Strongman
Samson Besford the strongman had a hobby of collecting mangles. He is featured in a 2015 mural in Sunderland.
Besfords
The history of the Besfords
Curiosities & secrets
Record-breaking trawler skipper
David Besford, the skipper of the St. Patrick trawler, broke the record for biggest landing ever made by a beam trawler at Lowestoft.
Cinema pioneer
George Besford (1871–1938) started out as a shipbuilder, but went on to be a leading figure in the cinema industry.
Medals sold at auction
George Bestford’s wartime medals were sold at auction in 2024. His great grandfather was William Besford, without a ‘t’.
Killed on a railway viaduct
John Besford (1820–1875) was killed by a passing train while working on a viaduct.
Coal miner becomes pub landlord
William Thomas Besford was a miner who became the landlord of The Waterloo Hotel on Queen Street, Amble, Northumberland.
Crop circles
In June 2014, a crop circle featuring a star design appeared in Besford.
Dr Besford’s Aubergine Pickle
Chef Cyrus Todiwala created an aubergine pickle at his restaurant and named it after Dr John Besford, a regular customer.
The hotel with the family name
Samuel Besford (1822–1889) and his wife Mary Ann ran the Besford Family Hotel in Colchester.
Union president’s clock donated to museum
The Ashington Mineworkers Federation presented Jack Besford with a grandfather clock in 1939. It was donated to Woodhorn Museum in 2019.
Besford family in Northumberland
Explore the history of the Besford family in Northumberland through a
series of articles written by John Hornsby. These are also linked from the
family tree, which traces back to
James Besford, who was married in
Rothbury in 1679.
John William (Jack) Besford (1891–1975)
Jack Besford began work as a miner on his 13th birthday, and went on to become a leading trade unionist.
David Besford (1863–1954)
David Besford was born at Cowpen Colliery, where he began work aged 12. His work as a Methodist lay preacher led him to meet his wife.
Joan Besford (née Matthews) (1921–2019)
Joan Matthews was born in Haltwhistle, Northumberland. She married David Besford four years after the start of the Second World War.
Dorothy Jane (Dora) Besford (later Hornsby) (1915–2018)
Dora Besford spent two years training to be a teacher at City of Leeds Training College, and returned to teach at Hirst North Girls School.
David Besford (1919–2015)
David Besford worked for the Cooperative Wholesale Society in Newcastle, where he met his future wife Joan Matthews. He drove a fire engine during the Second World War, and later joined the Civil Service.
George Besford (1871–1938)
George Besford started out as a shipbuilder, but went on to become a cinema manager.
George Besford (1893–1966)
George Besford was born in Amble, Northumberland. He lost his leg in the Battle of the Somme, and later worked in the lamp cabin at Woodhorn Colliery, Ashington.
John Hornsby’s Recollections
John Hornsby is a grandson of Jack Besford, and grew up in Newcastle in the 1950s and 1960s. He has written about the period from his earliest memories to the start of his adulthood.
They include Saturday teas around the table at 550 West Road, the Northumberland Miners’ Association house his grandparents lived in, seaside holidays, and his first Newcastle United match at St James’ Park in September 1960.
Discover your Besford story
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Famous Besfords
Dr John Besford
A Harley Street prosthodontist, Dr John Besford wrote Good Mouthkeeping and co-designed a denture system that won a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in 2004.
John Charles Preston (Jack) Besford
Jack Besford was a dentist and amateur swimmer, who became British and European swimming champion.
Debby Besford
Debby Besford’s photographs of Norfolk youth culture in the 1980s and 90s are held by the Museum of Youth Culture. She teaches photography in Norfolk and Cambridge.
Pat Besford
Swimming correspondent for the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail, Pat Besford wrote the first Encyclopaedia of Swimming in 1971.
Places
Discover the
places associated with the name Besford, in many cases linked to
Besford in Worcestershire and
Shropshire.
Besford Court
Besford Court is a gothic English country house. It is a Grade II*-listed building, located in Besford, Worcestershire.
Besford House
Built as a private house in 1893, Besford House at Shrewsbury became a boys’ home in 1911 to keep children out of the workhouse, and is a family home again today.
Besford Church
One of the few timber-framed churches in England, St Peter’s at Besford holds a pre-Reformation rood screen, Jacobean altar rails and monuments to the Harewell and Sebright families.
Besford Water Tower
Built in 1926 to supply Besford Court, the water tower served as a Home Guard observation post in the Second World War and has since been the subject of a planning application.
