrived at Chelmsford by the
next coach after her, and would have been driving
into London just as she was leaving it, had she
proceeded on her journey.

Jonathan Grubb was apprenticed to the
milling trade, and when his time was out he took
Lexden Mill, near Colchester, where he carried on
business successfully for some years. During
this time he married Elizabeth, daughter of the
late Edward Gripper, of Layer Breton, Essex ;
but the union was not destined to be a long one,
his bride being removed by death, after little
more than a year of married life. This bereave-
ment came as a great blow, and so unsettled him
that, after a year of travel, during which he
placed his business under the management of a
Friend named Abraham Wallis, he gave up his
mill, and returned to reside with his parents at
Sudbury. While there he entered the bank of
Alexanders and Co. as clerk, afterwards becoming
the joint manager, with his brother-in-law, the
late W. D. King, of their Sudbury branch,
retaining the appointment for a good many years.

In 1844 he married again, his second wife being
Elizabeth, daughter of the late Thomas Burling-
ham, of Worcester, and afterwards of Needbam-
Market, a union that lasted nearly fifty years.
He purchased a small country residence about a
mile from Sudbury, surrounded by a large garden,
at the time pretty much unplanted, together with
about eight acres of rich pasture land in the Stour
valley, and kept a few cows, in which he always
took a great interest. He was most industrious
in the garden, spending all his available time,
after his duties at the bank were over, in planning
the laying it out, planting many of the trees
and shrubs with his own hands ; and after the
place had had time to develop, it was much
admired. Every gravel walk was bordered by a
row of the yellow crocus, and when these were in
bloom in the early spring, it was no uncommon
thing for people to walk miles to see them. Up
to an advanced age he continued to work in his
garden, which was always the picture of neatness,
clipping the hedges and shrubs, mowing the
lawns, and pruning the fruit and other trees,
during the intervals between his frequent journeys.
Shortly after his second marriage, his gift in
the ministry was acknowledged by his Monthly
Meeting, and he began to travel with certificate,
sacrificing a portion of his salary at the bank, in
order to be more at liberty to do so. About the
year 1860, he felt a call to labour among Friends
in Ireland ; and that he might be able to devote
himself to what he believed to be his duty in this
respect, he found it necessary to resign his post
at the bank. His journeys in Ireland became
very extended, and he often remarked that he
believed he had visited the home of every
attender of Friends' meetings in that island.
He also held many public meetings in Ulster,
inviting not only the Protestants, but the Koman
Catholics as well, to attend them, somewhat
to the alarm of many Friends, who feared
that the party spirit prevailing there might
cause disturbance ; but such was never the case,
his meetings invariably passing off peaceably.
He paid prolonged visits at the house of the late
John Grubb Richardson, of Moyallen, and took a
great interest in the industrial colony of Bessbrook,
a manufacturing village of 3,000 inhabitants,
without a public-house and without a policeman,
of which J. G. Richardson was the originator and
proprietor ; and he afterwards placed his eldest son
there, as apprentice to the linen industry
carried on by the firm. He also heartily entered
into the many other philanthropic efforts of
this well known Friend and his wife.

He felt it his duty at this period of his life,
to plead for more liberty in our meetings for
worship and other devotional exercises, and his
views were somewhat too advanced to suit a
portion of the more conservative Friends. On one
occasion at Eichhill meeting, three dear Friends,
who looked on him as an innovator, thought it
right to bear their testimony by refusing to shake
hands with him after meeting ; whereupon one
of his most ardent admirers, to make up for their
apparent coldness, rushed up with open arms and
kissed him, the encounter knocking off both their
hats and causing much amusement. He became,
however, on the whole very popular with Irish
Friends, his name being cherished in many places
even now as a household word.

His journeys in England were not much less
extensive, as he visited with certificate in every
quarterly meeting, in many of them more than
once, and nearly every Friends' meeting in the
United Kingdom can claim to have had one or
more visits from him.

His Gospel labours were by no means
confined to his own Society. When not away
from home with certificate, he was in the habit,
very frequently, of driving round to the villages
and country towns in the eastern counties, and
holding meetings in the dissenting places of
worship, and sometimes, when permission was
granted, in the school houses attached to the
Established Church. He was almost invariably
well received and made welcome, and there are
comparatively few villages in Suffolk and the
northern parts of Essex, at any rate of those that
can boast a dissenting place, of worship, where
his name is not well known and remembered.
In these driving tours he was generally accom-
panied by his wife, who always went provided
with a large bag of temperance and other tracts,
which they freely distributed as they went along.
While he was never an advocate that his
own Society should copy the modes of other
religious bodies, believing that Friends had their
own place to occupy and work to perform ; and
while he sometimes found it his duty, during the
later years of his ministry, to utter a word of
caution against excess in the exercise of that
liberty in our meetings, which earlier he had so
eloquently pleaded for, he took a great interest
in the missionary work of the Salvation Army,
frequently appearing on their platforms in
Sudbury and elsewhere, and became a large
contributor, in proportion to his means, to the
social work initiated by General Booth in his
u Darkest England " scheme.

In conjunction with his wife, he very
frequently visited the Homes, Refuges, and other
reformatory agencies in London and its neigh-
bourhood, where he would plead earnestly with
the inmates to receive the love of God in Christ
Jesus ; so much so, that they were frequently
all reduced to tears ; and in his own neighbour-
hood he always took a deep interest in raising our
fallen sisters, and was the means of many being
induced to enter suitable " Homes," some of whom
remember him with love, as the instrument by
which they were rescued from a fate almost
worse than death.

