Jane Fea and William Spence

Adapted from a paper by
Graham Simpson
April 2002

Jane Fea, daughter of Thomas Fea of Clivocast, was born 31 Mar 1797. She married William Spence on 13th April, 1815, at Lerwick.

William Spence of Greenfield was the son of Gilbert Spence the second of Hammer who inherited Greenfield in the northern part of the island of Unst, where William was baptized on 3rd September, 1782 (Zetland Families, by Grant).   An account of life on Unst at that time by Sir John Sinclair was published in the Statistical Account of Scotland for 1791-00.
William was sent off to become a surgeon in the British Army when Napoleon was threatening to overwhelm Europe. He obtained his appointment in 1806 and worked his way up to become a Staff Surgeon by 1814 when he was retired on half pay when the war, which reached its climax at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, ended. William must have returned, not to Greenfield in Unst, but to Lerwick where he took up a medical practice. His house there was named Greenfield Place.

It seems probable that William’s partner Catherine Farquhar actually accompanied him to Gibralter or at least to Leith, in Edinburgh, the port of embarkation of many army regiments from the north of England to the Peninsular War. They had two children, Wilhelmina Spence (who married Capt.Thomas Irvine Fordyce, then Robert Robertson. They emigrated to Auckland, New Zealand where she died on 10 Oct. 1885) and Margaret Hay Spence, who married James Simpson in Glasgow.   Wilhelmina looked after her mother until her death in 1856.

William's will was proved in Edinburgh. A relative, Robert Neven Spence, was the writer (lawyer) who prepared the will. His executors were named as “Mistrefs Jane Fea or Spence, my beloved spouse, Gilbert Spence of Hammer, Magnus Sinclair Fea, Surveyor of taxes, Lerwick, David Nicolson of Sa. Hammer and Robert Neven Spence, Writer in Lerwick” etc. The will, written in lengthy legalistic language leaves his house and property in Lerwick to his wife for her ‘liferunt’, meaning it is only for the term of her life and then it was bequeathed to his son and heir or in order, “Gilbert William Spence, Thomas Fea Spence, Jane Fea, Jefsy, Catherine Stafford, Martha Joan and Philothea Spence his lawful daughters and to any others who might be born after his death” etc. He did not include either Wilhelmina or Margaret Hay as his legal children. His property of Greenfield in Unst was under a debt of £500 and that was to be paid out of his estate so it is possible that the debt was in some way a legacy for them but neither of them were resident there at any time.

William and Jane had 12 children:

Jane Fea Spence was born in 1819 and baptized 21 January 1819 in Lerwick. She married her first-cousin, Gilbert Spence, on June 6th 1844.   Three daughters were born. Gilbert died in 1850. She later emigrated to New Zealand where her nephews, Professor Richard McLaurin and Dr.Hector James McLaurin held posts. She lived at Motukaraka for 30 years until she died at the age of 89.

Jessie Hay Spence was born August 4th 1820; married the Rev.William Paterson of Whitness or Cockburnspath in Lerwick, 15 September 1843, and had issue. She died at 72 on 15th Feb, 1892.

Catherine Stafford Spence was born 16 July 1823 in Lerwick and died on North Yell on December 21, 1906, never having married.
Gilbert William Spence was born May 10, 1825, in Lerwick and christened on July 7. He was the heir to Greenfield and his father’s estate.   He married Bridget Mullins.

Thomas Fea Spence was born 18 Feb,1828 in Lerwick and christened 28th Feb. He died there on 22 Nov, 1848 at the early age of twenty.

Margaret Hay Fea Spence was born 27th January 1830, presumably in Lerwick, and died there later that year. She is the only child with three forenames, no doubt to distinguish her from her older half-sister with the same first two names.

Martha Joan Spence was born in 1831. She married the Rev. Robert McLaurin, Minister of Sandsting, near Edinburgh, on March 2, 1862 at Lerwick. They later moved to New Zealand where they both died. It was their son Richard who became the first Professor of Mathematics at Victoria University, Wellington, N. Z., and later President of M.I.T at Boston. Another son was the Chief Govt.Chemist in Wellington.

Edward Hodges Spence was born March 29, 1833, bapt. Apr. 25, 1833 and died 29 March, 1834.

Philothea Fea Spence (Philly) was born in 1834 and died August 18, 1907 in Edinburgh.     Pilothea remained a spinster and was the last surviving daughter. Apparently her sole claim to fame was that due to her efforts the ‘Auld toon clock’ was restored and set up again in the Tolbooth at Lerwick, after a long silence.

William Spence was born 1835, died young.

Ann Spence was born 1837 ? and died young

Elizabeth Spence was born 1839? and died young.

Grant’s Zetland history is replete with the genealogy of the Spence family indicating that it was high on the list of landed Scottish families and in the late 1700's the Spence family was named the fourth in terms of size of landholding on Unst. Grant comments about Dr.William Spence in Lerwick, “that Dr. Spence’s Park was where the Anderson High School now stands. The house of Greenfield was built in 1822. Dr. Spence was a member of the Parochial Board and attended its inaugural meeting on 3rd Dec. 1845.” He was clearly someone of standing in the community.
William died on 19th July, 1849, in Lerwick, Shetland.   Jane died 18 May 1865 at age 68.

Their headstone reads as follows:

“In the Memory of William Spence Esq. of Greenfield,
Staff Surgeon in the British Army
who died 19th July 1849 aged 67,
also his mother, Janet Hay who died October 30th 1834,
aged 85
and the following of his children.
Thos Fea 22nd Nov.1848 aged 20.
Margaret, Edward, William, Ann and Elizabeth
who died in infancy and
Elizabeth T. Paterson his grandchild
12 May, 1849, aged 6 months.”

The five infant deaths are testimony to the high incidence of mortality in children at that period when bacteria were unknown and hygiene was primitive.