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Belchier, John (1682-1707)

Belchier, John

Cripplegate Without, London; joiner (fl.1682-1707)

John Belchier was the son of Edward Belchier, a husbandman of Barford St John in Oxfordshire. On 21 June 1682 he was apprenticed to Charles Maule of the London Joiners’ Company for seven years and made free by servitude on 3 December 1689. By 1692 John was a resident in Cripplegate Without, just north of the City Walls. This was apparently a popular location for woodworking tradesmen as there were forty-nine others recorded there that year including joiners, cabinet makers, chair makers, upholsterers, turners, sawyers, and a looking glass maker. 

Belchier indentured five apprentices through the Joiners Company between 1692 and 1707 of which two are well known. The first was Samuel Jakeman, bound in October 1699 for seven years and made free by servitude in Nov. 1706. Jakeman later established a cabinet and looking glass business and also acted as a minor timber merchant in the Minories near to St. Katherine’s Docks. The other apprentice was John Belchier from Deddington in Oxfordshire who established a cabinet making business in St. Paul's Churchyard. It is likely the Belchiers were related, perhaps as uncle and nephew, since Deddington and Barford St John were adjacent villages. 

The Dictionary of English Furniture Makers states that between 1687 and 1710, a 'John Belcher' supplied work and goods to Boughton House in Northamptonshire for glass, solder, lead & piping to the amount of £3880, and speculates that he may have been the father of John Belchier the cabinet maker in St. Paul's Churchyard (1699-1753). In fact, the John Belcher who worked at Boughton was a plumber and glazier from Kettering with no known connection to John Belchier of the London Joiners’ Company.

Belcher’s name occurs in documents compiled in 1712 relating to the settling of debts owed to tradesmen by the late Ralph, 1st Duke of Montagu who died in 1709 [Boughton Archives, BM1/14].

Sources: DEFM; Joiners’ Company Records; Lindey, ’The London furniture trade, 1640-1720’ (unpublished University of London PhD. thesis, 2016).