His influence, socially and in private life,
had always been strongly used to promote the
cause of temperance, and the misery and degrad-
ation he witnessed in connection with the work
above mentioned, made him a very powerful
platform advocate of total abstinence. He used
to say that he was compelled to fight against the
drink, which was dragging humanity down faster
than all the agencies for good were able to raise
it. Consequently he rarely refused an invitation
to address a temperance meeting, even when its
acceptance involved a long journey ; and his
eloquent addresses in this cause led many to
resign the use of alcohol.

The issue of the " Reasonable Faith "
pamphlet, about ten years ago, caused him some
uneasiness at first, as he feared that the advance
of modern thought might lead to schism amongst
Friends. But while the views put forward in
that publication never commended themselves to
his own mind, he later felt able to give the right
hand of fellowship to ail who accepted the love
of God as manifested in Christ Jesus ; realizing
that truth is many sided, and that it is not
essential that we should all see alike as to the
exact way in which a loving Father can forgive
and receive back his erring, but repentant children y
provided they are in earnest to know His will
concerning them, and by divine help to do it.

About the year 1870, he undertook in
conjunction with a Friend from Ireland, a visit
of love to the inhabitants of the Shetland Islands,
during which he experienced a good deal of
hardship and rough travelling, which his fine
constitution enabled him to bear much better than
many younger men would have done. He found
an open door among all three sections of the
Presbyterian body ; and during the remainder of
his life, he always retained a deep interest in the
Shetlanders and their well being, and in conjunc-
tion with his wife endeavoured to help them by
securing, among Friends at home, a sale for the
Shetland shawls that are produced by the clever
fingers of the wives and daughters in those
islands.

A little later, he visited the inhabitants of the
Vaudois valleys of Piedmont, where also he found
an open door, and was enabled to hold meetings
in most of the Waldensian churches in that
district. The reminiscences of these journeys
formed the staple for many a lecture and address
during the closing years of his active career.

In the year 1864 he was visited with a severe
illness, from which more than once it seemed
hardly likely that he would recover. Indeed, in
the Fourth month of that year his eldest son
was telegraphed for from Bootham School to
receive his parting blessing. But he was finally
permitted to rally, and by the advice of the late
Dr. Hodgkin, who paid him a consultative visit
voluntarily and free of charge, an operation was
performed which was completely successful, and
he was eventually restored to a full measure of
physical health and strength, which continued
until he had reached an advanced age. During
the period of convalescence after the operation
he was persuaded by Ins doctor that it was abso-
lutely necessary for him to take a little alcohol
in some form. He complied for a short time, but
very soon gave it up again, saying that he could
not take it, even under such circumstances, and
continue his public ministry; and it was noticed
that his strength came back quite as fast when
not using it.

In the early part of 1884 his wife had a very
serious ilmess, which, while it lasted, caused him
intense mental anxiety ; and though she was
happily restored to a fair measure of health, he
never quite recovered his former mental buoyancy
and vigour, and did not attempt any further long
journeys, though he continued for some time
longer a frequent visitor at places in his own and
the neighbouring county, as well as in London.

In 1889, after addressing a meeting in one
of the smaller meeting-houses in Essex, he
stumbled when leaving the platform and fell over
a bench, fracturing one of his ribs. He was able
to return home, and under the care of his doctor
soon recovered from the injury ; but the shock
told on him, and a decided failure of both mental
and bodily power was noticeable from this time.

His country home near Sudbury was some-
what isolated, and in 1891 it seemed best that
he and his wife, who was also getting feeble,
should remove to Birmingham, where they would
be under the immediate care of one of their
daughters. The property was therefore sold, and
in Tenth month of that year they settled at
•Clarendon Eoad, Edgbaston. After the move he
was for some time a tolerably regular attendant
at Bath Row Meeting and occasionally at Bull
Street, and frequently took more or less part in
the vocal exercises of the meetings. He and his
wife also much enjoyed the kind visits paid to
them in their new home by many of the Bir-
mingham Friends, and it was always a great
comfort to them to be under the loving care of
their youngest daughter and her husband, and to
see so frequently one of their sons, who was able
to dine with them once a week or of tener. But
Jonathan Grubb did not altogether take kindly
to the change, which can perhaps scarcely be
wondered at after nearly fifty years in his old
home. He was, however, frequently reassured by
his wife, who never doubted that the change had
been for the best.

His wife's little remaining strength seemed
to give way during the great heat experienced
during the second week of Eighth month, 1893.
and she sank rapidly after it, being taken away
on the 19th of Tenth month in that year, at the
age of eighty. He did not seem to feel the
separation quite so much as was expected, his
failing mental powers probably preventing the
full realization of his loss. But his mind became
rapidly more clouded, and after a slight paralytic
seizure in First month, 1894, while on a visit at
the house of one of his sons, it failed completely,
and it was thought best to place him under the
care of Dr. Pierce, of York. He was therefore
removed thither in Second month, where he
remained until his death. While there, he was
frequently visited by some of his children, whom
he was generally able to recognize, but his mind
remained a complete blank in most respects.
On the 14th of Sixth month, he was attacked by
bronchitis, followed by pneumonia, and passed
peacefully away on the 17th, after only three
days' illness, in the eighty-seventh year of his
age.

His remains were interred beside those of
his wife, in Witton Cemetery, Birmingham, on
the longest day of 1894, amidst a large concourse
of Friends.