John Ellis, a Gentleman & Yeoman Farmer, Dissenter, of Flixborough, Lincolnshire

At the North East Lincolnshire Archives, Grimsby, there is a Copy-Will for John dated 19th of May 1792 (ref. SHEFF/A/7/2). There are various beneficiaries including his brother Uriah Ellis whom he bequeaths 2 freehold tenements in Burton  [upon] Stather and residue of goods. There is a mention of a Poor Thomas James of Crosby and bequeaths him 2 guineas and 3 guineas to Mr. Wesley’s preachers in the Gainsborough circuit.

John Ellis occurs in the Dissenter’s Certificates for Crosby, Flixborough , etc., years 1773-1787.

His brother Uriah Ellis left a Will and a copy of it is at said archives (ref. SHEFF/A/7/4 or SFF/A/7/4), dated 12th Jan., 1825, he being A Gentleman of Flixborough and owning his own chapel.

He bequeaths his wealth and properties to various members of his family, e.g., his wife Mary, sister-inlaw, nieces and nephews, two nephews named James Scott and Urian (Uriah) Willson, for items of furniture after his wife’s death. U. Willson to have cottage and two tenements and seven cottages adjoining them etc., The Darby Closes, etc., and house and carpenter’s shop, a chapel lately erected adjacent to it. “He is to allow the people called Primitive Methodists to occupy the chapel for a payment of £6, “.

At the said archives there is a Chirograph of a fine concord (ref. SHEFF/A/7/8) year 1832. It mentions James Scott and Uriah Wilson (Willson) and his wife Mary. regarding properties: a messuage and Chapel and a workshop in Darby, Burton upon Stather.

On a 25″ scale O.S. Map for Flixborough year 1885/6 it cites a Methodist Chapel (Wesleyan) near the Parish Church vicarage. It cites another “Chapel” in another part of the village but no religious denomination is mentioned.

Crosby is mainly today regarded has a suburb of Scunthorpe, but in the 19th century it was a small village and it is not far from Flixborough, it just an hamlet in the 19th and before centuries.

In Crosby (Scunthorpe suburb now) there was a Primitive Methodist Chapel. However, it is not clear if John Ellis’s (Will dated 1792) had a chapel and was the chapel in Fixborough or Crosby, making note he was documented has a “Dissenter of Crosby and Flixborough” be he an early Wesleyan or another faithful Christian following.

His brother Uriah owned a chapel recently built c.1823-5 and in his Will he has a clause in favour for the people called the Primitive Methodists to pay a fee for his chapel, he being of Flixborough but he held land and property elsewhere, e.g., Darby area of Burton upon Strather where today there is on a modern map a Darby Road.

It is a probability that the dissenter family of Ellis and later other related family members became Primitive Methodists and the newly built Chapel in their ownership via Uriah Willson (Wilson) was built c.1825 in Burton upon Strather, but was the first one built where the centenary one is or in the Darby Closes area down Darby Road?.