Brinsmead biographiesEphraim and Emma Squire
Ephraim Squire was born in
1854 in Buckland Brewer, Devon, the son of Robert Squire and Harriet
Brinsmead. He married Emma on October 22, 1879, in Chetsey, Surrey. Emma
was born Emma Sophia Carden Roberts, in 1854, in Brewer Weedon,
Northampton, the daughter of W. C. Roberts of Aldershot.
Ephraim died on June 15, 1937 in Weybridge, Surrey
followed by Emma, one year later, in 1938. The couple had seven
children: John (Jack) Brinsmead (1881), Charles (1885), Stanley (1887), Clarence (1889), Mildred (1891), Ella Brinsmead (1894)
and Doris (1900).
Jack died serving in the army in the First World War.
Ephraim
Squire's father was a jeweller in Buckland Brewer, a small village in north
Devon to the West of Weare Giffard and St. Giles in the Wood. The earliest
known Brinsmead in the present day line farmed land in Buckland Brewer in the 1600's,
in addition to land in St. Giles. The Squires of Buckland Brewer installed the bells in St. Giles in the Wood parish church. Ephraim
Squire followed his father's calling and also became a master jeweller.
We have two accounts of Emma and Ephraim's wedding
as well as this magnificent old photograph. Click on the picture for a larger
version and the two newspaper accounts.

The
woman in between the bride and groom is said to be Ephraim's mother,
Harriet Brinsmead. Ephraim eventually set up shop in Church Street,
Weybridge, Surrey. No doubt this was as a result of Emma's parents
having lived nearby at Aldershot, and her aunt living in Chertsey,
slightly North-East of Weybridge.
Ephraim also had an interest in bicycles, and appears not only to have
been an enthusiast, but also a small time manufacturer. At the end of
the First World War, Ephraim served as a Town Counsellor for Weybridge.