Besford Station
Besford railway station served Besford, Worcestershire, on the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway, from 1841 to 1846.
Besford family in Australia
The
family tree of the Besfords in Australia can be traced back to
David Besford (1897–1991) and
Thomas Besford (1899–1994), who emigrated from England to Australia in the 1920s.
David Besford (1897–1991)
David Besford was injured fighting in the First World War. He and his family emigrated from the UK to Australia in 1925, where he worked as a mines inspector.
Thomas Besford (1899–1994)
Thomas Besford was born at Chevington Crescent, Northumberland. He was a miner who first relocated with his family to Kent, and then in 1928 to Australia.
Ted Besford
Ted Besford moved to Australia with his parents at the age of 10. He went on to be an Australian rules footballer and cricketer.
Margaret Alice Dodds (1901–1986)
Alice Dodds married Tommy Besford in 1925. They and their children emigrated to Australia in 1928.
Rhoda Barkwell Websell
Rhoda Websell married David Besford in 1920. They and their children emigrated to Australia in 1925.
Unsolved mysteries
Help us get to the bottom of the unsolved mysteries of the Besfords.
Besfords in the late medieval period
Records from the Hundred Years War (1337–1453) include two men named John Besford, the first being a Clerk on Overseas Service in 1382, and the second an Archer in 1441.
John Hornsby explains the records at The National Archives and the link to the village in Worcestershire.
There is a gap of 97 years between the record of John Besford serving as an Archer in France, and the start of Parish Registers, which would potentially provide the link to the earliest Besford traced in the modern era, James Besford in 1679.
Besfords at war
Wounded on the first day of the Somme
George Besford was hit by shrapnel at La Boisselle on 1st July 1916, and lost his leg.
Lied about his age to join up
David Besford enlisted in the Royal Naval Division at 17. He fought at Gallipoli, and was gassed and shot in France.
Fought in both world wars
George Bestford fought at La Boisselle in 1916. In 1942, as a South African major, he was captured at Tobruk and spent the rest of the war as a prisoner.
Joined the ATS
Joan Matthews enlisted in the Auxiliary Territorial Service, the women’s branch of the Army, in September 1942. She served in London and then in Dingwall, in the north of Scotland.
Ship’s boy at Jutland
A butcher’s boy from Heaton, Charles Besford was on board HMS Monarch at the Battle of Jutland in 1916.
Conscientious objector
David Besford refused to fight in 1939. His tribunal was reported in the Newcastle papers, and he served in the National Fire Service instead.
Two months to Egypt
Harry Hornsby sailed for Egypt with the RAF in January 1941. To avoid the Mediterranean, his troopship went round the Cape of Good Hope.
Besford weddings
A small wedding “under the circumstances”
Joan’s mother wrote to Joan’s aunts in Haltwhistle that the 1943 wedding would be small “under the circumstances”, meaning the war. The aunts took it another way and were relieved when the first baby arrived eleven and a half months later.
Introduced by his sister
Dora Besford met Harry Hornsby through his sister Eleanor, who taught with her at Hirst North School. They married at St Hilda’s, Jesmond, in 1948.
Married before the lock-out
Tommy Besford, a miner at Woodhorn Colliery, married Alice Dodds in April 1925. They later left Northumberland for the Kent coalfield, and then for Australia.
A Salvation Army wedding
Alec Besford played the tuba in the Salvation Army band in Ashington. In 1971, aged 69, he married Jane Johnson at the Salvation Army Hall.
Met during national service
Janet Besford’s son Albert married Constance Lindsay, whom he met while doing his national service in the RAF.
Besfords at sea
Overboard in the nets
Peter Besford, skipper of the Lowestoft trawler Suffolk Kinsman, went overboard in the nets during a rescue in 1961 and swam back to the ship.
To Canada on a former troopship
George and Isabel Besford sailed to Canada in 1947 on the Aquitania, still fitted out as a troopship.
Record landing at Lowestoft
David Besford skippered trawlers out of Lowestoft for Colne Shipping. His record catch in 1985 came after 13 days at sea.
Glasgow to Boston
John David Besford, a cabinetmaker trained in Glasgow, sailed for Boston on the SS Corean in 1907. He later worked as a carpenter in Ontario.
Thirty-five days at sea
In 1928 Tommy and Alice Besford sailed for Australia on the RMS Orama with their son Alf, aged two.